Why is the trade union view against the mainstream?

In this case, the use of gaze or strategy is indifferent. This view is contrary to the current for several reasons. One, because it's against neoliberalism. Two, because it is contrary to the union view of the majority of trade unions in the West. And three, because in Euskal Herria there is another trade union majority, ELA and LAB, very committed to the national and social reality, and because their union activity can become the axis and stimulus of a new model of struggle, able to change the current power relations. Except for exceptions, in the political and trade union world this is not taken into account and that is why this view also runs counter to the current trend.

The subtitle mentions three concepts: class, territory and new alliances.

These three areas are fundamental to the consolidation of the new model of struggle. On the one hand, this Basque trade unionism bases its daily activity on a class perspective. Rather than the legitimacy and support of the institutions, we must seek the closeness and legitimacy of the workers, and that is what they do. Of course, neoliberalism is hegemonic and sometimes lost, but that is pedagogy, struggle and confrontation.

I would also like to highlight the territory, because in recent years the syndicalism of ELA and LAB continues to grow, also in Navarre; what is happening in this territory is very interesting, UGT – 25% now and 36% in 1993 – and CCOO moves, and ELA and LAB move forward. On the left is often discussed between the local and the global, and authors such as [David] Harvey say that you have to fight for the place you occupy, that to rise to the spatial scales it is very important to politically and socially complete the space of each one.

What are we missing? Alliances, that's what we don't have. In the 1990s there was a meeting between the two unions, very referential and with great force, but it was suspended. What if this process had continued? That is what I put on the table at the end of the book; and that is also the aim of the book: to resume that trade union majority, taking into account all the difficulties.

He mentions the great setback that neoliberalism has brought to the working class, but in the Basque Country this does not seem to be important. From the political point of view, the parties that support this neo-liberalism win tenderly. Look at the PNV.

A psychiatrist friend says that neoliberalism is perverse and I agree. Perversity is not only bad, but it is also unalterable from within. Neoliberals think that reality is theirs and that there is no other reality. [Margaret] Thatcher clearly said: “There is no alternative,” and they have managed to consolidate this idea in some spaces, even in the main syndicalism. They once asked him what his greatest achievement was and he said clearly: “That socialdemocracy has accepted our program.”

A person who learned economy with me just said to me: “But Joxe, don’t you see where the reality is? Don’t you see that you’ve gone to the mountain?” This is a prevailing thought, and so I answered: “Mine is the loser’s point of view, but I still have hope.”

You talk about the success of the PNV, and yes, it has been, but to have an absolute majority in Parliament you have to agree for the first time with two forces and not one. But the good situation of the PNV does not come only from its result, but it has a privileged situation because the PSOE and the Sortu want to reach an agreement with it. Sortu, for example, has approved the budgets of the Council of Álava, which do not have a vision of change. Why doesn't EH Bildu say they're not good, but they accept them? That would be more pedagogical. However, although it is not politically efficient, EH Bildu and Podemos have more parliamentarians than the PNV.

On workers' rights, and in order to put them in time, how far has it gone?

Graphically, we have reached the earlier stage of capitalism, the hardest. Theodore Roosevelt, who was president of the United States between 1901 and 1909, said about the accumulation of money and the economic power of the rich: “Cursed barons!” Today it is impossible to imagine a politician of the system saying these things. Economist Tomás Piketty analyzes in his famous book [Le Capital au XXI e siècle and believes that we have returned to the 1940s in terms of inequality.

After the Second World War, the welfare state was built in Europe. This was the result of various phenomena, including the Cold War, but also of the trade unionism struggle. In this struggle between labor and capital, at what stage are we now?

Now trade unionism is lost. He sees that he can't achieve the goals of yesteryear with his usual tools, collective bargaining, etc., but he doesn't change his behavior, and he's trapped. The Spanish trade unionism, for example, CCOO and UGT, are absolutely trapped. Germans and British, for example, have a lot of economic resources and do something. UGT and CCOO have nothing, state aid is fundamental to their survival. It is in the interests of political and economic power that they exist and maintain them, but as vindictive subjects they are dead.

