As I have previously explored, SEDOAC has a complicated relationship with the groups it is most similar to, other organizations that work towards advancing domestic workers’ rights. SEDOAC also has a complicated relationship within general labor movements and far left-wing movements within Spain, where they often wish to align themselves with labor movements so that their ideas gain influence, but also understand that many labor movements will never fully represent them.
A concrete example of SEDOAC beginning to have an influence is that its leader and founder, Carolina, has started to branch out to political parties and organizations to give speeches and include SEDOAC’s message in their redistribution policies, most notably Spain’s communist party. I see SEDOAC’s work with the communist party as a sign that they are at least open to democratic redistribution, or “democratic control over the production and utilization of the surplus,” as Harvey states.
SEDOAC’s relationship with redistribution is complicated, however, because the work sector they represent is mostly disenfranchised, and makes it very difficult for the women to be accurately represented in redistribution efforts. This is most prevalent with labor unions in Spain, which also have redistributive goals, but end up expressing those goals differently than domestic workers’ groups. For example, most of the redistributive efforts that labor groups or labor unions within Spain want redistributive parties to come down from the state. This is one reason why parties beyond the one right-wing and one left-wing party have begun to emerge and take some power within the Spanish government. Many unions do not see the largest left-wing Spanish party, the Socialist Party (PSOE), as aggressive enough in redistributive efforts. Instead, many have put their trust in the newer, much more aggressive and farther left party, Podemos, a party which rose after the European debt crisis in 2014. The trust in these new parties is widespread among many workers’ unions, but SEDOAC cannot place their trust in general redistributive policies because so many of their workers are disenfranchised. The women working in the domestic sector in Spain need specific protections, because they have specific laws and social pressure that work against them. Enacted laws to protect workers would most likely have no effect on domestic workers, because acts such as raising the minimum wage or decreasing the hours within a work week do not affect someone who is working outside of the system, and whose hours and pay are not being accurately reported, if they are being reported at all. Because of this, I believe that while SEDOAC is open to democratic redistribution, they also recognize that their needs for redistributive policies and workers’ protections differ from other workers in other sectors, and they cannot just join a large labor movement and expect the majority of the reforms made to be helpful to them.
This calls into question SEDOAC’s views on their “right to the city,” another one of Harvey’s points. While “right to the city” has never appeared as a conscious goal of the organization or any of its members, I see their goals of right to a living wage and right to fair treatment to be, in their own way, a “right to the city.” The right to a city implies a right to live in a city receiving fair treatment and representation, and SEDOAC’s primary goal is to achieve that for its members. I see SEDOAC’s members wanting a right to a respected place in Spanish society, which is a right to the city. Redistributive policies may be the only way to make this right possible for SEDOAC’s members, and the challenge of consolidating their goals with the collective goals of labor movements throughout Spain is a big challenge they will have to face. Building a bridge with labor movements could give them strength, but it could also lead to their cause being ignored within a larger context, and the redistributive policies they seek are more specific than general labor union movements in Spain may provide. Once again, the intersectionality of oppressions that domestic workers in Spain face, especially foreign domestic workers, make it difficult to consolidate their movement into other movements, and make it difficult for them to gain a right to Madrid.
Köhler, Holm-Detlev, and José Pablo Calleja Jiménez. “‘They Don’t Represent Us!” Opportunities for a Social Movement Unionism Strategy in Spain.” Relations Industrielles / Industrial Relations, vol. 70, no. 2, 2015, pp. 240–261., www.jstor.org/stable/24641878.
This is so helpful for me, Siobhan. Thank you! I had not thought of the ways in which SEDOAC’s particular needs differ from those of other trade unions such that the labor movement in Spain, in an effort to appeal to the broadest base, might flatten out the most important and distinct needs of domestic workers. It’s also interesting to be the ways in which the spectrum of Left politics plays out in Spain today. Redistribution seems like a fait accompli, but how it is done — if through the state or through small-scale cooperation — is still up for debate. I also wonder whether there is a vocal feminist group within the more traditional labor movement in Spain that might more fully embrace groups like SEDOAC? Really nice work, Siobhan.