Diving into the Wreckage 9.2
Added 2023-09-27 09:59:59 +0000 UTCSean and Varn continue the second part of their miniseries on left strategies and orientations.
Central to the discussion is the definition and role of what is called 'Rank and File' organizing, something that means many things to many people, but whose bases are often conflated in literature and debate, for example in the DSA. Sean and Varn tackle, in turn, the tendencies associated with Joe Burns, Jane MacAlevey, Kim Moody, Marxist-Leninists and syndicalists.
Taking a cue from current events, the conversation revolves around the ongoing United Autoworkers strike in the Midwest: what it might mean for the industry, how a victory might galvanize the broader working class, and how a defeat might play out.
EDIT
Articles in the episode:
https://isj.org.uk/mcaleveys-organising-model/
https://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1192&context=classracecorporatepower
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1E3V36-MJyMzLbrW6B5WcdGuFpEOHIjhGux06c6gHmZk/preview
Comments
Thanks! I appreciate it (I listened to y’all’s episode on Grossman and really enjoyed it- it’s amazing he’s not better known in left circles.)
Isaac Suárez
2023-10-04 19:12:03 +0000 UTCThis is a great article by our friend Aaron Benanev making the conservative (marxist) case for tendency of the rate of profit to decline: https://jacobin.com/2023/10/stagnation-productivity-profit-crisis-brenner-debate-1970s-economics Also of interest would be the episode we did with him last year "Automation and the Future of Work." For the most pessimistic take on the RoP you can check out our episode with Ted Reese on his work on Henrik Grossman's crisis theory from several months ago. Between those two you should have a leg up on understanding the outline of the various arguments. - Sean
The Antifada
2023-10-02 20:07:11 +0000 UTCYeah it was great
Kevin
2023-09-30 00:55:31 +0000 UTCI feel like there’s a lot to like about the McAlevey model. Perhaps it’s because I’m a hospital nurse and her examples draw so heavily from my industry. The backbone of it seems to be an “all in” approach which I’ve seen work at the unit level. That being said, going up against an intransigent union and employer makes the implementation of any strategy a total shit show. I was on a huge (thousand or so people) McAlevey led international training course a few years ago that had a significant Palestinian contingent. That was around the time of their general strike. I don’t honestly know what led them to be there or what their impression was (maybe they felt it was a waste of time for all I know). But I think the criticism that her methods absolutely require a huge paid staff maybe more an artifact of the US bureaucracy centric union situation in general. I mean unions already have massive bureaucracies, trying to graft a even bigger “organizing” segment onto the existing structure is a huge lift. My union wastes phenomenal amounts of resources that could be plowed into something else. Advertising campaigns that are a bad joke, massive Democratic Party donations , high priced “focus group” BS. Unions have the resources, as has been said before. I apologize if this is too much of a ramble 😂 But… okay what I really think Is this! The biggest problem with the McAlevey stuff is it’s totally out of sync with union bureaucracy. Leadership development and confrontation are HUGE components in her model. In contrast to that, Campaign’s in my union are ALWAYS top down affairs. The notion that rank and filers could start a conflict independently of the board is anathema for them, it’s unthinkable. If I had a dollar for every time a union boss told me that the union would be sued or that I would be sued for doing basic organizing, I’d have a decent chunk of money. And sued for what? A march on the boss, a petition that’s actually written by workers, that sort of stuff. They (union bosses) act like the earth would open up and swallow them if a group of workers challenged a boss absent years of centralized planning.
Trebor
2023-09-29 03:50:34 +0000 UTCI’d also add that the SAG/Writer’s strike also seems to evince a crisis of oversupply within the entertainment industry specifically, which seems to map weirdly well onto the old predictions of political economy models. So I can see certain sectors (not just autoworkers) seem to face serious disruptions of status quo labor relations. I’m not sure how indicative these industries are of the wider economy, however- which relates back to my curiosity about declining profit rates more broadly.
Isaac Suárez
2023-09-29 00:00:38 +0000 UTCGreat discussion! A tangential question, maybe dumb, question: what evidence do Varn and y’all draw from in relation to the falling rate of profit in the US? I’m inclined to buy the point because we’re seeing a lot of asset inflation, and it seems like US industry (particularly the tech industry) is moving in a radically protectionist direction. I think the confrontation with the PRC is, in large part, motivated by the fact that Chinese companies have outcompeted American companies, especially when it comes to consumer electronics, tech infrastructure (like 5G) and application platforms (like WeChat, TenCent, and Tiktok.) Though the economy seems to look good on paper- the massive levels of economic inequality, and steadily expanding cost of living crisis across the US and Europe evince some serious economic dysfunction that our economic planners/cheerleaders seem to seriously underestimate. QE feels like a slow acting poison- one that’s paired with a temporary set of highs. That being said, I feel like we may have a epistemic bias toward predicting “terminal crises of capitalism.” There were legit reasons (which Varn and y’all do an excellent job of discussing) for leftists to expect a “terminal crisis” in the late 1970s- yet the sheer ruthlessness and cohesion of political economic restructuring defied most expectations (though it did come at a high social cost.) What kind of data or sources could y’all recommend to read into this issue of declining profits, specifically in regard to the US economy of the 21st century? (I apologize for the long question, but I’d love to learn more about this- given the contradictory narratives I see across sources that I’ve found.)
