Union Shop: Consider a "Salt-free" Meal w/ MK Lees

MK Lees, contributor and regular editor of Organizing Work, joins Laborwave Radio to discuss the strategy of "salting" a workplace to boost a union campaign, and the need to refine this practice for optimal impact.

Among topics discussed in this episode is a response to the claim that salting is the best strategy for revitalizing a militant labor movement, and how salting done well abides by understanding that a salt cannot substitute for a committee of rank and file workers.

The article, "Salt: The Flavor, Not the Meal," published in Organizing Work formed the basis of our conversation. Read it at https://organizing.work/2020/06/salt-the-flavor-not-the-meal/

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I really appreciate your article that you wrote for organizing work on salt, the flavor, not the meal, clever title, by the way, to thank you before really digging into the contents of it. I feel like what I was hoping to talk to you about is just general conversation around salting as a union organizing strategy, and maybe some of its limitations, some of the advantages and just go wherever we want to go. But before diving right in just for our listeners, maybe you can provide like a description or definition of salting. So what is salting?

2 (2m 18s):

Yeah, sure. I mean, I think it's fairly simple idea. Although I guess in that article, I did kind of problematize, I think some of the assumptions about what people think it means. I mean, typically it's a word used to describe somebody intentionally taking a job with a purpose of organizing it. So that's, I think the generally accepted idea of what salting is. And then I do point out a difference in that, in, in that some people are often thinking that salting means I need a job. And so I'm going to take this job that I would have taken otherwise. And then I'm going to organize the job when I get to the job, which I think is, is a little bit of a different thing than usually what we mean by salting, which is like reorienting the priorities of your life.

2 (3m 8s):

A lot of times to go use a specific tactic to boost the campaign in some way, which I think is a little more of a precise definition of what salts.

1 (3m 19s):

Yeah. And it's pretty common amongst unions, right? So like mainstream unions use salting, the IWW is amenable to assaulting. I think what was really interesting about your article is that you focus specifically on a case study of Jimmy John's and the salting strategy use there. So I want to talk like, just in the broad sense first, just kind of zoom out before really getting into the nitty-gritty of salting because there's a debate, even though it's a common tactic, there is clearly a romanticized version about salting can accomplished. And I think that the debate goes effectively like this, particularly amongst socialists salting is how we built the labor movement in the first place.

1 (4m 4s):

A bunch of radicals just inserted themselves into key strategic industries on their backs. They like radicalized their co-workers and built unions. And today that, that needs to be the strategy. Again, saltings the way forward. And that's how we can organize Amazon, organize the key logistics chains, organize the entire country and like turn it into a socialist utopia. So what do you think about that argument? Like what is your take on salting as a strategy? Just in the broadest sense,

2 (4m 34s):

I guess in the first place I would say I understand the logic and I probably believed something similar at some point until I saw some of the problems that potentially emerge out of kind of that line of thinking, which we can talk about. My history is not tip-top in terms of whether I can answer this question of was that the thing that built the labor movement, but I have a do I do have a suspicion that that's a pretty incomplete picture of like what the real strategy was that built the labor movement. And I think there are even, you know, some good case studies on, on organizing work, organizing.work, the website that I wrote the piece for that take a look at and kind of demystify some of the things we think about how organizing happened even back in the teens, like with the Lawrence strike, for example, and sort of, I think what the popular imagination and the labor movement is sometimes about like how something like that happened in the wobbly, like descended onto the city and then kind of galvanized everybody called big meetings.

2 (5m 39s):

And, you know, there was this massive strike that we were able to win for a variety of reasons. When in actuality there was years of organizing going on. That was just the type of stuff that you don't hear about. And you don't see because it's more interpersonal and it's building things that take place on the job that have these little successes and these little failures and that build upon the failures that came before them and culminate in sort of a big historical moment that everybody talks about. And, you know, I, I don't know that I'm qualified to necessarily argue against that theory outright based on a bunch of case studies that I have, but I do think it just, it, it might, my suspicion is that it's a very incomplete picture and it's also, I don't know, I have a lot of feelings about it and I, I, I don't know.

2 (6m 31s):

I'm curious to see where we go in this conversation, but like, to me, it also just has this kind of, I don't know, something egotistical about it or something that like, Oh yeah, elitist. Yeah. It's like, we're the people that are going to solve everything. You know, if we can just go bring our enlightened ideas to the working class, like I know people don't think that consciously, but like that's sort of embedded in the strategy there, which I think is, is sort of like if that's what we're relying on, I have, I have less hope if that's the case. You know, I, I'm much more of the opinion that your average everyday person, whatever that means. It's not really even a thing. Right. But like you're consciously non-radical workers out there that can they're, they're the ones that collectively can change the world.

2 (7m 13s):

And it's more a matter of like accompanying people to use sort of the like Scott and Lind kind of idea, and offering whatever tools we can to people that just like help to clarify an organizing situation. And then things can happen that way potentially. And people can learn things, all kinds of different ways. It doesn't necessarily come from us on the left. So yeah, I, I, for a variety of reasons, I'm, I'm dubious of like having that be the lens that we, we look at things through. Yeah.

1 (7m 44s):

I wonder if we kind of share common ground here and that for me, this kind of waxing poetic claim about what salted can accomplish and why it's necessary. Like I mentioned, it does smack a believism, but it also seems to approach organizing from the perspective of, we need to educate and enlighten the masses. Like the problem is that people have backwards ideas. The working class is clearly ignorant around radical politics and socialism, and if they just knew the facts of the matter, if we could just enlighten them and give them like a clear political line, then we would win, you know? And I think there's some grains of truth to, you know, popular education is important obviously, but I'm more of the mind that you have to build organizations with power.

1 (8m 31s):

And it's really just about building, working class power through organizations. And that doesn't necessarily mean you start with the grand enlightened, you know, Marxists that comes into the shop for, and just gives everybody a class analysis.

2 (8m 45s):

Yeah, certainly no argument there, you know, it makes me think of something that came out around a similar time on organizing work, Marianne Garner's review of the angry class power at zero hours. I think the book is called and just talking about that, they did a lot of stuff that was similar to like it, it had a lot of parallels to me of the kind of Marxists who would, and when the seventies kind of went from being students to me and like, Oh, we got to get back into the factories. And it was, it was all about like designing the best leaflet and the best newsletter and presenting the best analysis. And that would kind of draw people to your cause and galvanize people. But in the book, at least my reading of the book through the review of the book, you know, this was, this was not a, not a winning strategy and often surprising that like it didn't result in more people like doing stuff and coming to the meetings and she has a good line in the review.

2 (9m 41s):

That's like, you, can't something like leaflets, can't listen to people, you know, only people can do that. And it's, you know, I think that's, that's the thing is organizing is all about relationships and you don't build relationships with big political ideas. You build relationships with small interactions with people on a one-to-one basis. So

1 (10m 1s):

Well, and I think that brings us to, as I mentioned briefly, Jimmy John's as a good case study and one that, you know, makes up the bulk of your article and organizing.work. So what's interesting about this is that you have a totally different assessment of it than some of the other articles I've read that called Jimmy John's the success story arguing as an endorsement of salting that Jimmy Johns shows that salting is the strategy that works and is going to rebuild the socialist movement. Can you give us kind of a rundown of the Jimmy John's organizing campaign with the years, it was where it took place, the union that was involved, but also your take on how effective the strategy of salting at Jimmy John's was

2 (10m 44s):

Sure, as a caveat, I was not part of that campaign. I was, I was close to a lot of people who were very close to it. And then I, I did some interviews after the fact. And so I'm, I'm gathering what I could from the primary sources that are out there. First of all, I would say in terms of things that I think the campaign did well or that were kind of good things about it is that it was an attempt to be, I think the right kind of ambitious for our organization, for the IWW in that a lot of, a lot of campaigns at the time were kind of like taking a single shop that would come to us often, very small shops. And sometimes we would win.

2 (11m 24s):

Sometimes we would lose, we were experimenting with different, you know, alternate forms of organizing that weren't prioritizing recognition in the contract as a goal, sometimes mixed with more traditional campaigns, but it was kind of haphazard and also just like falling victim to the, to the problems of organizing in a small shop where it's like, if you've got 10 workers at a shop and, you know, you lose one, you just lost 10%, you know? So it, it took on, I think what was kind of the size target to punch just a little bit above our weight class in, in a chain that was in a piece of a chain, like a franchise chain of sandwich shops within a particular kind of bounded geographical area, where they had like a lot of organizers.

2 (12m 10s):

And so they thought, okay, we can, we can put our resources to use in a way that can really up our game and potentially like create a large enough target that we can really do some stuff. So I thought, I thought that was cool. And then I think the union learned a lot from that about how to create good public relations. I remember being impressed at the time with the professional quality press releases that were coming from the workers and it's a classic technique, but I think they did it really well of these regular flyers that would have pictures of workers faces from the committees. And then each time a new flyer would come out up more faces on it, and it would just get bigger and bigger.

2 (12m 54s):

You see this big cloud of workers, faces and lots of quotes about like, why they were involved. Again, like those were kind of stepping things up from where we were at at the time. I think, you know, as a side note, we can come back to the PR campaign. Also had some problems in terms of whether the PR matches what's actually going on in the inside. And maybe that relates to kind of some of my criticisms of it, I guess, before I go there, the, the rest of the summary of the campaign is that a member had been organizing his shop since probably around 2005, you know, stops and starts some successes here and there got a little bit of heat again, and then a bunch of folks from the IWW at the time and friends, all kind of decided now's the moment.

2 (13m 42s):

We're all going to go take applications for jobs at different Jimmy John's stores. And we're going to launch like a campaign with a bigger scope. So they started going in and they started building committees. There's like five salts may. I mean, the term salt here is also gets a little fuzzy because there was also like, you know, the original guy that was working there. He was an IWW member before he was working there. Does he count as assault? It kind of was his job, but the point being that at some point along the way, there was this problem at the core of the organizing in that the people who were doing the heavy lifting of doing a lot of one-on-ones with other workers and, you know, the sort of administrative things that come along with organizing, like keeping minutes and meetings and interfacing with the branch and potentially talking to the NLRB and things like that, that all just was starting was really just handled by the people who were either the salts or who were the IWW activists.

2 (14m 49s):

And they had, they were unable to branch out beyond that. And I don't think that was intentional, but it is the kind of thing that that happened. And then is exacerbated. I think once they made a decision to file for an election at, at the bargaining unit of, of several stores, kind of all within the twin cities limits, what happens then is you just sort of get on this track of a timeline and you are fighting to get the vote when it comes time to hold the elections. So pressure really ramps up cause you have this kind of do or die moment. You're either going to win the vote or you're not going to win the vote.

2 (15m 31s):

And I think when that pressure added to the situation, it just, it just compounds an already existing problem, which is that they weren't really able to build robust committees in the shops. But in the meantime, they do have a lot of people doing things. It's just that from the outside, you might not know that most of those people were folks who were already that level of active and most of whom came from the outside and then took the jobs. So it's this kind of thing where it almost becomes like, you know, it, it petered out for a variety of reasons. They narrowly narrowly lost the election.

2 (16m 14s):

It was a really sad day. They kind of missed it. They missed it by two votes. The boss did a bunch of ULPs, which they contested and then the election got overturned. But by then, you know, there wasn't like there wasn't enough support to ramp up for another election. And the bosses knew this as part of the strategy, right? As things fizzled, there still was a time like around that time where it's like, you've almost got a zombie union where you've got the, the folks that were starting to get involved, starting to form the basis of a committee, kind of dropped out and you're left with a shell of salts and a couple activists who can kind of keep things going, but is there really a union there?

2 (16m 54s):

You kind of have not built anything past where you started and really it comes back to sort of, what is the whole point of doing any of this? What's the point of labor organizing in general? The point is to develop capacity that wasn't there before, right. Is to develop a independent structure that workers can use to fight the boss and win and grow bigger and draw more and more people in and create something that wasn't there before. If that's our measure, Jimmy Johns was a failure by that measure. There's other measures where I think it was successful. I mean, I think if you measure by just kind of like having, having a lot of experience in a short amount of time that can lead to lessons that you take to other campaigns, you know, there was a couple people that were drawn in from that campaign that I think went on to stay Wobblies, although for the amount of, you know, workers involved in that unit kind of a disappointing few from, from where I was sitting.

2 (17m 55s):

And again, like maybe that's, you know, that's, that's a problem. Anyway, that, that goes to sort of the core of what I, my argument was is that salts, well, they can be a useful tactic if we're deploying them in, you know, responsible ways. They also carry with it, this, this danger that you can have an illusion of progress when not as happening. So that's kinda what I was trying to point out when I wrote about them.

1 (18m 23s):

One of the things you highlight in the article is that the perspective you're bringing into this as the perspective of a wobbly, right? The IWW perspective, which as a labor union, the idea is that the working class builds its own organization and minister, is it right? It's not a professionalized and bureaucratized business union, like not top heavy on the staff side. And what I like is that you highlight too that this idea that the salts go in and they kind of substitute themselves for the committee or they're in the lead of organizing. If we in the IWW have a critique of professional staff, as the problem with professional staff is they can easily come into a campaign and run it and administer all of the logistics of it and take over the strategizing and basically make workers the backend of their plan.

1 (19m 16s):

How is salting, where we basically substitute for committees and take charge of things any different than that. That seems to also be really important to the critique and the quote here that I really like is you right? Most radical say they believe workers can and should run the world. But too many times we don't behave that way when it comes to our own organizing. So that really seems to be the meat of the matter is who do we think is actually going to change power in the workplace? Yeah.

2 (19m 45s):

A few thoughts about that. I mean, yeah, in the first case, I really wanted to just highlight the point that you can't get away with a critique of staff-driven organizing just by saying, well, these Wobblies work there, they don't, they're not getting paid by a union for their, you know, the paycheck's not coming from a union, it's coming from a boss, just like a regular job, but it's not really a regular job though. Is it like, again, if it is, that's kind of a different scenario, but like if you're going in there to boost the campaign and like, I mean, this is the thing that the IWW says a lot and is like, well, I mean, part of it comes from a practical problem, which is that like, we are it low dues, scrappy, DIY kind of workers helping other workers kind of organization by.

2 (20m 48s):

And so we can't afford to have a whole bunch of staff, right. That's just like, we don't have a financial model that supports that kind of organizing. So it's like, okay, well we can do this. We have the boss pay the workers or wages, but if that's what we're doing, that we've also got to be careful of like all the other stuff that goes along with the staff critique. So anyway, I think, I think we're on the same page for that. And then, yeah, I wonder if, you know, part of the issue with these problems that emerge from salt, heavy strategies is actually kind of a subconscious belief that workers are not going to do it themselves. And we might say, we think that, but deep down, we don't actually think that.

