HOW TO BUILD UNION POWER
By Elaine Bernard
NUMBERS – WHETHER OF STRIKES, member or union density – are important measures of a union’s strength, but they don’t tell us much about members’ understanding of and commitment to unions. Rather, the future of unions and their power rests with an informed, committed, membership who understand that they are the union and that the power of the union rest with them.
Unions are something that you really need to experience to fully appreciate. And becoming an activist in a union, and learning about the power of collective action and solidarity, is a transformative experience. For the American Labor Movement to have a future, we need to think about how to make sure that a new generation of American Workers gets to experience that transformation. In fact, we need to also consider how we structure our organization so that increasing numbers of members themselves experience this transformation – from being “dues payers” who see the union as a purchased service to becoming “activist” who see themselves as the union.
For an earlier generation of unionist, this transformation took place during organizing campaigns.
During an organizing campaign, workers reject what might be called the “market approach” to jobs where, if you are unsatisfied, you simply quit and get another job. The “labour market” is just one big market place of opportunity: if you don’t like your boss, shop for a better one! On the other hand, when workers decide to organize, they are deciding to stay, to take a stand, and to transform the work place. And, in the process, they transform themselves and co-workers.
An organizing drive may start with a few workers talking about specific problems and grievances but, before long, they are broadening the critique to include general issues of dignity and their right to a say in the workplace. What a radical notion: That worker should have the right to participate in decision-making in the workplace and to negotiate their conditions of labour. Successful organizing campaigns are not just an explosion of grievances against the employer; they are also a positive assertion by workers that they are more than hands for hire and that they have a right to negotiate the terms and conditions of their employment. Not surprisingly, union members gained through new union organizing are among the most committed and enthusiastic activists.
Today, however, the vast majority of American Union Members are not won to the labour movement through organizing campaigns. They become union members by getting a job in a unionized workplace, and membership is seen as simply one more automatic deduct ion from a dwindling pay check (federal taxes, state taxes, SS taxes, work fee taxes, etc). Occasionally, workers might purposely seek out a unionized workplace because they are aware of the union advantage (higher wages and benefits). However, just as often, they may associate the “good job with good benefits” as simply a feature of the industry of company. And very few workers seek out jobs in unionized firms as a first step in seeking a carrier as a union activist! The challenge for unions is to transform these inactive and potentially reluctant “dues payers” into informed, committed, union activists.
And for all of the discussion about density and structures, the key place where this transformation happens is in the local union. New members don’t join the national office, or even the regional body.
THE UNION LOCAL IS
· Where members join the union
· Where members experience the union
· Where members become involved in the union
· And where members shape the character of the union
The thousands of local union in America are the keystone of our labour organization because they’re the springboard for membership participation and leadership development (whether in unions, politics or community). It’s the experience members have at the local level that determines whether they will see their union as just an agency, or whether they will grow to understand that the power of the union is not in its full-time staff and officers (with the power entering and leaving the workplace with the visits by the staff reps), but rather is embodied in the membership and is in the workplace at all times whenever union members are present. And it is committed activist members who are the best promoters and organizers of unions.
So, as important as it is to build quantitative strength through growth, I believe the challenge for American unions is to build qualitative strength through involving greater numbers of members in the activities of the union. But to do this, we need to remember that unions must be more than instruments for winning wages and resolving workplace grievances.
Unions are also schools for democracy in a society where there are very few places we actually get to practice democratic decision-making. Unions exist to provide workers with the vehicle for exercising their rights in the workplace, reaffirming the most basic principle of democracy: the right to participate in decisions that affect you. They are builders of a community of interest among members, and also with the wider community. Communities don’t simply exist, they must be constructed.
As well, unions increase the likelihood that workers will stick with a job and attempt to improve it rather than simply quit and get another job. And protected by rights enshrined in a collective agreement and backed by the union vehicle, workers can and will provide management with valuable feedback, which is essential for the improvement of any business or organization. In short, unions are the premier institution of a free, democratic society, promoting democracy in the workplace, as well as economic and social justice, and equality. They have this role because they are instruments of transformation of members and of society at large. And in this wonderful transformation rests the real power of unions.
