Domestic workers organizing in Latin America: case studies from Mexico, Costa Rica and Uruguay

• In Event: Vulnerabilidades y resistencias: trabajadores/as latinoamericanos en tiempos neoliberales

Abstract

Until quite recently, domestic workers were considered unorganizable because their work is largely unregulated and carried out in private homes. This has changed during the XXI century as domestic workers have become more visible in the globalized care economy and forged international labor movements. Domestic workers’ organization in Latin America dates from the first half of the twentieth century. Their current landscape is rich and varied and includes associations, cooperatives, unions, national federations and a regional confederation. This paper compares experiences of three Latin American countries: Mexico, Costa Rica and Uruguay. Mexico has over 1.2 million domestic workers; their work is largely unregulated and characterized by colonial and patriarchal relations. The Centro de Apoyo y Capacitación para Trabajadoras del Hogar, founded a national domestic workers’ labor union in 2015; although the members recognize that unions have lost ground in Mexico, they believe that the union offers them the best means towards regulation of their work and recognition of their rights. In Costa Rica the Asociación de Trabajadoras Domésticas has spearheaded campaigns for labor and migrant workers’ rights; recently it opened offices in Nicaragua, reflecting the transnational dimension of domestic employment and political organizing. Uruguay has been showcased by the International Labor Organization as an example of good practices in domestic employment, because of its labor and social security laws and their enforcement and the Sindicato Único de Trabajadoras Domésticas that represents domestic workers in tripartite wage negotiation.

Author

• Mary Rosaria Goldsmith Connelly, Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana/Xochimilco