Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Trade unions and occupational health and safety in comparative historical perspective: a comment on South Africa and Britain

2024; Volume: 30; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.62380/ohsa.2024.30.1.1

2226-6097

Arthur McIvor,

HIV/AIDS Impact and Responses

No AccessTrade unions and occupational health and safety in comparative historical perspective: a comment on South Africa and Britain A McIvor A McIvor1 https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8907-3182 Affiliations 1University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, United Kingdom Published Online:1 Mar 2024https://doi.org/10.62380/ohsa.2024.30.1.1https://hdl.handle.net/10520/ejc-ohsa_v30_n1_a5SectionsPDFView Full Text ToolsAdd to favouritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditGMailOutlookCopy LinkMendeley AboutAbstractIn this paper, prepared for a keynote lecture to the International Commission on Occupational Health (ICOH) conference held in November 2023 in Durban, I explore the historical relationship between trade unions and occupational health and safety, comparing developments in South Africa and the United Kingdom (UK). The focus is on mining and I address the following questions: What impact did trade unions have, what was their relationship to occupational health and safety, and how did this change over time? I first argue the case for the central importance of trade unions and the progressive role they played, historically, in occupational health in the UK as 'guardians' of workers' bodies, critically examining the so-called 'trade union effect'. I then discuss the distinctive racialised nature of trade unionism in mining in South Africa and the role of the unions in occupational health. The powerful role that the whites-only Transvaal Miners' Union and the Mine Workers' Union played in occupational health is examined, and how the labour movement colluded in the tragedy of the silicosis and tuberculosis disaster amongst black miners in the twentieth century. 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Imagining Memories in Post-Apartheid South AfricaNew YorkPalgrave Macmillan2012org/10.1057/9781137011480 Google Scholar Previous article Next article FiguresReferencesRelatedDetails Volume 30, Issue 1 | Mar 2024 Downloaded 0 times AccreditationDepartment of Higher Education and Training (DHET)LanguagesEnglish InformationCopyright © 2024, Mettamedia (Pty) Ltd:All rights reservedKeywordstrade unionsmininghealth and safetySouth AfricaBritainPDF download Disclosure The authors confirm that the manuscript has been read and approved by all named authors and that there are no other persons who satisfied the criteria for authorship but are not listed. The authors confirm that they have given due consideration to the protection of intellectual property associated with this work and that there are no impediments to publication, including the timing of publication, with respect to intellectual property. Ethical conduct of research The authors state that they have obtained appropriate institutional review board outlined in the Declaration of Helsinki for all human or animal experimental investigations. A signed informed consent document has been obtained from all participants included in the study.