Trade Union
A trade union is a group of employees who join together to maintain and improve their conditions of employment. Most, like UCU, are independent of the company in which they organise. The typical activities of trade unions include providing assistance and services to their members, collectively bargaining for better pay and conditions for all workers, working to improve the quality of public services, political campaigning and industrial action

Company or Yellow Union
A company or “yellow” union is a worker organization which is dominated or influenced by an employer, and is therefore not an independent trade union. Company unions are contrary to international labour law (see ILO Convention 98, article 2).

Anti-union Discrimination
Any practice that disadvantages a worker or a group of workers on grounds of their past, current or prospective trade union membership, their legitimate trade union activities, or their use of trade union services. Can constitute dismissal, transfer, demotion, harassment and the like.

Bargaining Unit
A group of workers within a particular company, establishment, industry or occupation that constitutes an appropriate unit for the purpose of collective bargaining.

Black List
A list of workers compiled by and circulated among employers identifying union members and activists who are to be boycotted or otherwise penalised.

Boycott
A collective refusal to buy or use the goods or services of an employer to express disapproval with its practices. Primary boycotts are used to put direct pressure on an employer, while a secondary boycott involves the refusal to deal with a neutral employer with the view of dissuading it from patronising the target employer.

Casualisation
The practice of increasing the flexibility of the workforce by replacing permanent, full-time workers with workers on temporary, irregular contracts.

Freedom of Association
The right to form and join the trade union of one’s choosing as well as the right of unions to operate freely and carry out their activities without undue interference.
industrial actionAny form of action taken by a group of workers, a union or an employer during an industrial dispute to gain concessions from the other party, e.g. a strike, go-slow or an overtime ban, or a lockout on the part of the employer.

Industrial Dispute
A conflict between workers and employers concerning conditions of work or terms of employment. May result in industrial action.

Picketing
Demonstration or patrolling outside a workplace to publicise the existence of an industrial dispute or a strike, and to persuade other workers not to enter the establishment or discourage consumers from patronising the employer. Secondary picketing involves picketing of a neutral establishment with a view to putting indirect pressure on the target employer.

Recognition
The designation by a government agency of a union as the bargaining agent for workers in a given bargaining unit, or acceptance by an employer that its employees can be collectively represented by a union.

Strike
The most common form of industrial action, a strike is a concerted stoppage of work by employees for a limited period of time. Can assume a wide variety of forms.
See general strike, intermittent strike, rotating strike, sit-down strike, sympathy strike,

Strikebreaker

A worker who continues to work during a strike, or an outside worker hired to carry out the work of the strikers.

Union Busting
Attempts by an employer to prevent the establishment of a trade union or remove an existing union, e.g. by firing union members, challenging unions in court, or by forming a yellow union

Many definitions sourced from: Global Rights Index where a longer list of defined terms can be found.