2 (21m 30s):

And it also might STEM from like people just not being very good at organizing sometimes like, like it's, and it's, that's not really a knock on, let's not meant to like slam organizers out there trying to do this. It's really fucking hard. And like, it's a skill that you learn over time to be able to have a conversation that moves someone to action. I often think this is a problem of the left that it's like, well, I had a one-on-one with that person and it didn't work. So like, therefore I have to go do the work that I was trying to get them to do. And

1 (22m 10s):

Therefore one-on-ones don't work at all. Right.

2 (22m 12s):

Or, yeah, exactly. And so like, no, it's the, it's the wrong conclusion being drawn it again, like even if, a lot of times that's a, that's a subconscious process that goes on for people. Cause I don't think a lot of people, you know, most Wobblies are not going to be like saying that stuff out loud, that it's just sort of a computation that happens. It's just like, it happens a lot in different forms of organizing where it's like, we know the steps to like achieve what we want. We know the organizer training one-on-one one-on-one and we're trying to do it, but when it's not working, it can get very frustrating and lead us to take these different shortcuts and salting sometimes comes as a shortcut.

1 (22m 52s):

Well, I think sometimes the pressures of a campaign to make it to where you want to just keep moving things forward and you get desperate and moments of stagnation and even decline to try to just substitute for the work, just take over and then hope that you can reverse engineer all the gaps that, you know, you were missing along the way. And you'll just get to the finish line. So now it never works that way. No, definitely.

2 (23m 16s):

Well, it seems like it's going to work and then it doesn't, it doesn't work and I've been, I've been there too, you know, I think we've all been there. Like then when you do this work and you look back and you're like, yep, that was the moment I was too caught up in. We can't lose momentum or it's going to die. So let's just skip this step and it'll probably be okay, we'll just roll the dice. So almost never is.

1 (23m 38s):

Oh yeah. And I'm, I'm, I've been guilty of this too. So nobody, nobody is free from this failure. Yeah. There's another part of this that I wonder it's gonna clearly be speculation, but you did point out and I have heard the strategy more recently with salts is that a lot of times they tend to be people that are recently out of college, like new members of the DSA recently out of college or whatever, it might be like newly radicalized people are like fresh out of school that don't have much practical organizing experience that tend to be the salts. And maybe that's part of why there's this kind of subconscious thing, like you're saying where they just don't actually trust the workers to do the work or they don't really have a conception of the working place of the working class being capable of self-administering its own organization.

2 (24m 26s):

Yeah, it's weird. Right. Like I went to the factory and then like the workers didn't trust me. So like they probably don't know what they're talking about. Yeah. That, that is the thing. And again, like full disclosure, I totally was one of those guys. I like, I got out of college and I went and took a job at a boiler factory. I didn't, I didn't really have any plans. I didn't know. Like I didn't actually implement anything that's succeeded or failed. Eventually I just got laid off because there wasn't enough work. But yeah. I mean, I think, I think that certainly is like, I just in general, like just thinking back to that time in my life and I just didn't, I didn't know anything, you know, I even having been through the organizer training, like the organizer training is one thing, but it requires going out there and trying to test the material and trying to like stand on your own two feet and do things that are really uncomfortable and have conversations that fail.

2 (25m 30s):

And it's only with that kind of work that you actually end up knowing how to do it. So again, I'm not like I'm not totally down on salting and I see some places for it, for college students or otherwise. But I think, you know, the more you kind of go into anything related to organizing with the understanding that like, you just, you don't know how to do it yet. And you're really learning from people, including your, and maybe especially your coworkers, like the better off you're going to be.

1 (26m 5s):

Well, I'd like you to say it too. It's not all to dismiss entirely salting as a tactic and a strategy. It's more to learn from the lessons, take case studies and get better at what we do. So you do offer a very tangible advice on how to tweak and define salting in a way that can make it productive to our organizing. So I'd like, I'd like to talk about those specifically. So the one thing you already touched on, but maybe you could just clarify briefly is that we should probably have a better definition of salting. So you write, if you just need a job and you're already a wobbly, that's not really the same as salting. Do you want to elaborate any more on that?

2 (26m 47s):

Yeah. Well I would say, you know, it, doesn't, it's, I think of the idea of, you know, this concept of we organize the worker, not the job, which I think is overstated. Sometimes we do both, but like with the concept of like, there's something unique about the IWW as a union, which is that it, when you join it, you take it wherever you go for, as long as you are down with the preamble, you know? So whatever job you're at, you continue to be a member of the union. So that's why I think of that. Even if you're technically not a wobbly, but you have that philosophy of like, whatever job I'm at, I'm going to be doing some kind of organizing.

2 (27m 27s):

That's just like a way of being that is like a wobbly way of being, I don't know if that answers your question, but like, that's kind of, to me, I just basically saying like, let's call that something else. Let's not call it salted.

1 (27m 38s):

Cause you say that salting is more ad hoc, right? It's like a temporary tactic that we should use to help boost and advance campaigns. Right. And on that note, you say kind of jumping ahead of some of your other pieces that something is better used to augment pre-existing campaigns. Do you want to talk more about that?

2 (28m 1s):

Yeah, so, and I think that goes along with another point I make, which is like for a specific, like to get past specific obstacles. So it's just a suggestion that like maybe instead of thinking about salting as a way to jumpstart a campaign, we should think about it as a way we, we should think, look, be more creative and look for other ways to jumpstart campaigns. And then if we can get them off the ground and we run into a very specific obstacle that salting would solve, it might be a more useful tactic. For example, just a very common one. We ended up in a workplace that has different departments and one of the departments is mostly Spanish speaking.

2 (28m 42s):

Then we do have a very kind of like external obstacle right there that if we have someone who's willing to salt who speaks Spanish, that can bridge the gap from an existing committee, from a different department to at least get the communication going, you know, and expand that way. Or if we're in one location of a job that has multiple locations or multiple stores in a franchise, and we feel like we need to expand to get the necessary power to win our demands. That's like a, you know, a geographic obstacle. We don't have anybody over there. So we didn't send out if somebody over there that's generating contact information and connecting new organizing to an existing committee, but kind of the principle behind it goes back to the idea that we have to.

2 (29m 29s):

And I think this is a bigger principle that can be applied to so many lessons that I feel like are really important is to think about what exactly constitutes success and you know, early on in organizing, I think we have to be very clear that success means very specific things. It means getting a complete contact list. That's a success identifying organic workplace leaders. Like that's a success once you've done it. If you can S like successfully figure out that social chart and then actually building a committee of workers, not salts who are meeting and starting to decide things, and then themselves getting trained and doing, one-on-ones like, that's the real kind of nucleus.

2 (30m 16s):

Like, that's the goal when we can start to say, okay, now we are succeeding at the things we've set out to do. And that's the thing that I feel like oddly often, most often gets missed and people talk about there's a campaign here. And like in our branch in LA, we never say that we don't, we never call anything a campaign until there's an actual committee that has met like three weeks in a row. It's like, okay, now we can call this a campaign of some kind. But like, yeah, there's a campaign because I had a one-on-one with a coworker to me it's like, you're, you're not even quite there yet. So it's like, that can also be something where it's like, it clarifies the salting issue, which is that just having activity doesn't mean that we've got the thing that we want.

2 (31m 4s):

And if we've got the thing that we want, then salts become helping that thing grow and become more successful, not substituting for it.

1 (31m 13s):

Right. Which relates to a couple other points that you make that seem pretty connected is that salt should not lead the campaigns. Like what you're saying. They shouldn't substitute for themselves for the committees. And also they need to be part of plans that others are in on is how you say it. So do you want to talk a little bit more about that? Like, I think what you're saying is that not only should they not lead, but the fact that their salts should be transparent.

2 (31m 37s):

Yeah. And that's tricky because when do you tell people about the fact that you are assault and I don't know that I have great advice there, although that'd be a very interesting question to think about in general, I've tried to be very upfront about that. So, you know, in, in the most recent campaign I was helping with, we did try to get a couple salts in and we succeeded with one and not the other, but again like that was a small committee was built already. And there was a meeting where I was like, Hey, there's this thing called salting. And this is what it is.

2 (32m 19s):

And this is potentially how it could help. What do you guys think? Should we do this? And everybody was very enthusiastic. And they said, yes, we'll, we'll help get these people jobs. And, you know, we can spread the work around a little bit. And so that's also like a different picture, you know, then it's like the committee itself is, is debating a tactic and then using it and knowing right up front that people will be coming in. And then it just becomes, you know, sometimes awkward when the committee grows. And then there's new people on the committee who didn't know that this person was assault. And then you have to have that conversation, but hopefully you've built enough trust through one-on-ones at that point to find the appropriate time to fill people in on that.

2 (32m 59s):

But yeah, I think that's the best way to sort of give an example of like what it means for people to be defining their own plans. And when you start with salts, it's, it's difficult, you know, it's difficult to get there and there's all these pressures and temptations to do it the reverse way. Cause you're the union on the job when you start there and you're already making all the decisions.

1 (33m 21s):

Well, another thing that you point out that I really like a lot is that you argue the priority for salt should be to gather information. Right. And I thought on that note, what I would like is if you wouldn't mind sharing how you had your own personal experience salting on the job, where you were asked to transition into a different job category specifically for the purpose of getting information. So can you talk about that experience and why it was so vital to the campaign?

2 (33m 50s):

Sure. It's pretty simple. I was a bike messenger. The campaign was ongoing, a little bit of extra information about it was that it started as kind of a city-wide campaign. It's kind of started from, you know, more of a top level because that industry is so kind of messengers flow from employer to employer and there's this kind of culture in the industry. And then at some point I just decided that like, I'm going to stop helping from the outside and I was not working at the time and I'll go ahead and get a job. And I'll be, I'll be trying to build something at one of these companies.

2 (34m 33s):

Well, some of the other people that are involved, they're building it. Other ones turned out that like me doing that was actually the only thing that ever really built to real actions. So, but that's an interesting other lesson along the way. But anyway, so I was, I was working as a biker and at some point successfully helped to build a committee and then a dispatcher job opened up who are the folks that kind of tell everybody where to go, where to pick up the packages, where to deliver them. There's two of them at this particular job and they're on walkies all day, just kind of dispatching the orders. And they, the company asked me that like asked me if I wanted to do it. And my first reaction was like, no, it's kind of management E although that's really debatable in that industry.

2 (35m 19s):

And I was like, I got a thing going here, you know, is this going to take me away from folks? But then some of the folks on the committee, we were just starting to get organized and go in and they were like, take the job. Like we want you in there because you'll be in the office. We never get to even, you know, go through that door and you'll be able to like feed us information. Like, what are they, what are people talking about? And like, what kind of information can we get? And I, you know, within like a couple of weeks, there was a binder that had like everybody's phone number on it. And all of a sudden we had a complete contact, which like we were struggling to get, you know, and then we could just go, we could go house, visit everybody.

2 (36m 1s):

We could go like talk to people. We didn't even, nobody had ever even met. So, so yeah, that was a win, but it wasn't the end of it either. I mean, like I would hear bosses commit. ULP is like, you know, next to me. And when there were job actions, I would see their reactions, like even just their emotional reactions and be able to tell workers about it and giving them a feeling of power. There was just all kinds of little, little like bonus pieces of information that helped the campaign tremendously. It wasn't something I particularly wanted to do, but you know, even not knowing then kind of some of the perspectives I have on salting now that may have helped me to avoid some of those pitfalls that maybe I would have fallen into some of those things myself, you know, that certainly was a temptation all the time to, you know, do the work for other people.

2 (36m 50s):

And that was a way where it was like, it kind of forced a situation where the folks that were the bikers, like they had to do it, they had to do it themselves. You know, I couldn't be, I, I literally couldn't be out there on a megaphone or anything, like, cause I was the sleeper agent on the inside. Like they were like, no, we don't want anybody to know about you ever.

1 (37m 10s):

Hey, I think if I was going to be a salt, that would probably be the scenario. I'd like the most to get, to be a double agent, like really put on a different like manager perspective and personality and like one space and just act like a total different person.

2 (37m 22s):

Yeah. Honestly, not me. I hate that shit. It made me so anxious all the time. It took years off my life. I think I lost like, you lost a lot of my hair like around that time because it's so not me. I'm not like, not like a deceptive person. I hate that kind of thing. There was one, one experience that just, this is kind of funny side tangent was that there was another company on the South side of the loop that like we had, we had a couple of contacts over there and they were trying to get something going. And I got a call one night from one of them that was like, you got to come down here and talk to these guys. And it was very like unclear what was going on, but I could hear a lot of shouting in the background and he's like, yeah, we're talking about the union.

2 (38m 6s):

You've got to come down here. Like I got everybody red flags already, but so I go, so I like, I think I like jumped on my bike or something. And I went down to this place and started basically trying to put out fires. Cause it was basically a big argument about like, should we be part of this union or should we not, not a situation you want to get in. There's nothing good going to come out of this. I basically tried to like talk to who I could diffuse the situation, maybe set up a one-on-one at some point. Like, I don't know. I probably was also all over the place. Nothing came out of it. But the funny thing was that I went to work the next day as the dispatcher. And right next to me, the owner of the company is talking to like the CFO or something and saying like, yeah, the unions got somebody down, outside, outside comment messenger.

2 (38m 55s):

Like he was out there last night. And then like, she was like talking to people in the room about like whoever this guy was. And I was like, I wonder who that guy was. It was like the department, you know, I'm right. I'm right there. Standing, sitting right there. Huh.

1 (39m 11s):

Well, I hope you put on your best to Caprio impression for that moment.

2 (39m 14s):

Yeah. This hand does not shake.

1 (39m 19s):

Well, the one other piece of advice that you give for salting that I think is important that we haven't touched. We've kind of touched on it a little bit. I just want to flush it out more because I think it's also probably one of the ones that maybe you have the most charged feelings about. I think I do too, is the beware of the tourists. So when you're salting watch out for those people that are just kind of like looking for an adventure is maybe more, just an exciting escapade for them. So why is that an important piece of advice for people to know and to watch out for?

2 (39m 48s):

Yeah. I mean, I think it's something to watch out for in any circumstance, regardless of salting, it's just not conducive to, it's not a mentality that's conducive to successful organizing, which is a slow patient, mostly boring often demoralizing process. And when somebody's coming in looking to have some kind of adventure and possibly be the hero, it's not going to be good and it's going to be especially bad if we are having these other problems and trusting them to be the, the brains of the, of the campaign at the shop, which brings up another point too.

