The sobering news for these companies is that U.S. unions are beginning to follow the work to other countries. This past March, the union held a press conference at its New York headquarters announcing its support for local organizing drives in Central America and the Caribbean - particularly Guatemala, Honduras and the Dominican Republic. The breakthrough came a few days later when Phillips Van Heusen, a major U.S. employer in the maquila sector, recognized the union which had organized its workers, and pledged to negotiate a contract. The rest of Guatemala's 80,000 maquila workers, however, remain without labor contracts. In that year, a contract was signed with a small subcontractor for a U.S. label in the Bonao free- trade zone.
Laws have to follow trade, and follow work.
Union officials say this legacy is exaggerated. When they get attacked, they say, it's not from the left but from the right, and, they emphasize, the attacks are not meant to defend sovereignty but to neutralize attempts to organize. Even so, the union never goes in by itself. While New Jersey and Pennsylvania were once considered foreign territory for the apparel unions, the last few decades have considerably expanded the industry's geographic scope. Once again, the union is catching up - this time internationally.