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NEWS & LETTERS, April - May 2008Labor's battlefrontsDetroit--The biennial Labor Notes Conference, "Rebuilding Labor's Power," held here April 11-13, was a refreshing experience amid the global gloom of continued outsourcing, downsizing and relentless reductions in wages and benefits for those still holding jobs. Speakers could have ranted about unjust and greedy employers, but chose to concentrate on concrete struggles from Mexico to North Carolina as they identified specific impediments within the labor movement itself. Maureen Taylor of the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization welcomed one thousand union activists to Detroit by reminding everyone that there are "more of us than them," and that we have a lot in common with international workers: "only labor--employed and unemployed--can bring the world back from the brink." "Social movement unionism" was a theme that resonated throughout the conference as speakers and participants discussed the necessity of linking workplace struggles with their communities, such as relating workplace health and safety to the pollution the company creates in the surrounding region. Dinamichel Avila Gomez described the protracted struggle of the Cananea Mine Workers' Union in Mexico. Copper miners have been on strike since July against Grupo Mexico, which had been at war with Section 65 Mineworkers since they acquired the mine in 1990. Health and safety violations and cutbacks in social programs for mineworkers' families had prompted several strikes that the workers had ended only to confront further cuts. On July 11 miners were attacked by goons, and women and children were threatened. Realizing that the government would do nothing, 1,100 miners' wives formed the Women's Support Committee (Frente Feminil Cananense). Their methods included protests in schools, supporting wives to encourage their husbands to stay strong, and requesting international support, for which they thanked U.S. United Steelworkers. In North Carolina, a right-to-work state, the "Freightliner 5" were fired for union activity. Robert Whiteside of UAW Local 3520 explained that his was a new local, not under a master agreement. Nearly 99% of the membership voted to strike when a concessionary proposal was presented. But the union president countered the democratic decision to continue the strike by misinforming the membership. Whiteside stressed that American workers and workers of the world need to draw a line to say, "enough is enough!" --Susan Van Gelder |
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