2 (40m 29s):

And I think it's worth mentioning and they'll come back to this, but that there's another danger that's occurring to me now just organizationally is that once you're working at the job and you're the point of contact for that campaign or that organizing you also often kind of, because of in the IWW case sort of, because of our structure, you are suddenly lent a credibility and kind of a form of kind of social and organizational power with that, that also can be a problem. And that's goes back to, I think my point about like salt should be part of a plan and salt should be like reporting to somebody right. There should be some accountability mechanism there. Yeah. It's just, if those people are serving as sort of the brains of the operation and kind of doing all the work, then if things are going slowly, folks like that are just much more likely to make bad decisions and skip a bunch of steps and do something that gets everybody fired just to rush things forward.

2 (41m 29s):

And also I think I, I bring up at some point that especially if this is also combined with the fact that you just graduated from UCLA last year and you, in your mind, you made this big sacrifice to, instead of going to grad school, you're going to go work at taco bell. Then at some point, most people that are coming from that background are going to be like, I wasn't planning on being here like five years down the road, like, let's get going guys. Like, can we just do something so I can fucking quit?

2 (42m 9s):

And that's like not a good place to be making decisions from.

1 (42m 13s):

Well, and I think one of the other dangers too, is that, you know, you don't want somebody that's just looking to like, have like a cool rap sheet, you know, like, Oh, I just want to like get on a strike line and get to be able to put that down in my, my biography. I'm writing about myself already. You know, just kind of like, like you said earlier, just it's kind of an egotistical perspective to bring into the organizing that can genuinely be damaging in the long run.

2 (42m 39s):

You know, at this point in my life, I, I, I really avoid people like that. So I forget that there are a lot of folks out there like that who like are looking to, to, to put some of this work on their LinkedIn profile or something. And a lot of times like jumpstart their career as a staff or somewhere else and use the IWW as a junior apprenticeship program for their, for their future staff job. So, yeah, that's a real problem too. Yeah.

1 (43m 7s):

I'll be honest. You know, I meant like labor organizing can be a career. It can be a pretty comfortable one. So that could be a way that you step into that career.

2 (43m 17s):

Don't step on it. Don't step on workers, heads on you're on your way to that career, I'd say

1 (43m 22s):

Right. Well, I think that we've had a pretty fleshed out and full conversation about salting, I guess, to just kind of bring us to a conclusion I would want to ask, have you seen salting in places be really effective? Like maybe we can leave on the note of, we've gotten this good advice about how we can calibrate salting to get us farther and organizing we've we've leveled a lot of critiques about where it can go wrong. Are there any examples that come to mind where you've seen salting done really well and effectively? Yeah, I hope that's not the worst question I asked.

2 (43m 57s):

No, no. Yeah. Cause I have no, the answer is no, I never seen it. No, yes. I do have a few examples. I mean, I do think in my case, I like in the, in the messenger campaign, it was effective, you know, in the ways that we talked about, I think it was effective because I had had some failures under my belt already and I adhered very strictly to the organizer training steps. And it was anytime that I didn't, that things went wrong. So I knew by that time that like, if it was just me or just me and a couple other people, we were not winning yet. We needed to build to a majority.

2 (44m 39s):

And I also knew, and I think also by disposition, like I'm not somebody who likes to be in the limelight and who likes to be like out there giving speeches, I'm much more of a, in the background, nuts and bolts kind of one-on-one relationships and try to get, try to get somebody else to give the speech, you know, and that's, again, that's like more by personal disposition even than by good organizing principles. Although it is, it doubles as a good organizing principle. And then I would say, you know, I do have a couple of examples recently. They're more like non-public campaigns, but I worked on a grocery campaign that, you know, was ultimately not successful.

2 (45m 22s):

But for a moment we did have assault who did the things that I tried to argue for, which is we add assault who was there specifically because he was fluent in Spanish. And he was able to help us build a majority Spanish speaking committee, which we wouldn't have been able to do otherwise. And then in that same campaign, we also got assault in a different grocery store in the same chain who was very young, not great social skills. And we did not like deploy them as somebody to build a committee, but rather to take a photograph of the employee call list on a wall.

2 (46m 2s):

And it was also something where this person, like, they were also just like really directionless in their life. And like when they got this thing, we just like gave them so much praise. And they were like, I did something to like help people. And it was great, you know, like that was that, that was sort of the end of it. And it was just like a, a really good use of the, of the tactic. And then in a campaign I worked on in a museum, which is the one I mentioned where the committee was kind of deciding to use this tactic again, the committee was built, it was growing and then assault joined with who she was able to just take a little bit more of the work and very kind of humbly and with the direction of some of the external organizers kind of provide her own insights from her campaigns that she had been involved in, in the past and occasionally chime in at meetings, but leave the space for other folks to have the discussions in committee meetings, make their own decisions again, sometimes just like make mistakes and, and yeah, it was just a very small supplement to something that was already growing and had its own kind of independent existence.

2 (47m 16s):

So yeah, I think in those cases, those things were pretty useful. I, and I would even venture to say that in that most, that latter campaign things would have been perfectly fine without assault, which is another thing to think about. There might be times where we just don't need them at all. And I think some people in the IWW anyway, might not recognize that that's a possibility, like I think, and I used to have this mentality too, of like, if you've got a campaign going, you find anybody who needs a job, get them a job over there. But now I, I, I, I don't think that way, you know, it's, it's really only like, is there a very specific need and are we going to be able to avoid all these pitfalls? And sometimes like, I would favor just like not using the tactic at all.

2 (47m 59s):

So in general, you know, those, those very small, specific needs, I think, is the time to use them otherwise consider a salt-free meal.

1 (48m 11s):

Well, I think that's a perfect ending of this conversation. I really appreciate the time that you've given folks should check out the article. That was the basis of this conversation. It's called salt, the flavor, not the meal on organizing.work. Our guest has been MK Lees. Thanks again for joining the labor wave and hope we can have you again, sometime

2 (48m 31s):

It was my pleasure. <inaudible>.

Ep. 2 Comrades Read A Syndicalist View on The Rank and File Strategy w/ Tom Wetzel

Tom Wetzel, author of the forthcoming book Overcoming Capitalism from AK Press, joins Laborwave Radio to discuss a syndicalist critique of Kim Moody's rank and file strategy.

Our conversation focuses on arguments made by Wetzel in two pieces for Black Rose Anarchist Federation, The Case for Building New Unions https://blackrosefed.org/the-case-for-building-new-unions-wetzel/; and The Rank and File Strategy: A Syndicalist View https://blackrosefed.org/wetzel-rank-and-file-strategy-syndicalist/

Wetzel points out that Moody's strategy exclusively relies on transforming existing business unions, an unlikely task but also one that overlooks how nearly 90% of workers do not belong to unions and can be organized into independent unions. Rather than reforming business unions and then hoping it expands into more unions, Wetzel maintains our primary focus should be on organizing the non-unionized workers into entirely different types of unions.

This and more in our conversation. Please support Laborwave Radio by subscribing to our patreon at patreon.com/laborwave We have gifts depending on the tier you join, and exclusive access to our archives and Discord server.

Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, it helps our content reach new listeners.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/laborwave-radio/id1536697871

Transcript

So I want to go ahead and dive right in for listeners. This is the second episode of our series on comrades. Read the rank and file strategy by Kim moody. You can go back to the first episode and hear our conversation on what's in the text and Moody's arguments. Our guest today has a critical take on the strategy and its limitations. So Tom, the first thing I wanted to ask you is what is limited about Moody's take on the rank and file strategy. You talked about how he focuses on trying to create militancy within existing AFL CIO unions. And why is that not going to work out?

2 (2m 13s):

He assumes one kind of situation, which is where you have an entrenched AFL SIA union and the bureaucracy to paid officials at the top of that union pose a roadblock or problem for the developed further development of the struggle. And he recognizes that problem posed by the, particularly at the international union level of, of the, the full-time paid officials and their staff and the way in which many American use, since the second world war have become very top-down and staff-driven. And so his whole focus is on trying to change those right and to rebuild from within this inherited heavily bureaucratized kind of labor movement.

2 (3m 7s):

And that is actually a situation that, that a certain proportion of the workers do face that the problem is that today only 6.2% of workers in the private sector belong to those unions. They've been basically the, the, the so many industries of India union. So you have these men, you have today many large workplaces, large companies where there's no union, right? And he, his approach doesn't really address that situation. It's as if he saying, well, we will have to change the inherited unions so that then they can go out and try and organize the unorganized and build new union.

2 (3m 56s):

And that was actually the position that William Z. Foster took back in the twenties with the trade union educational league, which Mooney refers to as the first time his approach was used. So that's a fundamental problem. Fundamental problem is that there's really today, a lot of scope, a lot of space, so to speak for building new industrial unions controlled by workers from the beginning from scratch, right? And so why should we have to wait until somehow in the future you've rebuilt, you know, or somehow changed inherited unions.

2 (4m 39s):

And I think a problem there is that a lot of these international unions, the structurally are never going to be really changed into a work control. And you, if you look at, if you study carefully, the United auto workers union, and then its history and unions like SEU and UFC w they are so hardened in their bureaucratic control from the top. And, and you have tons of examples of rank and file movements in those unions that were smashed by the bureaucracy, went back to say the 1980s with the UFC WWE and the peanut strike at that time where there was a very participatory democratic militant movement among workers in meatpacking class, did that, that union organized well, what happened at, and the companies that was the beginning of the dehumanization, that industry where wages were being chopped down, the speed up was beginning to coming worse and worse.

2 (5m 43s):

And PNI was the first real fight back against that. And it was supported by many meatpacking workers, but it was destroyed from the top by the officials of the UFC w placing at union and trusteeship, throwing out their elected leaders, and literally forcing on the workers acceptance of the employers offer because they were simply interested in protecting the union as an institution, as a source of dues for them. And they were willing to accept any conditions. Anyway, as long as the union would be. And this relates to the problem of sort of the bureaucratic layer at the top, they tend to identify working class interests with protecting that institution that gives them their position and their income and their prestige and so forth.

2 (6m 36s):

And it ends up, you know, becoming a barrier to the advance of the struggle. Now that moody recognizes that problem. He recognizes that the role of the bureaucratically, but the fundamental inconsistency in his outlook is he doesn't really have any different, he doesn't have a different vision of how a whole national union could be Brian and the history of the American Federation of labor. The legacy of that, of the American Federation of labor is we have these international unions as they're called that are really forms of democratic centralism, where power is centered in the international executive board and paid officials at the top.

2 (7m 25s):

And they have legally the right and the power to control and manage the whole union. The local unions legally are just this street of units of the people at the top, and the courts have ruled this so that when unions go in and throw out the leaders, that they, you know, if, if they feel that the militant movement at the rank and file level is threatening them, their interests, the courts have said that that's perfectly legal for them to do because that's how those unions are structured and moody never really deals with that problem at all. And there is of course, an alternative to that, an alternate and, and the penile strikers in the 1980s sort of revived the earlier like 1920s and 1930 cynical view that said we should build the national union organizations as controlled by the workers from the local unions, so that the local unions would remain in control of the, of, of the whole national organization, because the union would be organized as a kind of horizontal Federation of local union.

2 (8m 37s):

So the peanut and Stryker's proposed, for example, a new national meat packing industry union, where instead of a headquarters that paid officials at the top, they propose there would be the UV control by the local unions to election of delegates, to like coordinating councils. So like, there'd be a whole coordinating council for the union, but it would be made up of delegates from the local union and in a particular company like Hormel or one or Smithfield, one of the other companies, if there was multiple plants, then there would be a chain committee for that company that would also be made up of delegate delegates from the local unions.

2 (9m 19s):

And that way the local unions themselves would remain in control and they explicitly rejected the whole power of trusteeship. They said that if a local union disagrees with the national union, they should have the right to disaffiliate and go the wrong way so that the national union should be regarded as a Federation of horizontal Federation of local unions under the control of workers at the local level. Right. And so, so it's interesting that the Penai strikers from their own experience came to that conclusion, which had been like the common program in the twenties and thirties of these, of the large syndicates unions in Europe and Latin America.

0 (10m 3s):

Yeah. I want to talk more about that history and also go deeper into your arguments about how to organize the unorganized, the need to do that. But before getting there, there there's something that I find is very interesting and paradoxical about the popularity of Moody's arguments. As you just noted yourself, moody acknowledges all of these limits to boring from within, at the AFL CIO and how the bureaucracy keeps reproducing itself. And what's interesting to me is that it seems like we're witnessing a resurgence in the popularity of the rank and file strategy and the people that are finding it inspiring also tend to understand these well-documented limitations of trying to bore from within the AFL CIO.

0 (10m 49s):

So I just kind of wonder, like, what's happening. Like, why is this so heavily embraced even by people that will out of one side of their mouth, talk about how probably it's not going to work, but then keep pushing forward. Like, what do you think is happening?

2 (11m 3s):

Well, I think the problem here is that it's really both the democratic socialist or social Democrats on the one hand and Lennon is on the other, have been committed politically to what they call democratic Central's conceptions of organization. That conception of organization is that you have at the top of an organization, a paid group of paid elected officials, and they have the power to manage that organization. So if you accept that concept and you think that's the way organizations, unions, or political parties or whatever should be run, you don't really have a critique of the kind of structure of this kind of top-down structure of the FLC.

2 (11m 54s):

That is the fundamental contradiction in Mooney's theory of the rank and file strategy, because he recognizes the importance of patient of developing, you know, the struggle and the shop worker control over the union. And he also, you know, but at the same time, he wants to propose that movements work rank and file movements go for powers and put it, or take over the existing apparatus of the unions. But that's just simply as accepting that paid the Roxy at the top implicitly, right? He doesn't critique that idea the way in which the AFL CIO interaction with Oregon, and that makes the whole program inconsistent.

2 (12m 41s):

But I think that gets to your question it's because I think of the it's the political limitations a whole lot, that a lot of the groups that support the rank and cross strategy come to the, to this issue with they bring the, they accept already the idea of centralizing control of organizations at the top. Yeah. I mean, that's part of Leninist ideology was historically also part of social democratic political organizations as well. But I mean, that's, it's a political problem basically.

0 (13m 16s):

Well, and it sounds like it's a political problem of a vision, right? Like there's competing visions of politics and the path forward. And clearly right now, the popularity of groups, like the DSA makes one type of political vision, more prominent, one that we're more exposed to regularly on social media, you offer a different political vision. And what I really like about your articles and black Rose is you document some of the history of when these moments of imagination around like what's possible kind of flourished. So can you talk about like the cynical view, like what, what it means, what this vision is politically and what periods of time and us history have we seen cinder carism really like more prominent.

