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NEWSLETTER 20, Dec 2005
Inside a National CCC:
Austria
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The Clean Clothes Campaign is an international campaign, consisting
of a loose, informal international partner network of NGOs,
unions, individuals and institutions in most countries where
garments are produced, organisations in consumer countries,
CCC "projects" or "project groups" in
several garment producing countries (Eastern Europe, India),
an international secretariat (IS, based in Amsterdam) and
Clean Clothes Campaigns (CCCs) in nine European countries.
These CCCs are autonomous coalitions consisting of NGOs (consumer,
research, women's, fair trade and youth organisations, solidarity
groups, churches, etc.) and trade unions, each with a coordinator
and a secretariat. CCC coalitions can be found in Austria,
Belgium (North and South), France, Germany, the Netherlands,
Spain, Sweden, Switzer-land and the United Kingdom.
The Olympic "gods"
demand fairness in a Vienna Play Fair at the Olympics
action, June 2004. |
Although the European CCCs share a common aim and cooperate
on joint projects, they each have their own flavour - due
to their composition, history, cultural context and style.
We'd like to share with you the workings of the different
campaigns. First in this new series is the Austrian CCC,
the Clean Clothes-Kampagne.
Working together
The Clean Clothes-Kampagne (CCK) was launched in 1997. Among
the founding members were women's organisation Frauensolidarität
and development NGO Südwind Agentur.
CCK supporters sweating for justice
at the Vienna 2005 Marathon. |
For the last four years, Südwind Agentur has hosted
the secretariat for the Austrian campaign. Stefan Kerl,
the national coordinator of the CCK, is based in their Vienna
office. Being based within an organisation, as opposed to
having an separate campaign secretariat, has benefits for
the CCK. For example, CCK can rely on Südwind for technical
and organisational support.
The Austrian coalition consists of 19 organisations (see
box). Unions in Austria are not officially part of the campaign
due to reductions in union international departments, although
the trade union NGO "Weltumspannend Arbeiten"
has been involved. The Play Fair at the Olympics Campaign
in 2004, a collaboration between the CCC, Oxfam and Global
Unions, contributed a great deal to increased cooperation
and support. The Olympics Campaign was the first time the
CCK worked closely together with the federation of trade
unions, which resulted in a very strong and big campaign,
with good media coverage. In June 2005, the CCC European
Coordination Meeting - where national coordinators meet
to discuss strategy and exchange information three times
a year - was hosted by the Austrian union ÖGB and received
considerable attention in the Austrian media.
All member organisations, together with CCK activists,
are invited to monthly coalition meetings to discuss structural,
strategic and international issues. Participants do not
vote during meetings, but build consensus. Decisions about
which international topics and activities should be taken
up within Austria are taken at these meetings and are based
on the connection to Austria (for instance if Austrian brands,
or brands known in Austria, are involved). Other volunteers,
activists and trade unions as well as interested consumers
from Vienna, are invited to an action meeting that follows
the coalition meeting. Twice a year the CCK has a longer
meeting - the "enlarged meeting" - where there
is more time available for in-depth discussion of specific
topics.
Marathons and house parties
"The CCC, together with the fair trade movement, is
a pioneer in consumer campaigns. In the last year Greenpeace
also took up the issue of consumer power as a tool to pressure
companies and developed their web-platform www.marktcheck.at
- of course in cooperation with the CCK", said Kerl,
CCK coordinator.
The CCK engages in a variety of activities to convey the
message that working conditions in the production of Austrian
clothes must be improved to the Austrian public. Among the
most eye-catching CCK actions are those related to the Vienna
City Marathon. Every year, the CCK takes the opportunity
of this international sports event to raise awareness about
the working conditions in the sportswear industry. In 2005,
over 300 runners donned CCK outfits. Tchibo, the sponsor
of the marathon, was targeted by CCK actions. CCK held a
protest action at the entrance to the marathon, receiving
a good response from the runners and considerable media
attention, as well as two threats of lawsuits from the marathon
organiser.
As the CCK has a strong base amongst young people's organisations,
(street) theatre plays and parties are part of Austrian
campaign work as well. The CCK holds house parties: You
are invited round to a friend's house for a basic awareness-raising
workshop with a couple of other people and someone from
CCK. You look at labels in clothes, the wardrobe of the
host, talk about buying clothes and working conditions,
play a game about the amount of travelling clothes do -
and end with signing up to join the CCK of course!
Experience
In general, considering the size and number of inhabitants,
the CCK gets quite some support in Austria. It appeals to
young people, and has a strong activist supporter base and
growing urgent appeals system.
The CCK has considerable experience of working with the
media, and generally succeeds in getting coverage. The CCK
strategy is to make the media recognise and remember the
campaign, for instance by regularly sending out press releases,
so that in the end the media will proactively approach the
CCK if they are looking for news. The CCK feels that urgent
appeals, outcomes of research, and joint campaigns are good
tools for getting media attention.
Measuring the impact of, and support for its work is central
to the Austrian campaign. The CCK considers it important
to know how many people sign petitions and support campaigns,
and work hard to update their urgent appeals supporter database,
address database, media database and newsletter database.
Looking to the future
Recently, the Austrian campaign has given its urgent
appeals (UA) work more structure. A national urgent appeals
co-ordinator was hired to enable the CCK to work more effectively
on gaining wider public support for workers' concerns and
pressuring brands involved in UA cases to do the right thing.
Additionally, the Austrian CCC is looking to develop activities
in new areas of work. For instance, they are looking into
the possibilities of joining the European Clean Clothes
Communities project, where local governments are pushed
to purchase work wear in an ethical way (see www.cleanclothes.org/campaign/
communities.htm).
The CCK also has ideas for increased cooperation within
the international Clean Clothes Campaign coalition. They
would like to work together more on a language basis, and
exchange translations, actions and press releases. The recent
Tchibo-campaign - which the CCK works on together with the
German CCC, see page 4 for more information - is a good
example of this effective way of campaigning.
Clean Clothes-Kampagne
c/o Südwind Agentur
Laudongasse 40, A1080 Wien
Austria
T: +43-1-405-5515
F: +43-1-405-5519
cck@oneworld.at
www.cleanclothes.at
The Austrian CCC coalition is made up of:
Development NGOs