Gender, the environment, multiculturalism and anti-racist attitudes… You say that classical unionism has not dealt with them correctly and criticises itself.

The lack of recognition of the gender struggle in the Fordism era has been one of the main strategic errors of the syndicalism. She agreed to leave women out of the labour market, relegating them to home and to their families, as well as to their exclusion from work, for example, that with the same work she would earn less pay. Those of my age have known it. Nancy Frasser, who has addressed this issue in depth, says that social democracy expelled women from her project. I therefore see it clear that trade unionism must regard the gender women’s movement as a leading ally.

The issue of the environment must also take account of a centrality, trade unionism did not take account of the fact that this economic growth would plunge the planet. On the subject of climate change, this is very clear, and those who deny it are very few. Now we will have to see what happens with the arrival of Donald Trump.

As for the ethnicity perspective, [David] Harvey states that capitalism has used space to create and dominate differences among workers: race, religion, language... In the United States, however, a part of Luther King's unionism and anti-racist movement had a strong alliance.

It proposes the union unity between ELA and LAB to promote social sovereigns. Why now?

Because the offensive of neoliberalism is harder than ever in recent years. For example, in the last legislature the PNV reached an agreement with the employers and the trade union minority to reject the trade union majority. That is last summer. Lehendakari Urkullu said that the unions do not have the legitimacy to claim the political and social space, but that they have to limit it to the workplace. Nothing like that has never happened. That is a false syndicalism. Changing political and social conditions has been one of the axes of the history of trade unionism. What happens? They have realized that through the elections it is not possible to change the union model, because here they dominate ELA and LAB. So what? If not, they use others to change the rules and the majority unions are not visible.

Especially in recent years, the PNV is making a special effort to approach entrepreneurs, it is their brand image. The neoliberal image of the PNV is seen above all in fiscal policy, it should not be forgotten that it was condemned by Brussels in the case of "tax holidays". The tax burden in the Basque Country is seven points below the European Union average of EUR 6 billion, compared with Navarre 1.6 billion. It is also clear from the budgets. How is the deficit controlled? Cuts in the health and education departments, the largest.

From there, in the book you also come to mention the national desertion of the PNV.

The NIP is within a neo-statin logic. Its main objectives are to extend the competences with greater legal certainty than is now the case, always within the limits set by Madrid. I'm not deducing anything, that's what they say. There is no alternative plan. In this logic, they propose negotiation and what is agreed at the table leads the citizens to accept it or not. Citizens have nothing to do in this scheme. Some want the PNV to go to Maltzaga, but the PNV makes its alliances with the systemic forces of the State, with the PSOE and pp, and in the trade union sphere, if possible, with UGT and CCOO. Urkullu made it clear that, for a new political phase, there is no need for reform of the Constitution and not for reform.

So if the PNV does not want to go to Maltzaga, why is it striving for the deaf to have to reach a historic agreement with the PNV? There are no conditions for this. In the document Euskal Herria bidean Sortu pointed out that its task was to change the institutional map. What does that mean outside the electoral logic? And you might think that Maltzaga is used as a pretext for giving priority to the institutional map.

In the book, you say that Maltzaga's road is not worth it. Why?

Because the PNV does not want to go and, therefore, there are no conditions to go. We know that national processes have to be done starting from the bottom, taking into account society, but we cannot talk about the national process without analysing neoliberalism. It can be an academic construction, but neoliberalism is at the center of the national debate. What to do after studying it? That's another debate, but it's there and it has to be in the diagnosis. There are sovereign approaches that do not make a single mention of neoliberalism: that we must start from the bottom, among all, with good will… So what, that reality is eliminated and it is already? All this needs to be looked at carefully, especially in view of the extent to which trade union reality can contribute to changing relations of strength. And that's where we put the ALS and LAB action unit.