2 (14m 5s):

If you go back to the two biggest periods of working class insurgency in USA in the first world war era, very that's where you can see examples of that kind of grassroots unionism being built. And one of my favorite examples from the 1930s was the independent union of all workers. It was ironically, but started at the same plan as in Austin, Minnesota. And the main architect of that union was a long time IWW.

2 (14m 47s):

What's your crack yellows. And his conception was that we're going to organize all the workers in town. It's not going to be like siloed, just focusing on meatpacking workers. We're going to organize everybody in the town into a single union and two to run. What was essentially a local labor Federation in that town. They had delegates elected from the different sectors. So they're going to be from the retail sector. We organized the storms and the downtown. They organized truck drivers and warehouses, and they to have sector delegates who would come to a monthly delegate council meeting.

2 (15m 31s):

And that, that was how they made decisions for that local union. But they built similar role in a number of other cities like in Albert Lea, Minnesota, which is fairly North Northern part of Minnesota. And in the cities that they also look into view Iowa. Another one, there was no national executive board that ran it rather. It was a horizontal Federation of these local unions that were essentially internal federations of the various sectors in that now. And that's very similar to the way that unions were developed in places like Spain and Portugal, where you would have like an, a CNT in Spain in the twenties and thirties, the dominant organization was the local Federation of local unions.

2 (16m 23s):

And so each ancient, these vocal unions would be built on the basis of, in the shop organizing, you would have elected delegates, you have a delegate council and you have periodic assemblies of the workers, each of these workplaces, right? And then they would send delegates to a Federation throughout the city throughout that particular region. And then the CFE nationally was just a Federation of all those local Federation. That's another example of that. And, and B, because it remained very locally focused and controlled. The tendency was to develop struggles of solidarity who general strikes among those different local unions, these sectors, because they direct directly were connected to each one of the problems of the AFL CA each union is sort of siloed.

2 (17m 18s):

That is no national Congress of worker delegate to make up, decide on the program direction, the whole labor movement, the FLC is just an Alliance of these top leaders, right. Or the different union. And so there's no cross union direct connection of the workers.

0 (17m 41s):

Yeah. I mean, operating inside mainstream labor unions, business unions, I can attest that the inter union is complete, is minimal to non-existent. It's like such a mess. And these are things that fall under the umbrella, the AFL CIO, like the Teamsters don't fall under that, but even, but they operate very similarly. I want to hear more of your thoughts about how they do try to practice democracy and like AFL CIO type unions, particularly at that national international level, you're talking about conventions. So why are conventions basically a farce of democracy? How do they cut out the rank and file?

2 (18m 19s):

They nominally, they're supposed to be democratic organizations where the local unions like delegates, but in practice, what happens first of all, the conventions nowadays don't happen very often, four or five years at infrequent. And so they don't interfere with management from the top that much, but very often at the convention that these conventions you will have, the delegates will actually be paid officers or staff members for local unions or from the international union. And many of the larger local unions are kind of like eat them erratic Ethan's are political machines. And so they will have their people there at the conventions.

2 (19m 1s):

That would be a very powerful for us at that convention so that the international union ends up being kind of like just building alliances among the bureaucracies that make up the layers of that and the international. And also the conventions may have limitations in terms of what the rank and file can do. If you look at the United auto workers, unions, sample their constitution, which is creating a top-down, but the 1935, let's say you're elected as a delegate. And there is a proposal from the leadership. You have no right to stand up and make a proposed amendment to that proposal.

2 (19m 46s):

The constitution gives delegates no right to do this proposals from the floor, no right. To make amendments from the floor at all calls. Those have to go through the committees, the convention committees and the convention committees are appointed from the top of the national executive board. So that's how in that union, there really is no rank and file control over those convention.

0 (20m 13s):

Also to that point, it's pretty common that union elections are uncontested even the mechanisms of democracy that might exist. Aren't heavily utilized because they're in various ways kind of discouraged, I think. And I think this, again, a test, all the well documented case studies that we know make Moody's arguments about the rank and file strategy, extremely difficult to realize if not outright implausible. What I think is interesting that you lay down in your article, the case for building new unions in black Rose is that you're not opposed to the rank and file having power over unions. Like that's not the aspect of Moody's arguments that you find out of order.

0 (20m 57s):

Like you think that, but you're saying what kinds of unions is more important? And I really like, I just want to read this quote from the piece and ask you to expand on it. You're right. In certain times and places, the rebel grassroots soul of unionism comes to the fore and other periods of paid bureaucratically or consolidates its positions and looks to restrain the level of conflict in order to ensure the survival of the union as an institution, to the hostile terrain of capitalist industry. This contradictory character of unionism is also expressed at times in the conflict between the rank and file of unions and the paid officials at the top. So you're clearly wanting that other expression, the rank and file and rebellious expression of flourish.

0 (21m 40s):

What are the ways that you believe for today? We can enable that spirit to come to the, for the rank and file that actually has power over particular kinds of radical unions. How do you suggest that can start happening?

2 (21m 55s):

Well, if you look at the particular periods of time, when this rebel tendency is, I call it constant reform becomes really a major force like in the world war one era or early 1930s, there were certain kinds of conditions that started enable that to happen. There was, first of all, there was a previous period of testing and, and developing experiences by ranking for our workers who were interested and committed to building right over a period of some years. But by the time this really takes off what you see.

2 (22m 38s):

If you develop a very substantial layer in the unions of what the cynical to call the military minority or the active committed workers who have some kind of experience who know a little bit about organizing and, and committed to building and bringing in other coworkers into the game, right. Then a lot of them present. So the prep, so the development of that layer of more and more people who are actively committed to organizing in the workplace, you know how to do that. That's one of our tasks. We have to develop more and more people up.

2 (23m 21s):

And also another thing that you will find in those periods is that there's a kind of connection between a period of social turmoil and development of social movements in general, that affects the work that thinking of the working class in general, and therefore more and more workers rank. If I work with open to the idea of taking on you in court and at building an opposition organization. So that's another one of the features of those kinds of theories, you know, and another sort of aspect of those situations is workers learning from other workers.

2 (24m 4s):

So you'll have strike waves, which are, can be a kind of copycat phenomenon. You see, you see a group of workers in another place they've gone on strike at one certain concessions from an employer, you know, so then you borrow their tactics. You try to build something like that. And when that really takes off and you see lots and lots and lots of strikes going on, then that creates a kind of, it's greater than the individual parts for social force that creates pride. And that's when the working class is really on a roll and is able, he make major gains in the society and it encourages workers more and more to have competence and the ability to do that.

2 (24m 51s):

So that class consciousness develops from the success at curing out disruptive actions that bring production to a hall, which is the way that worker power is really expressed.

0 (25m 6s):

And those features, they all seem very present today. Like so many of them. Absolutely. So what's your assessment right now of the prospects for building these radical independent labor unions? Like, are we seeing it happen or what does it look like?

2 (25m 22s):

I don't really, I don't know. I haven't yet seen a lot of initiatives towards independent unions. There are some that do exist organizing groups or trying to build independent, but mostly most of the organizing of new unions or unions at workplace that takes place happens within the framework of the AFL union. So you have people who want to organize the union. So their tendency is to go out and contact one of the AFL CIO union. You know, like for example, the current, the effort at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama, they contacted the retail wholesale and departments that are part of the CW.

2 (26m 13s):

And if there aren't workers there as organizers who are consciously thinking along the lines of building an independent union, that the workers control, and because of the fact that they understand the problems of the AFL CIO union, if you don't have yet significant numbers of those people, then you're not yet ready to have a real movement of independent unionism. So I think more and more organic ranking need to be, have that kind of orientation of trying to build unions that are independent from the AFL CIO, the workers themselves would remain in control of them, I think.

2 (27m 4s):

And I think that there's potential for that precisely because as you pointed out there is gradually a growing willingness of workers to fight that willingness of workers to try to build organizations in our, in workplaces where you use. And when you see that, you know, see this in various place, it is in, high-tech like warehouses healthcare in various areas, right?

0 (27m 31s):

Yeah. But it does sound like the real challenge is figuring out like what should be our approach to the AFL CIO, like recognizing that their reach is much more extensive than say, like the IWW, like that could help foster and instill this idea of like rank and file control and administration of your own affairs. And you put this on your article too, is that we shouldn't just completely ignore the AFL CIO Moody's arguments leave a lot to be desired. So like, how do we approach the AFL CIO understanding that it poses a real challenge to cynical us unions for fishing, as well as other forms of like radical, independent. Yes.

2 (28m 10s):

As I stay in that ease that there is a certain section of the economy that is where the AFL unions aren't, I, we can't sort of ignore that sector. So we do need to have a kind of strategy for how to deal with that situation. But I think that it, there, again, it's similar to the perspective of building anything in unions and you recognize and understand the problem posed by the concentration of power in the paid official layer in yantra Alfio union. So that means that if you're in a workplace where you do have any AFL union, then your goal there should be to build a worker, community worker, organization, independent of the garage, and to maintain that independence.

2 (29m 4s):

And you can intervene in various ways because unions at the local level have a certain level of democracy, or there are certain kinds of meetings where more of the members present, like if you're going to have a strike vote, or you're going to have vote on contract, these are like massive debt where large numbers of the, of the members of the union show up, which they may not two monthly meetings, regular meetings. And so in those kinds of situations and independent Nate can express its particular orientation, its point of view, you can sleep, people can speak their mind, you know, and your committee can have its newsletter or blog or whatever.

2 (29m 48s):

And he producing information. And it had a perspective for the rank and file members of that union. And I think that the thing about having an independent is that you want to be able to, to the extent possible, have the potential to develop action evidently of the bureaucracy and also in situations where the you're obviously is going to sell you out. It's significant opposition to defeat an example of an organization like that is a railroad represent height. For example, they have, they have members in several different railroad crafting the smart, which is a conductors union and the brothers over a reel of maintenance away employees and locomotive engineer.

2 (30m 43s):

And they basically bird dog what the officials of those unions do. And they've been able to intervene to stop sell out agreements at various points and may have one of the main issues. There is the push of the companies to go to just having one person running a huge trade rather than the present two person crews. And they've been able to defeat those moves. Right. And so having an independent organization enables you to mobilize people for action like that.

0 (31m 17s):

Well, and just for clarification, that independent committee, that's not the same as having like a caucus, like a left caucus, internal to the existing union. It sounds to me like what you're proposing is more like an IWW strategy of dual carding that you can participate as a union member in the craft union or business unit that exists, but you actually want to have an outside committee, like not try to run like a left caucus and plank to take over the official of that union. Am I right on that?

2 (31m 48s):

Yeah. The, the, the problem with the IWW strategy of the <inaudible> is that it very often in not actually taking the step of organizing a distinct organization in the workplace, but it becomes just simply, well, I happened to be a member of the IWW, but you're not organizing independently in that workplace. So I think that what, this is why I would say the, what is important is building a collective organization, committee and association, which actually takes engages in activity in that, in that workplace produces their own newsletter, their own literature though.

2 (32m 33s):

Their leaflet talks to people as their own meeting so that they have the ability to, as an independent force, right. In those workflows and can intervene within the union, within the, the FLC union in that sense that isn't, that a form of due carton. That is isn't is an example of, at times there have actually been a few situations where the IWW has actually done that in the thirties. They did that in the sealer Pacific group, so that the actions of that minion and Navy did that earlier on <inaudible>

0 (33m 15s):

With the main focus on organizing non-unionized workers, as it pointed out, you know, that that's, that's the situation, realistically like 6% union density in the private sector is effectively non-existent right. So realistically, we should be looking at this as like the masses are non-unionized. So we have a lot of, there's like, there's a lot of putty to mold in a particular ways. Right. So what do you think are practical and tangible, like steps for workers on the ground, in the shop for is whatever industries that might be in to start building these independent unions to avoid the capture of the AFL CIO and their they're imitators?

2 (33m 56s):

Well, I think that you, the course, the first step is trying to find other people in the workplace and building an ordinance or first step. And then once you have some kind of a resistance grouping, then you can start small steps based on, depending on the amount of support you have. And it's the numbers and cohesion of that grouping, which gives you whatever level of power you have. And so that can grow as you become, you gain a greater support. And eventually what you want to get to is having majorities, or you want to be able to get to the apartment.

2 (34m 37s):

You could actually turn out a Stripe and shut the place down, but you have to start, you know, you have to have walked before you can run. You start with smaller scale actions at the very beginning. So like I organized the teaching assistants was one of the organizers and teaching being in little seventies, the first one at UCLA. And we started out with an organizing team. We had a fairly larger it's about 40 people, but you get to the point of having a majority took six years of pursuing grievances issues after issues in the various departments. And it was really an action of the employer that enabled the union to build itself through a majority force.

2 (35m 23s):

The UCLA administration tried to want it to eliminate 10% of all positions. And so then the union developing a manager mobilization campaign yet speak out on campus week where the teaching assistants would be invited to give their own perspectives. They were constantly, they had like every two weeks you're producing a newsletter and they give this mobilization campaign. They go through union up to where it had an average membership of 75% of the teachings. My department was 90%, but over more than 90%. But at that point, once you have that kind of a majority, then you're in a position to actually shut them down.

2 (36m 8s):

And so that's when he decided to carry out a strike and they had a one week strike and the interesting person would never negotiate with them. You see, in that era was included in transition and I guess all you, but after about a week, the university minister, she said, Oh, well maybe we found some funds and we won't have to lay off that. The setup of the TA that we can just reduce it by five who's that. And then there was a meeting where a lot of them are military people said we got to still keep going until they have fully off anyway, but the vote actually, they voted at that point to correct work. But by the end of the semester, the university, it found the money.

2 (36m 48s):

So they will, they won, it was a victory. And that's, what's interesting also is that it was a victory, even though there was no negotiation, no contract was ever signed, but they won on the issue. They fought over. And if you, if you study the strike ways of the world war one era and the thirties, that was not uncommon very often. If you have a particularly in transition inquire, what might happen, this workers might strike. And then after like a couple of weeks, the employer begins to soften and then say, Oh, well, maybe we can raise wages by a certain amount. Maybe we can, you know, do other kinds of changes. And eventually the workers have to make a decision, whether the concessions are sufficient to go back to work, right?

2 (37m 32s):

So it's a question of starting with what you have with getting together people for me, organizing and building the workplace organization and doing smaller scale kinds of actions around whatever the grievance, the God people have there. And if you're starting from just not even having an organizer, then what I recommend usually spending a lot of time talking to people because you have to find out what is important to people there and you know, what are they willing to take action about? What are the issues that are important to them? So an organizing committee, it needs to be able to know what people, what really moves people.

2 (38m 18s):

Right? Well, people are really interested. You can build up their resistance to the employer.

