Union Network International (UNI) is the global union for skills and services with 1,000 affiliates and 15.5 million members.
UNI's forerunner, the Postal, Telegraph and Telephone International (PTTI) was started in the early 1900s as an International Trade Union Organization inspired by the basic principles of international, free and democratic trade unionism.
Its origins can be traced back to June 1910 when in France, a group of European trade unions issued a call to create an international organization of Postal and Telecommunications workers. At this time, there was strong feeling that the postal and telecommunications unions in Europe should work together for their common purposes. A year later, in June 1911, the Statutes that would govern the new International were approved at the Conference of Paris, France, and its headquarters was established in Berne, Switzerland.
A short time after PTTI's establishment, the first World War (1914-1918) broke out and, as a result, all its activities were paralyzed until around 1920 when it renewed its work with more strength, although still only within the European sphere.
While the PTTI was able to establish the first contacts with communications trade unions from other continents, the second World War (1939-1945) again brought bloodshed to Europe and interrupted the growth of the PTTI.
The period between wars marked a slowdown in labor activities. Totalitarian doctrines which were developing were hostile toward the free and democratic trade union movement. It was not until the year 1951 that, through the actions of the communications trade union organizations of several European countries, the PTTI became consolidated.
In the mid 1950s, there was a move to expand the activities of the PTTI. NALC affiliated with the PTTO in January of 1950. By 1955, when the XV World Congress held in Weisbaden, Germany, ratified the affiliation of the first trade union organizations from the American, Asian and African continents, Postal, Telegraph and Telephone International took on a worldwide character. At the next Congress held in Florence, Italy, General Secretary, Fritz Gmur, reported that unions in thirty-five countries with close to two million members were then part of the PTTI.
By the later half of the twentieth century, the Trade Secretariat had affiliated organizations in virtually every country of the world where workers had the freedom and the right to organize in trade unions. It had a total of 4 million members in 100 countries from every continent. In the Western Hemisphere, the Light and Power organizations also joined the PTTI.
In 1997 at the PTTI's World Congress in Montreal, delegates voted to change the name of the PTTI to the Communications International in preparation for a merger with three other International Trade Secretariats, the International Graphical Federation, the Media and Entertainment International and FIET, the banking and commercial workers union. The merger, which created Union Network International in January 2000, both anticipated and reflected trends (i.e., globalization and technological convergence) that are revolutionizing the service sectors represented by the four international organizations.
UNI links 15.5 million service sector workers in more than 1,000 unions around the world. It serves the interests of letter carriers in international organizations such as the Universal Postal Union, the United Nations agency that regulates international mail transport and delivery, the World Trade Organization and the NAFTA/FTAA secretariats. |
