Empowering informal workers through unionization

In lower-income countries, over 80% of the workforce sustains their livelihood through the informal economy. This has drawn attention to the precarious working conditions in these activities and underscores the need to prioritize informal economy workers in striving for more and better jobs (SDG8). However, there is very little research on workers’ own conception of “good” work, and scholars have largely overlooked collective action by informal economy workers (e.g., through unions) to enhance their working conditions.

In this transdisciplinary research project, we address these two research gaps. We will investigate (i) what informal economy workers consider as “good” work and (ii) what avenues of collective action could improve working conditions in alignment with their own conception of “good” work. We focus on the food service sector in Accra, Ghana, due to its rapid growth, large informal (and female) labor force, and the unique presence of a Informal Economy Workers’ Forum (INFORUM, an umbrella trade union organization for informal workers) in Ghana – a rarity in sub-Saharan Africa. 

We employ a transdisciplinary photovoice design, a participatory action research methodology. By asking informal economy workers to take pictures of key aspects of their work activities and reflect upon them in-depth interviews and group sessions, we can reveal their lived experience and facilitate dialogue among informal economy workers and unions. With this transdisciplinary research project, we identify solutions to informal economy workers’ precarious work conditions and barriers to collective action (e.g. unionization). Our close collaboration with INFORUM will help to increase union benefits and understand barriers to unionization, both of which will yield important policy recommendations for our partner and beyond. 

Contact: Dr. Patrick Illien & Dr. Anna Fabry

Partners:

Informal Economy Workers’ Forum Ghana