Friday, December 9, 2011

99% (rank and file) confront Big Labor


“The Occupy movement struck a chord,” explained Stan Woods, a member of the Transport Workers Solidarity Committee, a multi-union rank-and-file organization made up of ILWU members, teamsters, city train drivers and other similar blue-collars workers. “The union leadership doesn’t want to be left out, but they are hamstrung by their relationship with the Democrats, mayors and other politicians. They’re caught in a quandary.”
Barucha says the democratization paradigm of the leaderless occupation movement is proving to be a model for workers unhappy with the status quo.
“This is the first time there has been an exemplary movement that is encouraging and teaching people to self-organize.” The occupation, she said, allows union members to act as individual community participants and create community pickets, alongside the unemployed, the non-unionized working class, the homeless and any other supportive neighbors that share the same material needs.
Read it all at Salon
by Emily Loftis
(h/t Keven Fathi)


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