ABSTRACT
The signs from the current global political conjuncture are that global capitalism is taking significant steps to attack openly the regulation of labour. In various countries, this attack has taken place through proposals to alter the organs of the state and regulatory statutes with a view to reducing social rights of working people. In recent years, the most significant expression of this movement has been the labour reform initiatives tried out in various European and Latin American countries, which confirm that these initiatives are not individual cases, but the consequence of a wave of liberal governments whose aim is to offer greater freedom to capital by challenging rights considered to constrain the free circulation and accumulation of capital. Within this framework, unions have played a fundamental role in curbing this movement to roll-back rights by establishing limits, although insufficient, to the actions of capital and the subsequent imposition of degrading working conditions. This chapter deals with this last point and, in particular, with the union strategies for regulating labour relations alongside economic enterprises that take shape during sporting mega-events.
