Technology improvements and global trade has decreased the power of labour in the economy, and this trend will continue.
The current economic cycle is turning, and unemployment will soon rise. The last decade has increased wealth inequality to obscene levels, and inflation will soon make this worse. Like the US, Australia will soon see real poverty increase to scary levels.
As the cycle turns, unions may yet see a resurgence.
But...
Technology continues to march on. Machines now generate more wealth than human labour does, and machines keep getting better.
If "0" is stone age and "10" is fully automated "android economy" we are passing "7" and accellerating to "8".
When we reach "10" labour is worthless and Capital is all.
Will we adapt as intelligent beings, or will we follow our natures?

Will we ever reach a point in society where crime falls to a point where we can finally disband the Police force and the Courts? I think not.

The days of all Workers' rights somehow being universally protected and respected haven’t arrived yet and until that’s the case, there will be a reason for Unions to exist.

If workers want Unions to be more relevant it’s up to them to elect better quality representatives – just like they should be more selective about their Members of Parliament (where I notice secret ballots are still not permitted).

In the early 80's I studied Industrial Relations at Uni. The 1st thing they taught was that the first objective of any organization was to maintain their own existence even at the cost of their members. This is clearly a case of the creation controlling their creators.

This piece of wisdom can be applied to both sides of the industrial fence. The only master now is profit and both corporations (inanimate creations) tend to dictate the terms the only god is profit.

Snr Victorian is partly right about the industrial environment has changed not least by globalized capital. Capitalism flourishes by ‘consolidation’ (getting bigger) however union growth is limited in that it needs to be local to be relevant to all members. Unfortunately it is only when big expensive issues like Work Choices that the benefit of unions is most obvious.

What doesn’t seem to be addressed by Passey is that back in the old days businesses were limited by their size, trade barriers and therefore the ability to move ‘off shore’ for manufacturing. Trade unions know that if a union is too aggressive in demands the controlling bean counters will simply pack up and move to where labour or laws are the least.

The only unions with any sort of real power are those who cover organizations that are anchored to Australia mining, construction, public sector etc.

I worry about enterprise unions in that they too will be subject to capital manipulation too. Tragically what is indicated is a winding back of liaise faire capitalism on a global basis or both the environment and the whole capitalist structure collapse under it’s own complexity and competing interests. It won't be communism either I suspect something far worse.

Ozandy

The whole history of capitalism has been to develop technology at the expense of labour. (This is the basis for Marx's argument that there is a tendency for the rate of profit to fall.) In the past unions have adjusted and built or re-built. Why is today any different to 100 or 150 years ago?

I also disagree that machines create wealth. They transfer the embodied human labour within them. It is workers who create wealth. In fact, the less workers there are makes the workers who remain to turn on and run the machines even more industrially powerful. And it makes those workers who build the new machines very powerful too.

examinator, you say:

"Trade unions know that if a union is too aggressive in demands the controlling bean counters will simply pack up and move to where labour or laws are the least."

Globalisation is an old phenomenon. Marx and Engels in the Communist Manifesto identified this systemic drive of capitalism to expand around the globe. I think the argument about moving offshore is overstated.

The stock of foreign direct investment in Australia stands at about $1.5 trillion. It is growing at about $180 bn a year. The stock of Australian direct investment offshore is just under $1 trillion, and it is growing by almost $130 bn a year.

The trickle down theory union leaders have adopted - what's good for the boss is good for workers - is the problem, not workforce restructuring or the threat of moving offshore.

dovif2 says:

"The union just have not looked after the rights of their workers enough to warren memberships, they are always looking at what can the union official receive and which ALP seat they can get after an election."

I agree that is one expression of the trickle down theory. Opportunistic careerists have been a problem for the workers movement since it first began to stand candidates for Parliament. Now almost every senior union official seems to be a careerist, either in their union leadership role or their desire to be bumped into Parliament.

I am not going to be popular in this thread but here gos
I am union till death.
An activist too.
And from the right of the movement.
Once born in fact to be from the very left.
Unions will survive in fact they will thrive.
But we must never hide our heads in the sand, tell it like it is.
WORKCHOICES a dreadful act by a now dead government.
However UNIONS let workers down, did filthy agreements with labour hire , just because they feared AWAs.
Right now, gee it hurts but it is true I fight for justice daily.
Passy we could find such fault in EVERY union but.
The darling of the left has construction casual laborers, the modern slave laborers.
BUYING their own PPE.
Those lucky enough not to pay have got one shirt, nothing more in three months!
They get for that first day a shirt they paid $25 for.
It has the name and phone number of the employer on it.
OH yes I got the money paid back, I pretended I did not know each had been handed a membership card from that Union, fill it in or you do not have a job.
I pretended it did not matter they are another unions coverage, mine.
And that the insults I faced did not matter.
In truth each of those poor bloody casuals on getting a full time job have asked, not been poached, to join my union.
Some who wear union shirts should not be in a union office with a mop and bucket in their hands.
We must regain the passion for fairness in the workplace, and recruit only the best to serve our reason for existing members.
Oh after all those years of working in construction, being in every union on site it pays of ,my membership is growing.
If we remember we owe respect to our members, loyalty and understanding even when we can not help we will see growth .

Belly, you say:

"Oh after all those years of working in construction, being in every union on site it pays of ,my membership is growing.
If we remember we owe respect to our members, loyalty and understanding even when we can not help we will see growth."

I agree. Even the CFMEU is not immune from the conservative pressures of the rest of the unon movement.

For example Carmichael, who led massive and successful strikes in the 60s and 70s, was one of the architects of the class collaborationist Accord and because of his respect among workers for the successful campaigns he had led, also the chief seller of the Accord to militants.

Militants in the current environment are not immune from the pressure to not only compromise but trade off conditions and tightly control the members and squash wild cat strikes.

One of the argments Tom Bramble makes is that is why it is improtant for a small socialist group like socialist alternative (300 or so members around Australia) to attract militants to it to help their socialist edcucation and join in the struggle to re-build unions and unionism over the long term. That includes building a network of rank and file militants in unions and across unions committed to rank and file control and militant action on wages, conditions and jobs.