0 (38m 24s):

Well, and something I want to immediately respond to is the length of time. It took for y'all to build a majority. You said six years, if for any listeners that that might sound like daunting, I guess I would just for one year, that that is not a uncommon timeline. Even if you are going to try the roots of like traditional business unions, I've seen those campaigns from start to finish, take 10 years, even before they get their first contract. So it is a marathon, right? Like you have to dig in for the long grind of organizing,

2 (38m 55s):

Right? If you, if you think about just for example, the famous, the Memphis, that patients, right. Of the guy who a man who was the main organizer, he ended working for something like six or eight years. And he had built an independent union there that at the time of the strike only had 30 members, but because it was such an incredibly damaging thing, two workers were killed, but I, for equipment of these Cobb packing trucks, right. Trashcan, that everybody was really angry and suddenly 600 workers walked out. And so now his 30 members, you know, 30 member union is suddenly growing into this huge union, right.

2 (39m 41s):

Large local union and a major struggle. So that's how things can happen. Things, you know, people can be organizing and talking to you and, you know, as a ranking for organizing, you may think your words, you're not having any effect like in, in, when I was building a teaching assistant union, which it took me several years to organize my department, I thought I would talk to people about talking about the issues. And I thought I had noticed that finally, when the, the, our supervisors did something that equally as dangerous people were coming up to me and saying, we have to have a meeting, you know? And I, and I called a meeting and 23 of the 24 teaching assistants.

2 (40m 23s):

So suddenly we haven't had an organization with more than 90% of the people in that department from that immediate reaction, what the supervisors are doing, speaking all the talks that I had had over a period of years, various people laid the groundwork for that, that wouldn't have happened. It wouldn't have come to me and say, we got out of a meeting. I hadn't been doing well. Yeah. And that's the thing with organizing, you know, you may not, you may feel that things aren't going anywhere or that you're not really getting making progress, but you may be laying the groundwork for a better response when people, you know, in the future.

0 (41m 6s):

So if you build it, they will come. I mean, what I like about that story too, is that I I've encountered this a lot. The impulse is to call a meeting and just see who shows up. And I try to organize people in a mass meeting setting, but clearly the, the methodical approaches, you had all these one-on-one conversations prior to the need for a meeting. And then by the time there was a mass interest, you call a meeting and you work with that. So I just think that's, I just wants to say that aloud for like, that's an organizing lesson right there. Don't try to substitute meetings for one-on-ones. You got to focus on one worker at a time where you get to that point. But I wanted to bring us to a conclusion here.

0 (41m 46s):

I really appreciate the conversation. Something that you have been saying throughout has made me kind of wonder this question around the history of these examples. What I see a lot right now, are people on, on social media. I got to get off of social media. I have to be honest. Cause it's, I think it's distorting my understanding of like where people are at, but I see a lot of people that are enthusiastic about unions and organizing, trying to claim that what we're doing now is new and unique. And there's all of these new examples and novel experiments with unionization and over. And what they're talking about is like minority unionism rank and file committees. It's like, this is stuff that we've been doing for years, for hundreds, like at least a hundred years, it's not longer.

2 (42m 33s):

Well,

0 (42m 34s):

Why is that history? So submerged under the surface, like what happened to that history and how do we bring it back to the four to like show people that actually the AFL CIO is not the only type of union there is. There's lots of other expressions of unionism and there's a long and deep history of that. Like what do you, what do you think are some ways that we can start bringing back this memory around like what's possible and how many times we've actually done this.

2 (43m 1s):

We re we really need to have a much more systematic, popular education oriented to talking about this kind of thing. And they're doing exists. Things like organize a training, which I didn't w does that labor notes, you know, where a lot of the lessons of the past are kind of still, and, you know, they talk about them. But I think also in terms of publications that are accessible to working class people, you know, I think that in the past or been here is when there's been just a lot more like local, radical worker oriented publications that were whatever lessons, the people who were more experienced in those organizations that develop, could then be told to other people, to large interims people.

2 (43m 54s):

That's a question of the popular education infrastructure that the centers of training that we don't have when we have one-off organizing. But like there aren't like social centers that much. Well, I might say for example, in the thirties and Spain, you know, they had every neighborhood in Barcelona and Valencia have their worker storefront at schools and they had classes, workshops, and building games. And what kind of union, there's a little social theory about educating, working class people on these issues.

2 (44m 36s):

So that kind of process needs to take place. Then the answer that means various kinds of publications, various workshops, and kinds of social sectors that were popular education.

0 (44m 54s):

Thank you so much for the conversation. Our guest has been Tom Wetsel on that last note there around popular education. I think your articles and black Rose are useful for those purposes. I'm going to include them in our show notes, but it's the case for building new unions and the rank and file strategy as cynical view, check it out on black Rose. Honestly, you have a forthcoming book that's going to be published by AK press called overcoming capitalism. So just thank you for contributing to the popular education that you're advocating for. And we appreciate you coming on labor wave.

2 (45m 26s):

Thank you. <inaudible>.

Ep. 1 Comrades Read Kim Moody's Rank and File Strategy

Comrades Andrea Haverkamp, Nick Fisher, Tim and Joe Clement join Laborwave Radio for another series of Comrades Read!

We dig into the "Rank and File Strategy" a popular 30-page pamphlet written by Kim Moody in 2000 for the publication Solidarity.

We provide a summary of Moody's argument, that socialists are marginal in labor unions and therefore need to create "transitional organizations" to insert radical activity into unions and build toward a larger international socialist organization, and also talk through our points of agreement, departure, and the possible limits of the rank and file strategy.

Comrades challenged the idea that unions need to build toward a "socialist party" apparatus, while others acknowledged Moody's emphasis on focusing where we have current capacity in the working-class and therefore the rank and file strategy gives us a pathway for contemporary conditions.

This and more in the first episode of another mini-series where we'll be discussing the Rank and File Strategy! Read the pamphlet at https://solidarity-us.org/rankandfilestrategy/

Become a Laborwave Radio patron to support this show at patreon.com/laborwave

Patrons receive gifts based on their membership tier and are added to our Discord server where you'll have access to all the episodes in our vault!

Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, it helps our content reach new listeners.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/laborwave-radio/id1536697871

MUSIC:

Link Wray- The Bad and the Good

Transcript:

We're doing another edition of a fun series called comrades read. And this time we're going to be discussing in full detail with various guests Kim Moody's very popular rank and file strategy, which was published in 2000 in a journal called solidarity. So before we dig into the contents, I want to give our guests on this first episode of the series opportunity to introduce themselves. So how about we go around the horn and I'll ask Andrea first, introduce yourself. You could just say who you are and any of your affiliations that you want to share.

2 (2m 6s):

Hi, my name is Andrea. I've been on a few times. It's always great to be here. President of coalition of graduate employees, a labor union in Corvallis, Oregon, and I am also affiliated with the job market. So looking for organizing work, if you're listening and you're in the Pacific Northwest,

0 (2m 24s):

Well, you might not want to share this with your future employers, that you're a supporter of the rank and file strategy.

2 (2m 29s):

Well, anyone that's going to hire me, I would be short-lived if they were not for it.

0 (2m 35s):

And how about Nick? Would you like to go and introduce yourself?

2 (2m 38s):

Sure. So my name is Nick Fisher here. They pronouns are both grace and I'm a vice-president for grievances at the coalition of graduate employees, working with Andrea on the executive council. We're an AFT local, by the way, Ft 669 based in Oregon. And I'm also a member of the mid Valley IWW general, general membership

3 (3m 0s):

Branch rom rank and file their no, no office, not on the job market yet, but you know, I would like an organizing job as well. So if you're out there,

0 (3m 11s):

Okay. And then we have one more guest on the call.

3 (3m 14s):

Hey, I'm, I'm a wobbly at large in central North Carolina, and that's about it. So my intro, not very public person.

0 (3m 25s):

Well, thanks for joining us. We also have just listening in, might jump on, but Joe is in the background. So if you hear a voice you haven't heard yet, that's Joe and Joe is sneaking time during work as a proper radical rank and file unionists would do so. Thanks Joe, for being in the background there. So what I thought we would do is start off with just a very quick summary of the rank and file strategy. What the arguments are that moody makes, and then allow us to just kind of dig into some of the analysis and details that we think are most interesting and pertinent, and then start trying to discuss limitations, any critiques, any things that we really enjoy about it for today, just have a fun conversation.

0 (4m 10s):

So I'll do my best to be succinct in a summary. And I ask you all to fill in the blanks after I'm done. So in this pamphlet, that's about 30 pages. Kim moody assesses the general weaknesses and marginality of the socialist left in 2000. And he claims that the primary reason for this was a lengthy kind of material analysis of labor unions in the United States, how they developed over the course of racial capitalism from the 18th and 19th centuries and early 20th century. But then also deduces that there is a general lack of socialist consciousness among the working class.

0 (4m 52s):

That's a big part of the problem too. He says that what we need to do as a beginning of a strategic process for overcoming this marginality of the socialist left is attached socialist to a mass working class organization. And he identifies labor unions, trade unions, more specifically as the apparatus that socialists need to glom on to, to start building infrastructure for the socialist left. And he says specifically the strategy should be creating what he calls transitional organizations to insert themselves into trade unions and start like building a foundation upon which socialists and radicals can start organizing on.

0 (5m 38s):

And the transitional organizations would be comprised of rank and file workers that would combat the bureaucratic and conservative tendency as a business unions while also providing a base from which socialists can organize. And that these transitional organizations will look like things like caucuses left, caucuses labor councils projects, like labor notes, I guess like education centers for workers and worker centers. This is some of the more specific ones that he identifies. He finally concludes his argument about the rank and file strategy by proposing six specific tasks for socialists in the labor movement.

0 (6m 18s):

The first one is to build the rank and file to fight the boss and let the union bureaucrats get caught in the crossfire. So in other words, instill a union culture of what do you call it? Social movement, unionism through rank and file networks to, to build cross union transitional orgs like labor notes, jobs with justice and labor councils, three ally with community-based work class organizations for build international workers, solidarity five create and build a labor party or forms of alternative class-based political organizations and campaigns. And then finally six, the task is to build a larger socialist organization that relates to all of these levels of work in class activity.

0 (7m 4s):

Okay. So that's my summary. What did I miss? What did I get wrong? What are things that you think should be also added to that?

3 (7m 12s):

No, I, I think that was very solid. I was not super familiar with this as, as a pamphlet and I was under the apprehension that they were actually going to talk about organizing workers and, you know, the project is to build a socialist party, labor being, you know, instrumental to that. So that's what most of his argument and definition of what the problem is and how, how to attack it is centered on which I found as sort of wildly really uninteresting.

3 (7m 52s):

But I'll just leave that I'll stop right there.

0 (7m 57s):

Well, just a follow up with what you're saying, Tim. So you're saying, saying that the argument really suggests that trade unions and he says this in so many ways like Lennon described the working class is only being capable of coming up with trade union consciousness that they're insufficient. But what you can do is kind of radicalize them as an instrumental process towards building a bigger like socialist party that will be more powerful. And what we really need is that

3 (8m 20s):

Yeah. I mean, like to quote a paragraph from him, you he's talking about unions and his transitional bodies that, you know, such struggle as in such organizations are expressions of work, herself activity and blah, blah, blah. And, but capitalism attempts to demobilize and disempower workers. And our experience is that it often takes people, trained an organization with a commitment and a perspective of worker organization that is socialist. So he wants professional socialist to really take the reins of these transitional organizations, which I thought was really interesting considering his rebuttal to the professional organizers.

3 (9m 12s):

What did other folks think or want to share before continuing to dig in deeper?

4 (9m 16s):

One thing that I think for me was useful in sort of setting the tone for moody is, is the sort of historical place it is. You know, I can moody in various discussions that he's had about it and another interviews and stuff notes that it's not like, you know, he created it out of thin air. You know, it's the result of what has happened for the past 30 years, leading up to it of, you know, internal union upheaval and rank and file workers being sort of frustrated with the way that let's face it. Unions are, self-preserving the number one task of the union staffers in leadership, whether they're elected or paid is to keep the union going.

4 (10m 3s):

And so in that way, sometimes the workers get sold out, you know, and not supporting strikes, fearing to do anything illegal on the job that would actually really support the workers. And so seeing an insurgency and the radical potential of insurgency within labor unions has been since the red scare sort of a reclaiming of what was for the 50 years prior, a large socialist political movement and also the sort of, you know, it, it's a transitional stage. I know sometimes, you know, it's, what is it stages? Is it taxes, whatever it is, the rank and file strategy I think is important.

4 (10m 44s):

And noting that it is one of the many leverages of power that in terms of accessible leverage point for socialists, it's it's right here and it's time we reclaim it. And sometimes that means that we are on the sharper point of the stick, if we are leadership and we are staff. And what that means is embracing that there will be, and there should be rank and file radicalization within your union and workplace that might challenge you and might challenge what we think of as organizational stability

3 (11m 21s):

Going off of what Andrea was saying. Like, not only is it that unions have to operate like within the context of capitalism and become kind of like a handmaiden to capitalism, right. But like Modi, like specifically calls out mainstream unions, business unionism as cozying up to the bosses and becoming complicit in the perpetuation of the very corporations that are exploiting the workers. Right. And like, I felt this tension before a little bit where it's like AFT calls me out to lobby, to lobby up in like at the state Capitol for increased expenditures for higher ed. Right. Which is like

2 (11m 54s):

Basically me going and being a part of that process of trying to get more money for my employer, arguably so that I could then try to like, you know, we can try to negotiate it back to us through contracts, but I really appreciated that that moody is kind of like identifying two parties in a really general sense. Right? Like he's talking about the gap and that's what this essay is supposed to fill is like, when he breaks down the history, you'll have the unionists on one side where for like the business union model has beaten socialism and leftism and communism and everything out of the labor movement at large over the past, Oh wait, we have to add twenties like 80 years. Right. So he is saying that socialism doesn't exist in the unions that exists in the student movements that came out of the 1960s and seventies.

2 (12m 40s):

And so, yeah, I really like it. He's trying to write this way. These transitional organizations are ways for the people who have studied the theory have all the socialist ideals and everything, but maybe aren't engaged in like working class struggle, like within a union context, within a working context, without a union. But these folks who might be like, middle-class more cushy bougie, how they can get more involved in that struggle. And I really appreciated that he was trying to like bring these two together and his historical analysis supports that gap, I guess.

0 (13m 10s):

Yeah. So there's a lot to follow up on there. I, I Def I definitely think it would be interesting to talk about, okay. I think what you're identifying as like the role of the professional managerial class in this strategy at, which is maybe a temporary class of like career and PR and like highly educated people that realistically their class material position has dramatically declined since the sixties. That would be interesting. But before getting there, I think it would be good to just flesh out Moody's analysis of business unionism, how it developed, like how unions got to the point they are now, because I do think he offers a lot of insights that are really important in that specific regard.

