The story so far…

“We have survived to fight another day, and that day is today”.
Drawing on a lifetime of  work and experience in the union movement, most of it at international level, network member Dan Gallin* looks at the big picture — how did unions end up where they are today? What can we learn from our mistakes? And where should we be going from here? This article is condensed from Dan’s welcome address to the Global Labour Institute summer school in Manchester, July 2012.

We are labour movement activists because we believe our movement is the first line of resistance, as well as the last, against the cold darkness of transnational corporate power. This power is advancing to impose its own brand of order on the world, with gated estates of privilege protected by militarized States, in a sea of miserable, exploited and repressed humanity, pillaging and destroying life-sustaining resources.

Must the labor movement save the world? Yes, of course. Who else is there? If not us, who? If not here, where? If not now, when? No other force in society has the potential to achieve this goal, which is the only goal that matters today.

 

Employment relations quality assurance

It’s not enough to produce widgets, we must produce quality widgets that can be sold for a profit. This expectation applies across the board — to the service industries as well as commodity production. However, “quality” is a notoriously elusive concept[i]. For this reason blue collar workers (and an increasing share of white collar workers) have grown accustomed to the checklists and graphs that come with quality assurance. Here’s an interesting idea: what if we extended quality assurance processes to employment relations?

 

Unions and job satisfaction

What makes a good job? And is it in management’s interests, as well as the union’s, to try and make jobs better?

Job satisfaction was once a hot topic in academia. From the 1960’s through till the late 1980’s, management theorists looked at the question from every angle, trying to find ways to create a contented labour force. By this, they meant: “one less concerned with money rewards and less inclined to  unionise[i]”. Researchers expected to find a strong correlation between job satisfaction and productivity. However, when this proved elusive, research funding dried up. More recently, a bunch of new research has helped the democratic labour movement better understand what workers want, and how we can deliver it.

 

Prioritizing union values

As unionists, we pretty much know what we’re against, but what are we for? What values should the union movement be prioritizing, representing and promoting? The New Unionism Network ran an online survey from January 2007 to January 2012* (it is now closed). In it, we asked people to select a “Top 10″ among 42 values. Below are  the results, with the subsequent 5 included as well. There is a very clear message in here for those who believe “business unionism” is the way forward. Most members do NOT wish to identify with a simple, self-interested approach. If your union prioritizes wage increases above all else, you might need to do some deeper research into what members actually want.

What values should unions prioritize?

 

Perils of the Precariat

If you’ve been puzzling over this whole #Occupy thing, Guy Standing’s latest book “The Precariat: The Dangerous New Class”(1) is essential reading. If you’re a unionist or center-left politician who’s been wondering where the hell your membership base went (and how to win it back), ditto.

If Standing(2) is correct, then we can expect movements like Occupy to evolve and grow. Unfortunately, we can also expect a continuing revival among the extreme right. Hence the word “dangerous” in the title of the book.

At the heart of Standing’s book is the contention that a new class is developing. Just as the rise of the “proletariat” (or industrial working class) changed the face of the 20th century, so is the rise of the “precariat”(3) affecting us today. The implications of this shift are no less radical. Unionists who ignore this change, or cling to hopes of a revival of the 20th century model, are already following in the footsteps of the Guilds.

 

Ethics and union bylaws

Phil Lillies is an internal auditor with a deep interest in workplace democracy. Based in Canada, he has spent ten years applying his training in philosophy and organizational development to the study of internal workings of labour and community organizations. In this article he focuses on bylaws — the rules and regulations that do so much to reflect and condition union culture at local level. He offers some reflections on how to write bylaws that will help create a democratic, inclusive organization… one that will inspire and empower its members to support good causes during times of quiet as well as times of struggle. This will prepare the union to better face the future, no matter what it may bring.

 

Democratizing work through participative design

As Merrelyn Emery has shown (here), the democratic approach to work out-performs other approaches across the board. It’s a conclusion she has tested and proven over and over again in the course of her career. But how can workers create democratic workplaces, starting from the traditional autocratic base? As any unionist will tell you, democracy can’t be installed from above; it must be resolved upon and built from the bottom up. As Hal Draper put it, “Only by fighting for democratic power do (workers) educate themselves up to the level of being able to wield that power.” In this article Emery helps unions in this struggle by describing the “participative design” process, which sets out to change organizations from autocracies (or laissez faire systems) to sustainable democracies.

 

The DOJO of Organizing: Five practices of the empowered shift

Here’s the third article in our popular series from Rex Lai, following on from the TAO and SHIH of union organizing. In this article, Rex looks at the DOJO of organizing. Literally, “Do” means practice and “Jo” means place. What are the practices of successful organizing, and what are the places we must create in order to achieve success? As a metaphor, the Dojo captures the art and the discipline of effective organizing.

 

Reviving the strike

Here’s an interview with Joe Burns, union negotiator, U.S. attorney and author of  “Reviving the Strike: How working people can regain power and transform America” (IG Publishing, 2011).

We contacted Joe after reading this book, which looks primarily at the situation in the U.S.A., and asked him what lessons other countries might take from his research. In short, he believes that we need to build a new unionism — one which is based on global solidarity and is willing and able to contest management decisions and, if necessary, stop production.

 

Communications workers and global value chains

‘Knowledge work’ is increasingly significant in global value chains – where creating, processing and transporting information plays a crucial role – but the analysis of this area of employment enjoys less attention. What is the scope for unionisation? How might this work across borders? The latest edition of the journal “Work, Organisation, Labour and Globalisation” (Getting the Message: Communications workers and global value chains, Ed Catherine McKercher and Vincent Mosco, Volume 4 no 2, 2010) looks at the growth of communication work and its political potential within the global economy. Richy Leitch reviews it for us below. You can buy the book or download the full text of individual articles here: http://goo.gl/IsN78.