By Dr Bertie Ramcharan
Institutions of social dialogue can play an important role in nation-building – especially in plural societies. Guyana would be well advised to give urgent consideration to the establishment of such an institution. The example of South Africa is one of the most telling in this area. In this essay we shall highlight the features of NEDLAC, the National Economic Development and Labour Council. NEDLAC was established in law through the National Economic Development and Labour Council Act, Act 36 of 1994. It has a unique role and status in the promotion of national cohesion in South Africa.

As apartheid was ending and the new, democratically elected, government was taking over

Dr Bertie Ramcharan

in 1994, South Africans realised that their society had deep divisions and fault lines, that labour relations had been catastrophic in the past and that trade policy had to be drastically re-oriented. They would, they concluded, have to institutionalise cooperation for a new South Africa. Institutionalised social dialogue was needed to help undo the damaging legacies of apartheid and address the challenges of economic performance, more especially with reference to growth, job creation and poverty.

In South Africa recently, we interviewed Professor Raymond Parsons of the University of Pretoria, an authority on NEDLAC. He has noted that “NEDLAC was intended to provide the socio-economic dimension of the reconciliation and nation-building to which President Mandela was strongly committed” South Africans therefore decided on the establishment of NEDLAC as the vehicle by which government, labour, business and community organizations would seek to cooperate, through problem solving and negotiations, on economic, labour and development issues and related challenges facing the country.

NEDLAC conducts its works in four broad areas, covering: (i) public finance and monetary policy; (ii) labour market policy; trade and industrial policy; (iv) development policy.

It has a Development Chamber, a Labour Market Chamber, a Trade and Industry Chamber, and a Public Finance and Monetary Policy Chamber. Government departments, organized labour, and organized business participate in all four chambers. Community-based organizations have a legal right to participate in the Development Chamber but in practice also participate in the other three chambers. There is an annual summit of partners, an executive council, and a management committee.

Upon commencing its work in 1995 NEDLAC set itself five objectives that shaped its agenda in the next decade and a half. These were to: (1) Promote economic growth, participation in economic decision-making and social equity, (2) Seek policy to reach consensus and conclude agreements on social and economic policy. (3) Consider all proposed labour legislation relating to labour market policy before it was introduced into Parliament. (4) Consider all significant changes to social and economic policy before it was implemented or introduced into Parliament. (5) Promote the formulation of coordinated policy on social and economic issues. From the outset it was acknowledged that in order for the negotiation process in NEDLAC to succeed it was crucial to place the emphasis on securing agreement. Every effort would be made to negotiate agreed policies.

NEDLAC was conceived as an agreement-making body rather than an advisory one. Nevertheless, it was recognized by all participants that the NEDLAC process was not supposed to be a substitute for Parliament. Whilst agreements could be reached between the social partners, such agreements, to be binding, required Parliamentary debate and adoption. It is of crucial importance, however, that the search for agreement took place within NEDLAC, where the social partners were present.

An external review of the NEDLAC process between 1995 and 2006, conducted by Professor Edward Webster of the University of Witwatersrand, concluded that NEDLAC had deepened democracy by creating new labour market institutions that had included constituencies previously excluded from the policy-making process. In the process of building these institutions a remarkable generation of social entrepreneurs had developed networks of trust. The NEDLAC had provided an opportunity for the four constituencies of organised business, government, organised labour and the organised community, to shape the content, sequence and pace of a range of economic and social policies before they were debated in Parliament. This had improved the quality of decisions, built political bases of support for the reform strategy and channelled political conflicts within democratic institutions.

South Africa, Professor Webster underlined, had chosen in 1994 the policy option of consultation and negotiation beyond the parliamentary actors. This policy process of drawing non-state interest groups into policy formulation and governance had played a central role in promoting good policy practices. As the ILO has noted, “The best solutions arise through social dialogue in its many forms and levels, from national tripartite consultations and cooperation to plant-level collective bargaining. Engaging in dialogue, the social partners also fortify democratic governance, building vigorous and resilient labour market institutions that contribute to long-term social and economic stability and peace.”

Professor Webster made the following assessment: “NEDLAC’s major achievement in the first 11 years of South Africa’s democracy is its cost-effective contribution to the sustainability of the reform process. This has deepened democracy, created new labour market institutions and contributed to long-term economic and social reform.”

For several years now Guyana has had a log-jam in the development of a system of governance that attracts trust and confidence across the society at large. Different ideas have been advanced to break this log-jam. It may well be that the way to go about this is to establish by law a Guyana Council for Social Dialogue (GCSD) which would have competence and Chambers similar to that of NEDLAC. Government, labour, business, and community organizations would participate in the chambers, where good faith efforts would be made to reach agreement on issues of political, economic and social policy and on strategies for alleviating the plight of the poorest. This would represent a new inclusive approach and spirit and remove the feeling by opposition forces (whoever is in opposition) that they are being steamrolled. Trust and confidence could be injected in the management of political, economic, and social affairs.  Parliament would remain the final decision-maker, but issues would not go to it before they have been debated and negotiated in the GCSD.
A new approach such as this might help to take us forward in trust and confidence instead of the divisions that currently characterise our society. It would be an act of the highest patriotism for a bill to be moved and passed urgently for the establishment of a Guyana Council of Social Dialogue along the lines of South Africa’s NEDLAC.