ABSTRACT
International trade unionism is based on structures that for the most part were formed over a century ago: the first International Trade Secretariats (now called Global Union Federations, or GUFs, based on industrial unions) were founded from the 1880s onwards, and the first international confederal structures (those based on national centres) in the first decade of the 20 th century. Yet the trade union movement has continued to grow and develop new forms of organisation and action over the last century, creating tensions and sometimes breaking the articulation between formal structures and trade union action. Major changes to the formal structures took place in 1945, with the creation of the unitary World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU); in 1949, when the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) was founded as a breakaway from WFTU; and, most recently, in 2006 with the foundation of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). The ITUC brought together the ICFTU and the Christian-inspired World Confederation of Labour (WCL), along with a number of previously non-aligned national centres. The creation of the ITUC also marked the beginning of a new era in relationships between previously independent bodies, primarily between the ITUC itself and the GUFs, which retained their formal autonomy within a new mechanism for collaboration with each other and with the ITUC through the Council of Global Unions. New regional structures were also set up, bringing a new relationship between the ITUC and the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC).
