Date: Fri, 15 Aug 1997 16:31:12 +0200
From: joern.andersen-AT-post3.tele.dk (Andersen, Joern)
Subject: Re: M-I: UPS Strike


At 09:05 15-08-97 -0500, Doug Henwood wrote:
>jonathan flanders wrote:
>
>> So right now, at least for me, it is time to pull out the stops and do
>>what we can to win. I can tell you that the second, even bigger mass
>>picket we had in this area today, was not built by the union leadership.
>>It was primarily a word of mouth affair. They needed a turnout, but
>>feared to call for it. They didn't even put out a leaflet. Its a classic
>>"opening" situation that anyone with half a brain can take advantage of.
>>"Sad as hell"?, sorry Doug, not in this corner.
>
>Look, there's no question this is an important struggle with surprisingly
>strong popular support. But this kind of cheerleading can obscure any
>critical examination of how U.S. labor got to this sorry pass. In fact
>that's exactly what I was talking about: we get caught up in the
>particulars of a particular struggle and forget about the systemic
>problems, in this case, the Teamster history of corruption, the lack of
>internal union democracy, the slavish devotion to the Democrats.... That's
>not to say we shouldn't pull out all the stops and do what we can to win.
>But it'd be a lot easier to do that if the fight weren't being led by such
>a flawed organization.

So the question is:
How to get a democratic union?

I think what Jon wrote just above the part, which Doug quoted, is very
central:

> Change for the better, for a class conscious, class struggle leadership
> in the unions will only come when we have a confident, militant and
> participatory rank and file. And victories, not defeats, will lead to
> such an outcome.  

In Denmark in 1985 we had for 10 days 100.000's of workers on strike in the
socalled _Easter Strikes_. (The effect of which was to stop the new
conservative government in following Thatchers footsteps.) After these
strikes we saw in many local unions a change in leadership - not
necessarily to pronounced leftwingers, but at least to socdems which had
been positive to the strikes.

I agree with Jon that the key to resolving this dialectical relationship
between a bureaucratic vs. democratic leadership and willingness vs.
reluctancy to fight is to look at the mood on the shop floor - not to hope
for some magic transformation of the TU leadership by itself or otherwise.

Of course it would require a stronger left wing current inside the unions
to challenge the present undemocratic leadership on a permanent basis - and
in the end to win away the leadership from them. But it often so, that when
a longer period of calm is interrupted by a more or less sudden eruption of
larger struggles, then the left is taken by surprise. So many socialists
who are used to look with horror at the strength of the TU bureaucracy,
often fail to see that in the real world this strength begins to be
challenged by the strength of the rank and file. This gives us
opportunities unseen for - maybe decades.

This is not to say that we should not take up the arguments about the
undemocratic TU leadership. On the contrary. But we can take up these
arguments very concretely - and for once with a clear and visible
alternative to relying on this leadership: That workers should rely on
*their own* strength, building from the rank and file.

This, to me, seems a much more promising perspective than just wringing our
hands at the sorry state of the TU leadership.


Keep up the fight!


Yours

Jorn



-- 
Jorn Andersen

Internationale Socialister
Copenhagen, Denmark
IS-WWW: http://www2.dk-online.dk/users/is-dk/


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