0 (13m 51s):

We can maybe contest some of the conclusions that he comes up with for transforming that. And the role of that labor unions should have it writ large. But I personally think his analysis of how we got here is pretty spot on. So the first place I want to start with is what he calls the common sense of the United States. Following Antonio Graham shoe's idea of common sense, just kind of being basically mainstream ideas, ways that people just rationalize and make logical, the broader systems of oppression around them, specifically in the United States. The settler nation is founded upon mass genocide and dispossession of indigenous people, as well as a major slave system.

0 (14m 33s):

And these foundations to the nation state provided a logic of racism and hierarchy that moody identifies right at the very beginning, lends itself favorably to business unions. Like it's easier for business unions to kind of gain a foothold and be more understandable to the masses at large when it fits pretty well within the already ideological apparatus that people are navigating. And I'll let you all add to the story or share anything you want to say to that.

3 (15m 6s):

All right. I will try a little bit in that. I agree. One thing that I would say that he sort of glosses over is, and going back to Graham sheet is the cultural hegemony of the state. Also that just one thing that bugs me about this, his analysis of the whole thing is how we got here today. The very real interests of capital as represented in the state, not just in a fight with, with bosses, but it was also, you know, the, essentially the de-radicalization and the demobilization of the working class that happened in the run-up to, and during the second world war there's a lot he could put in there.

3 (15m 53s):

And he got a lot in a very small a pamphlet. So, you know, that's a little little thing

4 (15m 59s):

And maybe one way that we could route our discussion in sort of putting that in there is that in many ways, business bureaucracy, leadership, and head Jeremy is caused by government in a way it's, what's legal. What we're doing is illegal. What they're doing is, is thoroughly regulated and what they're doing is not. And in that way, the Taft-Hartley act is discussion for a whole nother time. But I think it's essential in how we got to where moody is, because that was one of the big thrusts that really legitimized bosses in the eyes of the state. You know, before that, you know, in the late 18 hundreds, your middle manager quote unquote, was the organized rank and file leader of that sector of a factory or a workforce in which if the boss told that, you know, what we might think of as a stop steward, what the crew to do, and they didn't want to do it, that would be sort of the leader, but now it sort of sapped and absorbed middle management into the ranks of bosses.

0 (17m 7s):

No, I think you're absolutely right. I mean, I think that the, both the NLRA, and then later the Taft-Hartley act, it made this existing system of business unionism, more legible to the state. Like it was, it was a bureaucratic system for the state as well to minister unions more easily. And they're like, make them more readable to them, fit them into their governing structures. So like business unions existed prior to like the NRA and they had already a system of delegates and stewards. So they they're already friendly to the concept of the state. I would say, like they could easily be absorbed into it and like function perfectly well with class compromise of writ large, just so long as the state kind of expanded our labor relations framework to facilitate the creation of more business unions, as opposed to more radical unions.

0 (18m 1s):

I think Kip moody does make that argument, but he, he seems convinced that business unions I'd already kind of had something of a stranglehold on the broader labor movement prior to that, and really focuses a lot on the failure of the communist party in like building up a more robust rank and file union culture that could have been specifically in the story of what he calls the tool. So Modi is talking about the trade union education league, the tool, right at the early part of the 20th century and how they have this great opportunity as being one of the transitional organizations that he's talking about providing like socialist consciousness and education and a material base for organizers to use, but they were run by the communist party and the communist party didn't have a specific position on trade unions.

0 (18m 52s):

So what happened was a lot of communist party members would be members of the communist party and they would also be members of their union. And they would just run for union office and become elected leaders. But by becoming elected union leaders, they would just become the bureaucrats of the union and just administer a top-down. So he suggests that tool, the trade union education league could have actually been successful if they had a stronger position and focused on how becoming the bureaucrats of the union is not the same as having a socialist union. So he seems to say that like business unions had kind of already defeated these left-wing unions prior to even the creation of the NLRA or they already had more of a cultural hegemony.

3 (19m 37s):

Yeah. I mean, I think that's fair. I was more thinking about the second period, the creation of the radical unions that became the CIO. The CIO did not create those unions. Those unions were self-organized by rank and file. The CIO was, it was a bureaucracy imposed upon them by the labor relations framework. There were no CIO without the Wagner. Those would have been clash, struggle, unions existing outside of any labor relations framework. And he tends to blame a lot of that on that the communists were too focused on doing big, big, big P politics wheel on a deal on at the state level, as opposed to paying attention and actually doing class struggle.

3 (20m 34s):

Politics. That, to me, it was the big one, the earlier one, there's a lot of different perspectives on that. I think just the communist party's rule in defining the IWW at the time was really interesting.

0 (20m 51s):

You want to say more about that? I don't think I know that history as well

3 (20m 55s):

After the Russian revolution, in a nutshell, the communists had something to point at and say, this is the way to go. We need a political party. And at the IWW at that time, there was a lot of debate. A lot of Wobblies joined the communist party a lot because it, you know, they, they came out of an anarchist tradition and they weren't joining a political party and there was a power struggle and it was never truly resolved because the level of state repression that was visited upon the IWW sort of rendered that power struggle mood at the time, but it was new Ben Fletcher biography.

3 (21m 45s):

And there's an interesting interplay there on the suspension of local eight by the IWW and the communist leadership of the IWW at the time, that was actually a political play to defang, an actual radical working rank and file union and, and get control of it

0 (22m 8s):

For our listeners that might not know that biography of Ben Fletcher, a black wobbly is really, really good. I also just as by Peter Cole, I found out when I was reading it that Ben Fletcher just so happens to live on, had lived on the same block that I currently hold on in Philadelphia. Like literally he lived on the corner across the street from my house that I live in currently. So that's pretty cool. Anyway, I don't know how long you lived there. It's there, Nick. I want to bring you into the conversation, just make sure that anything you wanted to share, we're not missing out on

3 (22m 45s):

Related to what we're talking about. Something that I've read another sources. And I kind of appreciated that, that moody spends so much time talking about the communist party's role in the, in the labor movement during world war II has to do with how the communist party basically got so caught up in like the anti fastest efforts of world war two and therefore supporting like the subtler States of America. That, that was like their downfall within like the labor movement. Right. And once we get to like the NLRA, well, we've already had the NLRA when we get to like, Taft-Hartley what we see is basically this labor piece that was struck by the labor unions at large, but especially the communist party during world war II, codified into loss.

3 (23m 30s):

Like all of those practices that are more cozy with the managers become like those business union practices become,

0 (23m 38s):

Expand on what you're saying about Moody's treatment of world war II in the fifties and the era of like labor peace, which for a lot of mainstream labor union narratives often features as like the high watermark of labor union labor unions in the country. Like they lax poetic about this great moment in time. When we add a lot of union density, there were a lot more like contracts and the gap between CEO pay and average rank and file worker pay was only 33 times instead of 3000 times or whatever. So what a great moment in time, right? Our inequality was somewhat managed, but moody, like you're saying points out that business unions really attach themselves to the nation state project, post world war II during world war II and post-World war II and the kind of massive increase in production levels.

0 (24m 32s):

They help facilitate that. And what moody content consistently points out is that today unions are still kind of in this mode of operating as if we're in the 1950s, where there was a somewhat reasonable size private social welfare system for union members that they were able to carve out and somewhat of a sizable piece of today. We're still like business unions are still operating in this mode as if that's what we're trying to accomplish is just expand the private social welfare system for our members exclusively and not really bothered so much in trying to push for universal programs like Medicare for all and things like that.

0 (25m 16s):

And he's saying that the fifties really was the moment of just complete takeover of business evenings. Like they G they had already had cultural hegemony, but it really was solidified and entrenched. And today we just can't seem to break out of that at all, because there's no socialists left. There's no threat to the prevailing business union order. The bureaucrats just kind of run the machine and we don't have any like strategies to break it down. And so this is again in 2000 and he's offering this as a pathway forward. He does. And I don't think we have to talk more about his like analysis, this history that much longer, he mentioned kind of briefly the sixties and seventies offering like some moments.

0 (25m 57s):

There's always been some glimpses of rank and file strategy that he points to some successes, but ultimately still stuck in a position where business unions, reign. There is no end in sight. John Sweeney had taken over the AFL CIO didn't do much. So this is where we are. All right. So comrades, what do we think of the argument? I know that we've already shared some critiques, but how about we talk about some of the things where we think that the strategy makes sense or it's strong, and then we can talk about some limitations.

4 (26m 28s):

I think the absolute strongest point is the radical potential of working individuals to form organized working class structures and shape them. And I read it as that is where emergent strategy and emergent leadership comes from. Not necessarily the top down, not necessarily from Hetty theory, although learning and education are an essential part of it, but you can see it in what has been successful today. When we look at the, I think most notably like the big red for ed teachers wave and teacher strikes where it was up against the union and ultimately more powerful.

4 (27m 19s):

Cause if we're going to get that critical majority nationwide in a constellation of movements, it has to begin at the rank and file level. And this is where its power is. And using that to shape and sharpen and grow the already existing union structure, I think it's compelling. And there's a reason why it's recognition in this article has remained so popular and has been adopted so much because as soon as you try to sort of, prefigure an argument, that's it? That, that doesn't, you know, I love the comrade critiques, particularly the newest ones inspector with the Griffin keto Griffiths, but right.

4 (28m 6s):

It's not a pure, there's not really pure rebuttals, right? There's critiques and building on it. And it's, and it's a strategy, not a tactic. And I think that's also important in the name rank and file strategy that it's not a prefigured tactic, it's an overall strategic lens to view organizing.

3 (28m 27s):

The one thing that did strike me about the whole thing was just how small and limited it was that it was really only going to address the currently constituted unions to create a working class base of socialist workers for a socialist political party. And that struck me as just that just really limited in, you know, it's fine, but, but for the amount of ink that gets spilled over it. And I, my critique of that would be that those are not reformable body.

3 (29m 9s):

They're not structurally able to perform any sort of radical transition as they're constituted. In fact, that that to actually have a true rank and file led by the workers, a union that was fighting the class struggle, you would have to dismantle those unions. Once I read this, I went back to something that I'd read quite a while ago, a guy named Stan Weir, who did single Jack solidarity with his, he was a worker activist for many, many years, and then became an academic way and wife and his critique because like around 79 or so, all the labor federations got together and were talking about the need for a new labor party ban.

3 (30m 8s):

And his take was that, you know, the institution of collective bargaining in this country as it has come to operate is reactionary. And until that is changed, it doesn't matter who you put in, who is leading the union, whether it's the workers, whether it's the bureaucrats that you can't enter into that and not get chewed up by it or stymied by it because it's specifically formulated to take class struggle off the table.

4 (30m 42s):

Well, I I'd, I'd say that that that limitation is, is just baked into what is also a compelling well, not, well, it it's, it's what it, what this strategy does is it's like, what do we have right now? What is in front of us today? What can we do right now? And those structures, and, you know, the 6% of the private industry that is unionized, that's what we got. And to not use that as one of our tools in the strategy, you know, it'd be a huge setback as, as moody States about class consciousness, it ebbs and flows and it's, it's not necessarily a linear progression. And I think that there, there is a potential there.

4 (31m 24s):

Yeah. Ultimately in 10 years, right? What, what can AFT, you know, beat surely we will not usher in a such deep economic justice that CBAs and that, you know, Taft-Hartley regulations are out. But I think that is part of the strength of this is, is it's not, you know, that sort of Noam, Chomsky ass, big view. It's like, what is a strategy that we can do that you can read this and you can go to your shop floor. You can go to your workplace, you can go behind the counter and think I should start really talking to each coworker I have and, and start exploring this and what we can do.

3 (32m 9s):

Yeah. I it's just, it reminds me of this. I just finished writing this chapter in which the author was looking at union organizing practices in the mining industry. And she was really pushing for, she wants academics, social scientists in particular, who are looking at working class organizations to focus on Bush calls, small places, close to home, which makes me think about kind of what Andrea is saying about like the transitional organizations and where does this begin? Because if we're talking about like a

2 (32m 41s):

Rank and file grassroots labor movement, in which we're trying to build transitional organizations between people who are in working class struggle and people who want to support working class struggle, that doesn't necessarily start at the, even the local level of the union, right. That can start in mutual aid networks that are neighborhoods that can start. And all these other like different ways like forming tenants organizations. And so I think I'm not going to jump on the bandwagon and say, mainstream unions, we can just go reform them all. And they can the rollover and be committed to direct action. And they'll say like to hell with collective bargaining and all of these other practices that are really against workers, workers power, but I don't think I'm ready to say, like, I'm ready to burn them all down and start with something else.

2 (33m 28s):

And I do draw a little bit of hope from events like the Los Angeles teacher strike, which, you know, was within the bounds of contracts bargaining within that like business union model. And maybe this is something that moody. And the other article that I haven't read where he's actually focusing on maca Levy's work and like the critique of, of her position, maybe he gets into this and like the, the shortcomings of bargaining for the common good. But the fact that like the LA teachers union were able to get like limits on like charter school expansion and classroom sizes and all of these things that would be outside of the traditional business union purview. That gives me some hope that there, there is still revolutionary potential in the mainstream labor movement, but it does start like what movie, like what I think Modi would say, if he were to admit that there are still socialists in the labor movement, which I think we can all attest to on this call, that there's still potential

0 (34m 25s):

You hearing what y'all are saying. When I was reading this, it was hard for me not to immediately start thinking about like a pretty popular position within the IWW of dual carding. Like this tack, it's not a strategy specifically, but a tactic of like, if you're a member of the IWW, that's one card, you can also be a member of a business union. That's your second card. And with that dual card, a position, try to bring IWW practices into the broader union. The goal isn't necessarily to like, de-certify that union or replace it with the IWW. But if you can build like a rank and file caucus and get them to be radical and like take on grievances on the shop floor and when great, you know, like do IWW style organizing, even if it's, even if there's a business union that already exists.

0 (35m 12s):

And I, I feel like there's a certain affinity there with like Moody's argument moody has kind of a more elaborate and fleshed out strategy. But I think Tim, I agree with two of your assessments is that moody does focus very narrowly on existing trade unions. That does seem to be like the arena that he says, this is where we should try to attach ourselves to the broader working is socialist. He seems to kind of suggest like worker centers could be that umbrella that helps the non organized the unemployed, but it doesn't really talk about it that much. It's more like trade unions, that's where we should focus. So he doesn't spend much time talking about creating new unions and like radically independent unions, like the IWW or otherwise.

