23
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How to support a Unionizing effort without putting oneself at risk
I've been thinking about this for a while; working conditions in the U.S.A., stagnant wages, the growing power of the corporation, and the waning power of the worker. It seems to me that to speak of unionizing in the workplace is so taboo, so fraught with risk of retaliation from the employer, that we need to do something different.
What if we took an active role in speaking about, supporting, and encouraging people of a completely different industry to our own to unionize? If the employers come down on the leaders, well hey, they don't work in that field.
So, what do you think?
Join the IWW!
https://www.iww.org/
Good call!
Don't just join the IWW. Invite coworkers who might be receptive over on Sundays to watch football or something. Feed 'em, give 'em a beer or two. Don't even talk union at first, but keep Wobbly propaganda visible. If they bring it up, steer the conversation.
If you walk union at work, management is going to hear about it. If you talk union at home, recruiting one person at a time, management might still hear about it before you're ready to spring a union vote on them, but you're more likely to be able to finger the snitch.
I believe that encouraging others to take risks that we are not willing to take ourselves is not an effective way to create change in the world. The most powerful tool you have is to lead by example. If you truly believe in something you will show others that your ideals are worth believing in, by taking the risk yourself. If you aren't willing to take the risk people will perceive that you aren't fully committed to the ideal.
I fully realize that many people are not in the position to take large risks, I'm just speaking of how realistic effects and how other perceive our actions. Perception is very important when trying to cause change at societal level.
You have misunderstood me.
I am saying that I, as a worker in industry A, would not try to recruit my fellow A industry workers into a union, but rather I would attempt to organize workers in industry B, because if industry B management came to wreak some consequences down on the organizer of their union, they would be met with me, someone they have no influence or power over.
I believe I did not misunderstand. This is a scenario where you have very little to lose but all the other people have a lot to lose. Often time if businesses find their employees trying to unionize they just fire everyone and move on. Also once again if you have nothing to lose it will not inspire people to follow you. If you want to lead something people have to follow you.
I am imagining a scenario in which I too would be working for other people's industries to unionize, thereby putting myself at as much risk. I don't understand how you don't understand this.
Because what you're saying doesn't make any sense. If you're in industry A and working to encourage industry B to unionize, they shoulder the risk. If Industry B cracks down on the employees of Industry B for unionizing, they become unemployed whereas you, in Industry A still have your job. You shoulder some risk of your Industry A finding out that you tried to help another industry unionize, but that's peanuts compared to the risk the employees of Industry B are facing.
The hope is that those same people would also be helping us in industry A to unionize. But, sure. Ok. Bad idea. I didn't shoulder enough risk for you, when the entire point of this post was to try to minimize risk so that it would be more likely for people to actually attempt to unionize in the first place! Sure, great.
But you'r e only minimizing your risk, I believe is the point people are making.
Would you working in industry A follow someone from industry B who approached you to unionise? I wouldn't.
This was an attempt to talk about lessening the risk of unionizing. And yes, I would. I would love to unionize.
I think maybe the idea you're trying to flesh out is the idea of multiple industries unionizing together. Historically, there are instances of one union supporting another smaller union, or a group that's too small to be an effective union joining a larger one. In these cases at least one collective group already exists.
The greatest dangers when unionizing is being let go before you're a large enough group to bargain. Employers will generally simply replace all staff. When a company like Walmart can simply close their entire store to kill a union, there's not much employees can do. It's not only the leader or organizer of the union that is dismissed. Everyone who showed interest at a minimum would be.
Thank you for this reply, sincerely.
It wasn't an attempt, we are talking about it. I think you are taking the criticism too personally. And while @Catt seems to have got your meaning, the original problem still remains. People need to take the risk to get things going. I've seen unions backing each other up in Ireland in the 80's, where the teachers would go on strike to support a nurses strike, but those unions are already well established.
It's very difficult to create a union in America where it appears there are no laws to protect them. As best as I'm aware in places like Sweden people have the right to unionize. You cannot fire someone for starting or being involved in a union. So maybe that's the way to approach it? But frankly with the way American politics is going that sounds as risky and difficult as just unionizing.
I don't know what the answer is, but I don't think you can avoid the risks you want to avoid. They are inherent in the process. You need a critical mass of people who will walk out before the company finds out, which in the case of something like wallmart means have a critical mass of employees across a critical mass of their stores ready to walk out at the same time. That's a tough ask.