Global union federations and international framework agreements: Knowledge exchange and creation

International Framework Agreements negotiated between Global Union Federations and multinational companies are a major innovation which bring collective bargaining to an international level. We focus on the role of the union negotiators and analyse two cases, drawing on studies of innovation processes in business organizations. We identify types of learning processes and the exchange and creation of knowledge, and examine relations inside international trade union networks. We find that two conditions are necessary to develop an innovatory role: international unions must coordinate exchanges between different communities, holders and creators of specific union knowledge, and must also facilitate the dissemination of knowledge by maintaining the regularity and quality of exchanges between network members.