0 (35m 58s):

The second thing that I do agree with your assessment is that Moody's strategy is specifically transitional up to the point of building a more powerful socialist party or something of a labor party, all of this rank and file strategy really in the long run is subordinate to an organization that's bigger than that. That's like more of a official political organization, Allah communist party of the 20th century or whatever like that is Moody's position. That's what I read into it. But I think when we read this pamphlet personally, I am like, I can kind of choose to not care about that argument.

0 (36m 39s):

I'm not necessarily in agreement that we need to like subordinate this rank and file power that we built up just to something bigger, like the DSA or whatever party might emerge. Like I don't care about that so much, but I think that there's a lot that we can probably find in common ground with, with just specifically the idea of like rank and file workers, pushing their business unions to their limits and trying to win as much possible out of that. Like maybe a war position, so to speak. But there is one thing that I think I keep seeing this analysis of moody that I just want to share. I think it's a misunderstanding of his argument, but it's clearly adopted by the official platform.

0 (37m 19s):

The DSA is the DSA adopted the rank and file strategy as its position, as a strategy that the organization at large is going to embody. But it's very clear to me that they misunderstand moody is suggesting that rank and file socialists not only need to get involved in their unions and build left caucuses, but that they need to take over the leadership. And he is like explicitly not saying that he even suggests that becoming the leadership of business unions just puts you in the position of being a bureaucrat. And regardless of your radical credit, that's all just kind of be irrelevant because all you're going to do is run the business union. You're just going to have individually socialist ideas, but organizationally, that's not going to transform the union.

0 (38m 4s):

He really does seem to be set on the idea that like workers organize regardless of unions, existing or not. And what we need to do is help those rank and file networks on their shop for, and not even worry about the leadership of unions, like who cares about the leadership. So give you all an opportunity to keep going wherever direction we want to go. But I do want to share in the chat, our listener, who is again, embodying the rank and file spirit by stealing time on the job to be here with us is suggesting that one way to think through these limitations that we're identifying is that workers within business unions are in a position to see what doesn't work and what real alternatives might look like in those unions.

0 (38m 49s):

So, so Jeff, I'm understanding, you're suggesting that by kind of being familiar with the machinery of business unions and labor relations and the limits of collective bargaining, we can kind of get a sober analysis of what works, how, how to navigate the terrain and maybe where the other pathways open up that we should try to pursue. What do y'all think about that dual carding idea? Like if you're familiar with the idea, do you see like a certain affinity with the rank and file strategy and dual carding, or do you think I do a card maybe has some different insights to offer for rank and file workers?

4 (39m 26s):

I think that concept of being in, but not lock and step like of one's union is critically important. I think we see that across the UC California strikes where they were Wildcat strikes that emerged at each campus, which we're all apart of, you know, that the bigger parent governing union that, that bargain with the UC system as emblematic of the power of a dual card strategy, it's important to be able to force leadership's hand. And that's the power of an, a dual carding approach would allow multiple workplaces to push the same, you know, whether it is resisting a Jeff Bezos takeover of your city council that is relevant to you as workers.

4 (40m 21s):

And when we're thinking about, you know, trade unions, you know, maybe it's your staff and your teachers both being able to organize together to push their leadership's hand for something transformative for the whole community. Yeah. I absolutely think that, you know, not seeing becoming the leaders as the objective, but leading from below and also if you're a leader and you endorse the rank and file strategy yeah. You might be closer to the pointy end of the stick than not, you know, and, and, and embracing and welcoming that.

3 (40m 57s):

Yeah. I th I think there's some, some affinity between the rank and file strategy and dual carding. One thing I think though is the West Virginia teacher's strike. That was an illegal strike led by the rank and file. That is a much closer idea to dual carding than generally rank and file movements within unions. Particularly the ones that moody was identifying in the sixties were very reformist. They wanted to reform their union. They want a different union leadership. They wanted union leadership to care about other things than what they cared about, but fundamentally they were not subversive to the union.

3 (41m 45s):

So I think that that sort of differences is like, as a wobbly, I don't think about taking over the existing grievance or bargaining in the union, but what I'm trying to do is form a committee to take direct action on the shop floor, whether that be in one shop or across an entire state like I did in West Virginia. I think something of a distinction that I think moody would be my approach, but the movements that he sort of identifies as rank and file rebellions were generally more reformist in what they wanted out of their union leadership,

0 (42m 30s):

Just for our listeners that might not know Kim moody is one of the co-founders of labor notes. And labor notes was largely project that grew out of strikes in the seventies, as well as the kind of nascent Teamsters for a democratic union. And they were very supportive of these kinds of efforts. So I think, I think you're right to identify that he, he celebrates these kinds of reform movements, but it does seem to be a consistent that his criticism of them is that you all got to preoccupied with like changing the leadership instead of changing kind of the bottom up culture in general. If I, if I may, you know, something just to share with listeners with the guests on the call is that three of us have been in the same union together. And I, I genuinely feel like maybe not consciously, but, you know, regardless we kind of tried this experiment for the rank and file strategy in some ways in our own union.

0 (43m 23s):

And I know that Nick and I talked a lot of inside baseball throughout these experiments of trying to create like left caucuses and stuff. So maybe we could talk like empirically about the successes and the failures of that. I mean, Nick, you mentioned in the chat one indication of what happened was a lot of the leadership of the union are dual carding waffling is. So do you want to just talk about how it worked in that union?

3 (43m 52s):

I think that union cultures can be very insular. And so like, we are a higher ed union, so like we have connections to a couple other like grad unions in the state. Other like faculty unions, we have like connections with our faculty and our FCIU classified staff union on campus, but we're not well connected with like our level ask me, or like teachers unions outside of campus rights. We don't have all those connections, but I would say that within like those three on campus that we have faculty grads classified staff, that the grad union tends to be more interested in things like direct action and being kind of rowdy. I do definitely know like faculty members who are down

2 (44m 32s):

To like get on a picket line, but there are different sensibilities, different aesthetics and like approaches to organizing different unions. Right? So like we're in this weird situation where our IWW branch was not a charter branch or it's a new general membership ranch previously, it was like kind of a reading group that did something like did like a, a local or an annual fair around like the theme of solidarity and whatnot. So when we actually became a chartered membership branch, like it just so happened that Alex who was our staff organizer at the time and our other at the time part-time staff person, where as well as myself and I think Andrea, and like a number of other people, like were some of the founding members of our IWW local.

2 (45m 17s):

So there's been like a strong connection, I think, between the two unions for the last year and a half of IWW, mid Valley's existence. But yeah, it's, it's turned into like a lot of the folks who are active in our grad union start to get active on that in the IWW, because in IWW, we're also like working outside of our own workspaces and were helping organize other other folks. And we have like a, a bit of attendance union tied in there too.

0 (45m 47s):

Yeah. And I think what's kind of, it's all funny to me because in some ways it, it kind of shows some of like the possibilities of the rank and file strategy as identified by moody, but also kind of contradicts them at the same time. And that ironically enough, I do think, and I'm maybe other Wobblies back at mid Valley would disagree with me, but the success of the creation of left caucuses within the existing grad union, which by all purposes will be identified appropriately as a craft union, a business union, the success of those radical caucuses actually helped build the IWW locally because it was raised the kind of expectations of workers.

0 (46m 30s):

It became, people became more interested in union history in general. And the IWW was kind of there as like a cultural group at the time, but not really doing any organizing and the organizing took off. So it was like the kind of reversal of typically IWW is forming and then like kind of influencing the culture of unions surrounding them. This was kind of the opposite, but I think there are limits to, to like what was accomplished. So there were a lot of successes though. Oughta left caucuses created, like Nick mentioned housing caucus was in particular, one of the more popular ones. But I think the limits were that, I mean, this is a grad union, so maybe this wouldn't be the same for other unions, but the kind of temporary nature of grad unionists that they leave campus leaves with them, a lot of historical memory and kind of ideas around direct action.

0 (47m 19s):

So a lot of the leadership of these caucuses took off like they disappeared, you know, because they graduated. But also like next talking about is unions have this kind of tendency towards of themselves. And caucuses become very easily subordinate and peripheral to the central operations of the union during a year of collective bargaining. Those caucuses became ancillary and like somewhat of an afterthought in a lot of ways. So they're going to be nurtured and cultivated as rank and file networks of socialists or whatever. And instead they kind of became an afterthought and they kind of atrophied, and now I'm not in the union anymore, but it's very difficult to revive these things and resuscitate them their lives.

0 (48m 5s):

So they become like very often temporary moments in a union's history and disintegrate and dissolve. It's hard to keep the rank and file alive within existing business union culture.

4 (48m 16s):

Yeah, absolutely. A community garden if built for someone else and not organically emerging from the community is simply a plot that is soon to be weeds. And I'm saying this, I'm taking off my leadership hat in the union and I'm putting on my general membership hat. And I see just a bunch of vestige of limbs that now form nearly three pages of our constitution where these caucuses became formally codafide and almost all are defunct in practical terms. That's not to say they cannot be revived, but they're no longer organic, right.

4 (48m 56s):

Say, you know, I'm going to make up a caucus, say you have the vegan and vegetarian caucus. A lot of our caucuses look like affinity groups, not necessarily organizing around a working class need or a workplace common issue, but as defined are there. And then if, if, if no, one's in it, right. If membership has zero, which after bargaining in a lot of these formerly now constitutionally recognized caucuses, which can't, it's hard to be insurgent if you're a part of the constitution, you know, just, just in practical terms. And then if there is an insurgent issue, maybe you find your way into an affinity group caucus that fits your fits your form and function, and then you can carry it out.

4 (49m 45s):

But yeah, I think, I mean, I think that overall the rank and file strategy that we've tried to foster as a core part of our union has transformed our entire college, small college town community. If I look at where the culture, not only of this union was in 2014 versus where it is now entering 20, 21 radically different, I don't think in 2014, you would have seen the union put materials support into COVID community organizing and mutual aid, black lives matter, disarming campus cops, environmental justice, housing justice, all of these issues when it was a straight business union

3 (50m 28s):

Protected by Janice, very comfy with its dues. And now I think even more than ever, we realized that there's a need for deep organizing and emergent strategy from the rank and file. So I think, yeah, it's a mixed bag in some way. The experiment with formalizing different rank and file group caucuses was great. But I think unless the community garden is truly an organic kept thriving community garden, it can turn into a plot very quickly, constitutionally protected clockwise. That is actually really super interesting baseball. One thing that I was curious about, cause I I've never done, you know, been involved in that kind of business union I'm in North Carolina, we don't have the lowest density in the nation, but one thing that was interesting to me, it was exactly what Andrea was saying.

3 (51m 24s):

It doesn't sound like anybody like they were caucuses, they were relaxed caucuses as opposed to the idea of dual carding, which is basically you just apply a solidarity union as a principle, as in you build an organizing committee out of general members and you sewer grievances, and then you take direct action to get those grievances resolved. I mean, that's a strategy that's different from being, you know, it's usually not recognized in any way by its parent union, but it's usually tolerated because it has no interest in being in the constitution being involved in bargaining or trying to strip away members or competing.

3 (52m 4s):

So it's interesting to hear about the left caucus experience that y'all have had. That sounds really interesting.

0 (52m 11s):

Well, and also Nick and I have tried to think through some of these like direct action grievance committees, kind of like you're talking about like the solidarity union approach. And I fixed some of the challenges, like just the lessons for any listeners that are trying to do some of these experiments in their own unions. Like the imposition of labor relations is the structural challenge to overcoming these things and sustaining them. When you have a cycle of collective bargaining that takes up all the oxygen of the union, what is going to be tempting for anybody, for radicals, rank flowers, whatever that wanna like nurture their, their garden, you know, plant their seeds, if they're going to want to get closer to the action of collective bargaining.

0 (52m 52s):

And it's very, and like everybody goes in on that and that absorbs a lot of the energy and the focus. And then the imposition of the contract actually is the opposite practice of direct action to resolve grievances. Like they want to channel grievances into a formal system of meetings, HR reps, delegates, and so on. And it's really hard to be, you know, I was on the staff side. So the staff that relationship with members is always a little bit complex, I guess, to put it simply. But even if you're like a member that's really active a steward or an elected leader, and you want to instill that idea into members and your colleagues, it's really difficult to get them to see like the need to not rely so heavily on the contract and the specific grievance process detailed there.

0 (53m 44s):

Even as the grievance officer, you can say that stuff and it's really challenging to get them over that hump, right? These are the challenges I think of both dual carding rank and file strategy, direct action, and like unions is that the contract and labor law itself. And just the culture of being in a union in general and being in a workplace is always the opposite of these ideas. It's always the opposite of these practices. I don't know Nick, if you want to share, have, have you had any successes with this like model of grievances? Cause I know this has been like something you've really wanted to cultivate.

2 (54m 19s):

Yeah, no, I, I ran for grievances and our union because I wanted the experience of like trying to, trying to work on that aspect. Right? Like when you, when you talk to organizers about getting an organizing job, they're like, you know, if you're going to apply to work for a union, have you run a, an affiliation camp campaign, have you run bargaining, have you run grievances? Like those are the big three. Right. But they, those, those events skillsets. So I was like, you know, I'm a, I'm skeptical of the grievance mechanism and U S labor organizing, but I'll try it out. And yeah, it's been like months of people being just as suffering, like extreme financial burden because our employer can't file documents on time or, you know, won't make their business centers do their shit on time.

2 (55m 5s):

And basically when it comes down to it as the grievance officer, like I'm there saying like, this totally sucks. Like this is terrible, you know, like organizing conversation, right. Like validate and, and, and everything. But yeah, it's incredibly frustrating that everything that we file comes back with either you didn't file this on time because we, the union couldn't have known this was an issue when it happened or, Oh, well, this person, they ended up getting back pay a few weeks later, so we don't have to do anything about it. So we're just going to dismiss your, your grievance. And like, I'm, I'm really sorry to him because like the three of us keep basing this, like in our, our experiences in the same union. Right. And I'm trying to keep it more abstract, but like in the case of like working with, I'm sure there are other unions like this, especially if we can get like more like Burgerville workers, union, and like fast food unions, although, you know, unions actually help our employee retention.

2 (55m 58s):

But when you have this built-in turnover where you have grad employees who are here for two years, or they are for four years or every once in a while you get someone like me or Andrea, heres who was here for like six or seven years, you have the built-in turnover. So you, like Alex said, you don't have the historical knowledge and you lose your organizers every couple of years, but you also have this, we have this weird status within the university where we're thought of as students and employees in to, in separate spaces, doing activities. And so we have a grievance process, but we have a grievance process within like an employment relationship where our employers can say this issue that you're experiencing, that doesn't have to do with your contracts that has to do with you being a student. So you can't eat.

