Major decline in workers' rights worldwide, with the biggest setbacks in the US and Europe

Workers' rights around the world are in major decline, with the situation in Europe and the United States the worst since 2014, according to this year's Global Rights Index of the International Trade Union Confederation, the trade union portal Nezavisnost reported today.

As stated, in the newly published report, the Global Rights Index 2026 (TUC Global Rights Index), the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) reports that the workers' rights crisis is being redirected from the global margins to the very heart of developed democracies, and this is being contributed to by the rise of the far right, primarily in Europe, which manifests open hostility towards unions.

This year's report by the World Trade Union Confederation, under the slogan "Fight for Democracy", shows that violence against the world of work continues to grow globally.

In almost three-quarters of the world's countries, employees are denied access to justice in various ways, while in every other country, workers are arrested or detained.

Compared to 2025, the ICC Index records an increase in attacks on freedom of speech and assembly, violations of civil liberties, increasingly frequent persecution and arrests of trade union leaders, and in some countries their murders (Angola, Colombia, Indonesia, Mexico).

According to the Global Index criteria, this year's list of the 10 worst countries for workers includes Argentina, Belarus, Ecuador, Egypt, Eswatini, Myanmar, Nigeria, Panama, Tunisia and Turkey.

The United States of America was placed on the list of countries for the first time with a rating of 4 (systematic violation of rights) due to heavy pressure on collective bargaining and suppression of union organizing.

Some European countries were also rated worse than before, most notably France, which recorded its worst result in history, with its rating downgraded from 2 (repeated violation of rights) to 3 (regular violation of rights) due to repression of trade unionists and restrictions on the right to protest.

Only three countries in the world improved their ratings. First and foremost, Uruguay, which advanced to the best rating of 1, while the United Kingdom and Botswana improved their ratings from 4 to 3.

The official report of the ICC identified negative records - in 72 percent of countries workers are denied or severely restricted access to justice, in every other country workers are arrested or detained for exercising their trade union rights (mostly in the DR Congo, Iraq, Indonesia, Albania...).

Also, globally, physical violence against workers has increased by six percent compared to the previous year, with this increase recorded in almost every third country (e.g., India, Palestine, Ukraine, South Africa...), then employers are increasingly aggressively using digital surveillance to monitor, discipline and silence workers and unions, and the tactic of suppressing unions and interfering in their work is explicitly used by many countries (USA, Estonia, Serbia, Spain, the Netherlands, Poland...).

"This is the result of a coordinated attack on democracy – a coup by billionaires backed by political leaders – that is taking away labor and other rights, silencing workers and manipulating economies in favor of the powerful. But workers and their unions are fighting back. The fight for workers' rights is a fight for democracy itself – for our rights, our security and our sources of income. Without strong unions, there can be no true democracy," said Luc Triangle, General Secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation.

The Global Rights Index for 2026 ranked a total of 151 countries around the world based on 97 indicators, derived from International Labor Organization conventions.

The best score of 1 indicates a country in which rights are violated sporadically, a score of 2 was given to countries in which rights violations are repeated, while a score of 3 was assigned to countries in which rights are violated regularly.

A four is given to countries that systematically violate the labor rights of their citizens (Serbia traditionally belongs to this group), while a five is "reserved" for countries in which rights are not guaranteed at all.

The worst rating of 5+ went to countries in which wars and similar conflicts have completely collapsed legal systems, stated the Nezavisnost portal.