[...]
> ALL unions that have had substantial organizing wins in the private
> sector these days have used some version of getting neutrality from the
> boss--- from the CNA and CWA to UNITE HERE and UFCW. It always involves
> using some mixture of the carrot and stick to get employers to limit
> their boss fight. But SEIU has done the most of this type of neutrality
> dealing, and has clearly in some cases improvised in questionable ways in
> how it proceeds. This is natural--- 'wholesale organizing' as we call it
> is pretty new so the playbook and rulebook are both still being written,
> just as modern labor relations were still being figured out in the 40s.
> But that era of labor relations was decided in a time of intermittent
> mass rebellion by workers; today's organizing unions have a very
> different predicament, facing a workforce deeply politically and
> culturally divided, a united employing class, and a time when
> working-class losses are dealt with through consumer debt and multiple
> family incomes as opposed to the factory uprisings, shop-floor violence,
> urban revolts and regional populist crusades of the 30s.
>
> Now, a good labor leader in my opinion sets these carrots and sticks in
> context for the membership and the public: as strategic measures in a
> conflict between workers and owners (I think John Wilhelm of HERE does
> the best at this, although there are others). This is where the Stern
> team, and specifically Andy Stern the individual, fail massively. Stern
> instead talks eagerly about only the carrots, and sets them instead in a
> post-class future-world he imagines has arrived. This I find deplorable.
> Worse still is the fact that some of his weird futuristic post-left,
> post-class ideas seem to exert ugly influence on our strategic direction.
> Seriously, the dude sometimes seems to want to make SEIU more like
> facebook and less like a union. These particular faults are, as far as I
> can tell, particular to Stern the individual--- although some other ugly
> incidents from our recent history, like the puerto Rican teachers union
> debacle, indicate that others in the leadership are losing their trade
> unionist ethical bearings as well.
>
> On the other hand, people like Stern and Rivera have still executed for
> their members with an amazing and unmatched track record of success. So
> it's complicated. The sad reality is that Stern, despite all these
> things I hate about him, has increased workers power more than anyone on
> this list. He's also done bad things and he didn't do the good things
> alone--- the Stern team has a lot of different personalities on it and
> every single thing that happens in our union depends on working people
> bending their muscle and taking chances and making tough calls: from the
> worker I talked to three hours ago trying to decide whether or not to
> sign a union card all the way up to Scott Courtney and Mayee Crispin
> directing their little armies of leftist workaholic organizers in day to
> day operations; from a shop steward in a nursing home in canton ohio
> going out on leave to be an organizer and then an elected official of her
> local union to workers in las vegas having a brutal factional fight
> against each other because of an eclectic mix of strategic differences
> and personal conflicts.
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Another astute post from one of my very favourite list contributors. Keep on
reporting from the real world, Jim. How's your book going? I'll bet you've
got more than one in you.