Revolutionary role of unions

[Carrol Cox]

I triggered a brief thread on some list sometime in the last year or two
which contained some interesting observations on this general topic. My
suggestion was that there is at least some historical evidence that
labor unions are for the most part potentially revolutionary in their
process of _formation_. The struggle for union recognition, or for the
very legality of unions, is strongly radicalizing. Even the hardest
fought "ordinary" strikes, on the other hand, let alone the day to day
practice (grievance procedures etc.) is seldom radicalizing. This would
not support anarchist repudiation of unions as such, or even repudiation
of existing unions. It would suggest that unions are a bad place, or at
least not a primary place, to look for the development of class
politics.

It is simply not true that u.s. workers dislike unions. Employer action
(particularly the regular firing of trouble-makers) simply makes union
organizing too difficult and too dangerous. Which brings us back to the
failure of the DP to move seriously against the reluctance/inability of
the NLRB to enforce labor law against capital. And the DP simply isn't
going to change. Has that senator from Minn. ever used his legislative
position to issue exposures of NLRB failures?

Carrol