Globalization is a comprehensive process taking place on several societal levels, yet with an increasingly interwoven economy as prime mover. The process is driven by conscious actors, states and transnational corporations. Among the 100 largest economic units, 51 are corporations, 49 are states. The result is huge differentials of power and distribution of goods. The problems cannot be handled within national state frames only. This raises the question whether there are actors that may be a counteractive force, a ‘historical subject’. The project shall investigate the international trade union movement, as this is most directly facing the corporations and has the relatively strongest organization among present social movements. Questions to be addressed are: 1) Under what circumstances may national trade unions transfer resources and authority to a supernational federation? Is internationalism governed by interest and/or by an internationalist ideology? What role do national traditions of organizing and policy play? 2) How are global unions reorganizing themselves in order to tackle the new global capitalism? Do traditions from the global North linger on, or are there openings for the new movements in the South? 3) Which factors have made transnational organizing on grass root level possible, within corporations or via comprehensive campaigns where other civil society organizations participate? Have the trade unions been able to reach out to new groups, such as immigrants? From University College Dublin participate Roland Erne, an industrial relations scholar with a Swiss background, from Dublin City University, Sabina Stan, a social scientist with a Canadian-Romanian background, and from University of Nottingham Andreas Bieler, a political economist with a German background. Norwegian participants are human geographer Ann-Cecilie Bergene, and historians Idar Helle and Knut Kjeldstadli (group leader).

It became clear that we were not able to reach all aims listed in the original project description. Yet, the work has resulted in one book and two special issues of scientific reviews. In addition, there are a series of articles, and a finishes PhD thesis.

Globalisation is a comprehensive process taking place on several societal levels, yet with an increasingly interwoven economy as prime mover. The process is driven by conscious actors, states and transnational corporations, and characterised by huge differentials of power and distribution of goods. The problems cannot be handled within national state frames alone. This raises the question whether there are actors that may be a counteractive force, a ‘historical subject’.

In order to link detailed empirical results to wider developments in line with the method of post-holing, a conceptual basis is absolutely essential. Hence, we had to focus on how to conceptualise the wider dynamics of interaction between agency and structure within global capitalism. Globalisation has not only constrained labour movements, but it also provided them with new opportunities, new strategies. Hence, a focus on class agency, understood in a broad way, is absolutely crucial for understanding the possible ways ahead. At the same time, human beings do not make history in the circumstances of their own choosing. Hence, the structuring conditions of global capitalism around (1) the dynamics of competitiveness, (2) the tendency towards crisis, and (3) the outward expansion of capitalism along lines of uneven and combined development need to be taken into account when analysing class agency.

The analytical focus on class struggle, defined broadly to include struggles over issues such as gender, ethnicity as well as areas beyond the workplace and the direct employee/employer relationship, is crucial in combining agency and structure. Class struggle is the moment when agency meets structure, when labour meets the structuring conditions of the capitalist social relations of production. Class struggle is the process in which labour identities are formed and transformed. It is the moment when structuring conditions are being confirmed or changed. Hence, it is through the prism of class struggle that we can best analyse labour’s responses to global restructuring. Whether different labour movements engage in relations of transnational solidarity is not pre-determined by the structuring conditions of the capitalist social relations of production, but ultimately depends on the outcome of class struggle.

Importantly, the finding of an empirical analysis based on this approach cannot be generalised. The approach should be regarded as an analytical framework, which can be used for different empirical case studies. The class agents in play and the particular aspects of the structuring conditions of capitalism as well as the dynamics of class struggle need to be investigated for each case study separately, linking the empirical details to the general dynamics. Establishing general, law-like patters in a positivist understanding of social science is not the objective.

In sum, through the method of post-holing, the collective project has come up with a general understanding of the current dynamics within global capitalism as well as a multitude of empirical cases about innovative responses by labour movements to pressures of restructuring. The theoretical framework with its focus on class agency and struggle has thereby provided the conceptual tools to combine detailed empirical findings with wider general observations.