Does the dynamics of Zion Esku Dago, for example, want to put aside that reading of neoliberalism?

I am not going to go into that. All that is done at the lower level is fine, it's an accumulation of capital for the future.

In Catalonia, however, its independence process is taking place in the idea of Maltzaga.

Yes, it is, but Urkullu and the PNV do not seem to be very much in agreement with what has happened. It cannot be denied that theoretically the idea of Maltzaga is an option. But why has this process happened in Catalonia? Surely, because Pujol's party has changed. In the Basque Country, reality is not that. That is why I say that, in this first phase, the accumulation of sovereign forces should be done without the NIP. Other phases will be needed, and there will be a need for all the Abertzales.

On which axis should this activity be carried out?

ELA and LAB are unions of different history and culture and, therefore, the path to this process would be the following: two unions and a strategy. The axes of this convergence would be a compatible union model, a left-wing practice consistent with everyday life and a clear sovereign process that clearly identifies who stands for it and what issues it will address.

ELA has already proposed to LAB a stable partnership that would affect three areas. One, the trade union area: it is about designing what is an effective response in collective bargaining to provide an adequate response to the labour reforms that have taken place, especially in 2012. Two, the social field: to prepare proposals and mobilizations against neoliberalism. Three, the political framework: to draw a sovereign project that is articulated around the social model.

Why do you think the ELA-LAB action unit is not being complied with?

There are two problems. Every union has its culture and its ways, because if we weren't a single union, and we weren't. We see, for example, collective bargaining in a different way. Both parties have also blurred their differences with regard to labour reform, which has not been adopted. But the main obstacle to convergence is that the institutional priority of the political agenda must be abandoned, assuming union and social autonomy at all levels. Gramscik say and I agree: we must fight on both fronts, social and institutional, and that struggle is dialectical. What does this mean? Contradictions will sometimes arise between the two fronts that need to be managed. It's about not being subordinate to each other.

At the moment you do not see the Left Abertzale – what you call ENAM – in that option.

If it doesn't change the way it's organized, because there's Sortu, LAB and Ernai, and in the documents, they've made it clear that strategy and political leadership is going to be taken by Sortu. In addition, in the last elections we have seen EH Bildu’s effort to reach agreements with the PNV. On the other hand, the critical and unitary position of ELA and LAB in the assessment of the Government of Navarra is a satisfaction.

Have you talked to LAB about these issues?

It's not my business to talk about that, but I said it a long time ago: two institutions, ELA and LAB, and the only strategy. In our time we did not succeed.

The book is critical of the way in which classical unionism has addressed gender, the environment and multiculturalism. What place do social movements have on this path towards social sovereignty?

It will be necessary to guess what kind of alliances should be made with those who work with gender, the environment and multiculturalism or with the other social movements. The question is how to balance all these political alliances well. And it's not about doing what the union says, it's about the union needing freedom to say and do what it thinks. In any case, we must be clear that the struggle is the most effective way to weave these alliances, that the struggle to change society is essential. Neoliberalism increasingly uses the concept of “anti-system” to delegitimize the struggle: yes, we are opposed to this system and we want to change the relations of force.

And in the current Basque Country do you see such a process possible?

Convergence of ALS and LAB? It is not possible, it is compulsory, and if there is no accumulation of forces it does not exist. I do not understand why it is said that a new relationship of strength is needed and that the potential of Basque unionism is not valued. I take advantage of the demonstrations to be with our militants and they know that the situation is very harsh, but they have motivation and enthusiasm. I dedicated the book to them: “To the women and men of the fourth generation of ALS, for their strong struggle for the Basque working class.” One of the most beautiful things about my retirement has been to see how the situation has changed in the last ten years and yet the strength and potentiality of our people. Neoliberalism reigns, OK, in the world and here, but it is not invincible.