The power of the collective - this phrase could be the answer to everyone's question the teacher who is considering whether to go on strike on Monday (January 20) and refuse to teach at school.
Although they four representative unions agreed for the state to end the strike and start the second semester in exchange for a salary increase, many schools and members of other unions announce that there will be no classes on January 20.
Now the teachers who are not in the union are in a dilemma - can they get fired if they don't open the diary at 8.00 on Monday.
"The answer to the question - are teachers allowed to strike now - is not very simple," Mario Reljanović, a research associate at the Institute for Comparative Law in Belgrade, explains to Vreme. "Even if it is interpreted that Monday's protest is a continuation of the previous strike, teachers would still have to hold classes for 30 minutes, they cannot stop working." However, there is a solution, and that is for everyone to join together. They can't really fire all the teachers in Serbia."
What could be the problem
Few of the actors participating in the educators' strike these days behave as if they have read the existing Law on Strikes, even though it has not been changed for more than 30 years.
Thus, the representative unions, which until now have been negotiating with the state, announced that they have put a moratorium on the strike.
"This possibility, a break on the strike, does not exist in the law," says Reljanović. "That would be like opening up a man on the operating table and taking a break, then come back tomorrow." The man will die during that time. The very essence of a strike is continuity, so if you strike a break every now and then, it loses its point."
The problem that teachers who refuse to work can have is the interpretation of the continuity of the strike. Because it is not clear whether they will then continue the existing strike or start a new one.
If they continue the existing one, the representative unions can say that they stopped it, and if they start a new one - that strike must be announced in advance and officially, the law states.
Photo: FonetEducators have been on strike for months
On the edge of the law
Dušan Kokot from the Independent Union of Educators of Serbia tells "Vreme" that educators "continue the strike even though it is on the edge of the law."
"Every union member will get legal protection," he says. "Those who are not members can be in trouble, so I recommend everyone to at least become a member somewhere."
Even when they are on strike, educators, according to the law, must maintain a minimum work process.
"That's why we always had those shortened classes in some schools, that is, warning strikes, as they call it," Zoran Stojiljković, professor of sociology at the Faculty of Political Sciences, told Vreme. "This rule in the law is crazy because you're actually making it impossible for people to strike."
There are more of us - what if we all don't work
According to the existing Law on Strikes from 1996, which was written for the former Yugoslavia and has never been amended, another condition for a strike to be legal is that more than half of the workers participate in it.
So Tamara, a teacher at an elementary school in New Belgrade, will go to work on Monday and will not teach, because the members of her collective have agreed. There are 100 teachers in the school, and most of them were in favor of the strike.
"I'm not afraid of being fired, even though I'm not in a union, I guess 60 out of 100 employees at the school won't quit," she tells "Vreme". "Nevertheless, I believe that we will give in if there are any open threats and decisions on dismissal are written."
And Stojiljković says that practice supports Tamara's thinking.
"The collective can independently organize itself outside the union and make a decision, it is only important that they have a majority."
And experience from the field shows that when the entire collective goes on strike - the employer never fires everyone. Usually, the tactic is that the management, in order to prevent a strike or end it, fire only a few of the most vocal workers.
"But that applies to the economy, these are schools." I don't believe that any director will dare to fire a teacher, even one. However, after his directorship, he should return to the same collective," says Reljanović.
He gives an example of when director of the Clinic for Psychiatric Diseases "Dr. Laza Lazarevic" Ivana Stašević Karličić delivered as many as 70 warnings to employees before dismissal. She was eventually replaced, and the collective received a new management under pressure from employees and the public.
How can they be helped?
It is very important, urges Professor Zoran Stojiljković, that teachers, who will not start teaching classes, are not left alone in the windstorm.
"They can go on an unannounced wild strike, but there is a risk that they will be sanctioned," he says. "Disciplinary proceedings may be initiated against them and they may even lose their jobs." This is where civil society comes into play, which should provide free legal aid to those who are not in the trade union."