2 (56m 38s):

Like we're not even going to entertain this as an issue that we would like actually take on as your employer.

0 (56m 46s):

Yeah. And then like you spend all your time mired and just trying to figure out the details of labor law, the specifics of the grievance process, doing everything to the letter. And I think I'll share this and then we can move on to maybe a conclusion here. Cause we have been discussing this for a little while, but little anecdote for you all a crushing moment. In my experience as a staff organizer was when I was helping process a grievance of one of our members, previous member, I really liked this person. They were pretty rad, definitely had like good politics and they weren't really actively involved, but they were, they had a specific grievance that they were seeking counsel with. And I had met them a few different times to kind of talk them through. It gave some advice and they found it really helpful.

0 (57m 27s):

And at one point they turned and looked at me after all this like information sharing and like what the process is like and so on. And they asked me, why aren't you a lawyer? And I just was completely demoralized. Like everything, everything I had been doing, must've been wrong up until that point. Like that was the worst possible thing. This person thought they were like flattering me. And I think it was just genuinely curious about like, you seem to know so much of these intricacies, why don't you like become a lawyer? I was like, Oh my God, I've completely abandoned my roots. This has all become mechanical and automatic for me. And I, it was, it was just such a clarifying moment. And they were just watching me completely confused by my exasperated response.

4 (58m 11s):

Well, actually I think you should run for Congress. I have a question for the group if that's okay. Yeah,

2 (58m 20s):

Yeah. And it's on moody. So like it's bringing everything back. Right. But like, if we look at this article where moody plays sickly, his premise, right. Is that socialists exist in the United States, but they're not close enough to the working, the working class labor movement. And like, so his whole project is how do we bring these two groups together? And a big part of that is building a labor party. Like I think everybody on the call, I'm like, yeah, like Joe's got a, Wobbe a Wobbe picture up as their profile picture, like as IWW folks where we have this labor tradition where we're adverse to cooperating with political parties or like being a part of that arena as much, like, what do y'all think about his argument? But the way forward towards socialism is to get everybody working together, like in a political arena.

4 (59m 3s):

Well, I've been thinking about this quite a lot because you know that you only have so many shackles to spend in terms of dues elsewhere and I've been short on some cash. And so I, you know, I'll be honest. I, I forgot to pay my dues Ty WW one month and then I have kept forgetting. And whenever I remember, I'm like, well, maybe I kind of want to keep that 12 bucks for now. And where can I put it once I get full-time work, there's an organization called socialist alternative. They have branches a lot of places, but they have a very successful, very powerful political office here in Seattle, where they have pushed. And one on the $15 minimum wage, that was the socialist alternative party and Congress and city council member Seamus wants doing she and socialist alternative work so closely with all the labor unions here, they work closely with all different community organizing groups.

4 (1h 0m 4s):

They passed the Seattle green new deal. They got an Amazon tax, which now the state is trying to overturn the state is fighting the wins of the socialist city council member to try to prevent dual taxing of businesses. And this is a tax on just a few businesses that is generating tens of millions of dollars for the city of Seattle that can be put towards social good. So there is power. And I think that my biggest critique of DSA is in seeing what has become possible. And in today, today there was a rally because the right wing has or organized through the court system, a recall campaign, right?

4 (1h 0m 46s):

Democrats love to talk about democracy, but now they're trying to recall her because she used her office to support black lives matter. And they're trying to roll back the Amazon tax. They're trying to roll back the 10% cut to the police that the socialist city council member was able to get forth. There were people from Ireland, MPS, socialist MPS from Ireland on the call, speaking saying that as socialists, the win of outright socialist candidates in the United States is inspiring and needs to happen. And I think in terms of, I think what the conversation that maybe Alex can prelude to, to the, the spectrum conversations that are saying well, what does it mean for the DSS? I'm not sure if it means investing so much in the democratic apparatus.

4 (1h 1m 30s):

And I think it looks like seeing what has worked, who is winning and building on that. So in thinking about where I can put my small amount that I have dues, I'm really looking at local organizations that are, even if it's a school board member, right. Even if it's a city council member in a smaller city or in the 15th largest city, getting an outright opposition to Democrats who have a stranglehold on our urban centers, I see it as powerful. And it's very clear why UAW four, one, two, one which represents 6,000 graduate postdoc and undergrad workers at university of Washington has been really strong in supporting Shama savant and socialist alternative because that, that intersection of issues of the fight for 15 and the Amazon tax are worker issues.

4 (1h 2m 22s):

Those are working class issues. And you know, it surely was not some business leader of the union that said, well, maybe we should leverage some of our support, even though UWU is out of the district that Shama represents many of members of course live here, but it is the mutual shared liberation of that labor union in this town, their survival and their ability for their children, their partners, their spouses, to get decent jobs for their friends and comrades who are houseless or homeless to get housing. The mutual liberation is there. And I see the literal successes outside my door of a socialist city council member.

4 (1h 3m 6s):

And so I think the abandonment of the political arena and of the outright socialist party and have one that's more than cosplay, like a real socialist party winning is a critique I have of organizing to support democratic socialist Democrats. You know? So I, I think it's good. I think there's power.

0 (1h 3m 28s):

Thank you for that comrade. I guess I'll just share like, honestly, on the question of political parties, for the most part, I guess I've gotten to the point where I'm fairly like agnostic about them to outright. Just, I don't think the word, I don't know. I don't know how to say it more delicately than that. This, this is my, my quick view of the situation. When you're talking about a capitalist system, I think the workplace is the central power structure of that system. The relationship between worker and boss is the embodiment of capitalist power relations right there. Like that is the greatest disparity and inequality.

0 (1h 4m 10s):

It's right there. Now. I'm not saying that that doesn't mean other struggles don't matter like outside of the workplace, but I'm just saying it's like an arena that stitches together. The entire social fabric is work and wages at somewhere down the line. You have somebody, if it's not, you, you have somebody in your family, your relationships, whatever that relies on a wage that allows you to reproduce yourself socially. Like you ha you can't survive under capitalism without wages. Meaning work is an imposition that everybody feels in some way. And the power that bosses Lord over workers in the workplace is extreme. So what I don't understand about conversations like the strategic thinking around political parties is if we are able to build up a rank and file network of union members or, or worker organizations powerful enough to defeat their bosses and actually gain concessions at one of the most concentrated sources of power in capitalism, why would we build up all that strength and muscle to just surrender it to a political party?

0 (1h 5m 14s):

That's going to act on our behalf in a different arena. It's like we shift sideways or actually become the background of the class struggle that we have been winning. Like, I, I, that's what I don't understand about it. So it's like, why not just prioritize like focus if we can win in the workplace, why would we not continue focusing on winning in the workplace and trying to scale that and expand that outward? I guess that's where I come down on it now. I don't think that means that you can ignore the state, but I think it means more specifically, in what ways do we choose to go into combat with the state? And I think that what you're saying, Andrea makes more sense to me is like at most maybe we were run local politicians here and there have some kind of small-scale parties, but I want to give my dues monthly to a socialist alternative or the DSA over the IWW.

0 (1h 6m 10s):

If we're actually organizing workplaces, like that's where I'm going to put, I'm going to pull my resources with unions, radically independent unions. So that's where I stand on it. But then again, like I'll say, I always share that now because the question was asked most days I'm pretty agnostic about it. I kind of don't I kind of avoid the conversation and Angela says everybody is currently going to her seminar, lighted coffee budget. Yeah.

4 (1h 6m 40s):

Yeah. And I love that com comradely rebuttal. I would, I would say that where I currently am is my dollars are, are currently being saved that I've, I'm ex I'm exploring. I will say just very briefly, I've been invited because I filled out the I'm interested in socialist alternative and they organized by neighborhoods. My neighborhoods general branch meeting always begins with a 50 minute discussion of some technical article. And I've had shit to do with that with meetings that start with a 50 minute discussion of socialist politics in 1930s, Poland, like, yeah, no, I'm with you.

4 (1h 7m 20s):

Like I'm interested in organizing the workers in the workplaces. And when I pushed back, they're like, Oh, well, Marxist theory is really important to building a socialist political party. I'm like your Congress member, your council member is going to be recalled and a 50 minute discussion of marks

0 (1h 7m 36s):

And the capital that they could invest in, like overturning any kind of progressive legislation. It's just, it's so overwhelming to even start thinking about and, and talking again about Moody's analysis of bureaucratic labor unions, the bureaucratic disciplining power of the state over things in the specific political arena are way more immense. Like there is so much red tape, like Bernie Sanders can fundraise his campaign and all of the small donations that millions and millions of people give to him can exclusively be used only for political campaigning can not be used for anything else. He can't like create like an independent workers party out of that money.

0 (1h 8m 18s):

Like it's not allowed by the state. You know, there's so many traps to try to avoid in that strategy. So anyway, but I want to let Tim share his response.

3 (1h 8m 30s):

Yeah. Well, I think you stole mine probably a lot older than most of y'all on this call. And I really don't think the state has any right to exist, but I thought that one thing I wanted to circle back on what the description of how collective bargaining and the operation of the business union completely sucked, removed all the oxygen from the room around rank and file activity. And I thought that that was incredibly analysis analogous to what electoral politics does to a short of radical action.

3 (1h 9m 15s):

Oftentimes it's sectioned into a really safe place for the state political activity.

0 (1h 9m 27s):

So Nick, how about you share, and then I think we probably want to wrap this conversation up, not putting you on the spot to say be fast. I'm just saying, I want to hear your thoughts about your own question and then probably give people the opportunity to go eat dinner.

3 (1h 9m 41s):

What's funny, Andrea. And I just had this conversation the other day about avoiding isms, right. And like I avoid isms when I talk about being on the lift, the left myself, because I'm actually not sure if I would like put myself on like a, you as a party to seize the state or a, you know, fuck parties and fuck the state and place like just like seize the whole thing and burn it down. Right. That's my fast isle understanding of the difference between communism and anarchism. This is a matter of methods and strategy. Right. And I haven't put myself on either side, like which one I'm going to throw, I'm going to double down on. But yeah, I think after reading moody, I see his call to get unions, to participate in state politics in a way that they do similarly, like in the EU.

3 (1h 10m 23s):

And yeah, I'm just not entirely convinced because a lot of times when you like follow the ladder of corporate America upright, like there's every year, there's a, an organization that puts out the chart that shows like here's all the brands in your pantry. And here's the five people who own them. Right. The folks who are, who are funding, the politicians who are turning the state against the workers are often are often the same people who we are ultimately fighting against to try to improve our working conditions. So, yeah, I don't know. Right now I'm feeling state reforms, not the best way to go. I'm also seeing Joe.

0 (1h 10m 57s):

Yeah. Joe, please share. Yeah. It'll probably be my one comment I resonate with

3 (1h 11m 5s):

And your idea of where we should be focusing on building power, Alex. And I, I feel like there be

5 (1h 11m 14s):

A future where there is a state that is something that could benefit the working class, but that that's not anything that we're going to get through, get to by taking over state, as it exists. It's going to take some kind of rupture, which is going to take the kind of power base you're talking about building. And I'm, I have been just disgusted over the last several years, hearing how people try to promote Bernie or the Democrats by saying that, you know, we, we can elect them into power. And then if we hold them accountable, they will do do the right thing. And they point back to FDR and say, look, that's how they did it back then. But the reality was was that they didn't elect FDR in order to do that.

5 (1h 11m 59s):

FDR got elected and there was a class war going on. And that rupture of power is what shifted the possibilities of what the state was going to do for the working class. And it wasn't anything that was really guided by that rupture of power. It was just how things shook out. And that's, that's my perspective on how to kind of juggle these questions of, do we support the state or do we have hope in the state? It's I, like I said, support kind of a more agnostic position, but that if we're going to think about what's possible, we need to be realistic too.

0 (1h 12m 31s):

Well, thanks for sharing. I think it's totally fair. One of the, maybe we can wrap this up with a concluding thoughts. Folks want to share anything that they just didn't get a chance to toss into the conversation prior, but what you just said, Joe, what we're just talking about is I think one of the things that I like the most about Moody's analysis and quickly his kind of rebuttal of Jane maca, Levy's kind of approach to organizing whether or not we want to claim that he's correctly communicating her positions on things. His basic idea is like, look, the workers on the shop floor are the ones that organized themselves and they have a lot of radical potential through doing so.

0 (1h 13m 12s):

And the danger is getting these business unions or these like top-down structures tried to absorb them and those radical energies into their structures and channel them into preferred forms of class compromise. And I think that that's pretty spot on now Moody's conclusions, you know, we can disagree with and so on. But I do think that that analysis of like the bottom-up power is what's most necessary in the bottom of power is always already happening, but we need to do as further and expanded and figure out how to attach ourselves to it. I think that's probably the highlight of this reading for me. I liked that assessment probably more than anything else.

4 (1h 13m 52s):

I think it's a useful way for us to continue to challenge ourselves, to not see external leaders, especially in a social media, celebrity leader age, you know, whether it's high profile union leaders that are really cool or political leaders or Instagram celebrities, but see the revolutionary potential of ourselves in our workplaces and of our coworkers and all of our mutual political development. And that ultimately if we get a 51% super majority working class, super strike potential across all industry, it's going to take us all forming coalition with people very different than ourselves.

4 (1h 14m 38s):

And that can only happen through radically organized labor across all industry. And I like that moody puts that forth. We all need different leaders. We need EV hands on deck at rank and file.

0 (1h 14m 52s):

Tim. Did you want to share any concluding thoughts or things to leave with? Just that I really, really appreciate being part of this conversation. I

4 (1h 14m 60s):

Enjoyed being with you all. This was really fun.

0 (1h 15m 2s):

Thank you. Thank you. And how about you, Nick? You can get the second to last word cause I usually wrap these up. Yeah, sure. Yeah. I guess just something that's really going to stick with me from this reading

4 (1h 15m 14s):

That like we touched

0 (1h 15m 16s):

On for a second, was this idea of the private welfare state and yeah, I know I just said that I am kind of in the blends about state reform, but you know, if you're gonna, if you want to participate in state politics, try to like, yeah. Keep, keep working for Medicaid for all. And all of these benefits that are, that we're getting to this paternalistic relationship with our employers. And it's not enough that United employees have healthcare. We all need healthcare. All right. Well, comrades, I really enjoyed this conversation too. I think this discussion went pretty deep, right? Pretty interesting directions. It was a lot of fun. So this will be a series. I really appreciate you all kicking it off with us and hope to have you back on labor wave in the near future.

0 (1h 15m 57s):

Thanks Alex.

1 (1h 16m 0s):

<inaudible>.