I doubt that WW asked militant trade union activists in Puerto Rico what they think of the AFL-CIO proposal. Is WW saying that it is better that workers from Puerto Rico not be allowed the same organizing rights as US citizens? I would think this would be desirable to the labor movement in PR, even for those who advocate independence.
>
> Then there's China. AFL-CIO President John Sweeney has
> engaged in a full-throttle Cold War campaign of lies and
> invective against this socialist nation. The AFL-CIO and
> member unions make all sorts of wild claims in their drive
> to bar China from full access to world trade. They claim,
> for example, that unions are illegal in China. In fact, 103
> million Chinese workers are represented by industrial
> unions, a greater proportion of industrial workers than
> have union rights in the United States.
>
On the face of it this is true, but a Marxist analysis would unpack the nature of the trade unions these workers are members of, its depleted budget that renders it capable of doing little in the way of organizing or protecting workers, and the virtual non-role it plays when workers face widespread cases of management looting public assets...The AFL-CIO leadership often does make wild claims in their quest to prevent China from entering the WTO. However, it does workers little in the way of help to make wild claims about the level of representation experienced by workers in China today, be they in the state sector or private sector. This only leads to confusion about reality, hardly a basis for solidarity between working classes of different countries.
> . Labor should take a lesson from what happened with
> the overturning of socialism in the former Soviet Union.
> There, life for workers has seriously deteriorated. Pay and
> working conditions have gone from being some of the best in
> the world to among the worst. Industrial accidents and
> pollution have risen sharply. This and worse is what would
> happen to workers in China if the socialist state were
> dismantled.
>
This is happening right now in China, at a less advanced pace than in Russia, but certainly occurring apace. Denying it will get us none too far.
> The AFL-CIO's statements on China have left the impression
> that the U.S. labor federation is hostile to both the
> Chinese people and socialism. That is certainly how workers
> in China see it. That alone should be reason enough for the
> AFL-CIO to reconsider what it is saying and doing on China.
>
Certainly the AFL-CIO should reconsider its stance on China and on the WTO as well. However, its stance should be based on factual understanding of what is actually happening in China to China's workers (across sector, gender,...), not appeals to vague numbers that tell us little about the real nature of class relations as they exist in China today.