Isaac Suárez
2023-09-28 23:39:19 +0000 UTCThanks for the encouragement, Scott, it's really nice to hear! We commie tradespeople are a vanishing minority but I feel like our numbers grow by the day. Maybe that's just people finding each other after generations of isolation. Maybe we're seeing craft unionism reach another of its nadirs. Regardless, I'm really proud that we can make useful content for other workers out there. Thanks again for the great comment <3
The Antifada
2023-09-28 21:55:07 +0000 UTCOh damn they did an episode on The Long Deep Grudge, fantastic book
La synarquista
2023-09-28 06:04:55 +0000 UTCIBEW inside wireman, rank and file caucus guy. If I told you that my brothers and I were excitedly messaging each other about this morning like “bro Varn and Sean made an episode specifically for us” and we may very well be using y’all’s last few labor-focused episodes to inform some political education very soon you might not believe me, but it’s true. From our perspective the McAlevey model is essentially useless, it requires a level of paid and logistically supported staff that we simply will never have access to. Note that for all their faults this absolutely was not the model that TDU and UAWD used. IBEW is also not especially corrupt in the sense of being mobbed up, but we are probably the most slavishly captured by the Democratic Party establishment of all the building trades and have repeatedly bailed the AFL CIO out of various financial jams because at the very least our money is straight. Do some digging into how Liz Shuler ended up in her current job and you’ll see what I mean. One communist union building tradesman to another, the work y’all are doing right now is like a light in the fucking darkness. Growing this thing is hard and annoying work, and we’re eternally grateful to anyone else taking even the idea seriously
La synarquista
2023-09-28 05:25:00 +0000 UTCThere’s so much to this episode that I like . But one thing I have to reckon with is, especially with IWW is that the activists who represent these tendencies have in my experience a very difficult time interacting with normal people. I’ve seen these micro tiny groups of radicals crash and burn because they can’t compromise or hold a conversation without blowing out into radical causes that are unrelated to workplace issues. I haven’t seen that go well. There’s so much nuance I’m not capturing here anyway. DSA in my union has done some staff entry-ism, god bless ‘em. I know it sounds dumb and trite but people actually have to be nicer to each other. The notion that involvement in radical politics goes hand in hand with blasting people a and engagement on all manner of extreme rhetoric is so played out. I’ve put my ass on the line against the boss over and over. The defeat comes from within, the call is from inside the house 😱 One of the things I like best about super majority strategy is it focuses on workplace issues and stresses cooperation in the fight back against the boss. I have seen that work. That seems to normalize the actual dialogue and moves towards ordinary workers concerns. I agree with the analysis that McAlevey is more center left politically and that ties into the Democratic Party. I suppose that’s a valid theoretical critique of her position. But I don’t really share that criticism. I’d be happy, honestly with any movement who wanted to fight the boss and not simply fight one another.
Trebor
2023-09-28 03:45:35 +0000 UTCI thoroughly enjoyed this discussion! It felt a lot more tangible to an ongoing struggles, plus Varn was surprisingly, and to my mind justifiably, optimistic (with a ton of caveats of course). I love these deep dives, keep it up y’all!
Austin Hinkley
2023-09-28 01:17:02 +0000 UTCThe whole thing is heartbreaking. My union is essentially hated by the membership despite being objectively powerful in a certain sense. Pay and benefits and pension are good, actually. The union is wedded to the state Democratic Party. This arrangement seems to benefit the top union staff and electeds. The pandemic was the greatest gift to the union imaginable which led to a big contract where we basically won. But the members are still definitively uninvolved. Seen from the 5000 foot view, it’s similar to standard Democratic Party politics. Seen from the “shop floor”, it’s a dumpster fire that bleeds enthusiasm and morale. I view the union leadership as corrupt and a species of controlled opposition (controlled by the hospital). They are literally controlled in terms of who sets the meeting agendas and shit like that. IT’s Democratic Party style politics basically. But yeah I’m dealing with the reality of having years of shop floor organizing efforts be successfully crushed and my effort’s marginalized. It’s not that rank and file is a bad plan but it just requires a level of support more than actually exists to scale up. I’m proud to have fought for my co workers and earned their respect. But it’s not scaling up … I still think the rank and file strategy at least has a lot of integrity, base building is base building after all. But just when union heads come in making threats and accusations and acting insane it dispels the building unity of workers. If even it was possible to elect a slate of better candidates, still the union staff are dead weight. Dealing with that issue would be a massive challenge
Trebor
2023-09-27 23:43:52 +0000 UTCGood episode. People interested in left strategic tendencies in unionism should also listen to Labourwave Radio including particularly episodes debating with Joe Burns. https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/class-struggle-unionism-cross-over-w-wobcast/id1536697871?i=1000547536497
Kevin
2023-09-27 22:53:57 +0000 UTCChina entered the WTO in December of 2001. The threat of delocalization was another tool for management to use against unions and possibly why unionization reached its nadir then.
Anthony Reiner
2023-09-27 22:05:33 +0000 UTCSounds super frustrating and counterproductive. My union (NYCDCC) had a Maoist reform movement in the 70s-90s which ended up getting a woman carpenter in a position of relative power, but nothing that changed the business union dynamics. (She ended up brought up on charges and expelled over some impropriety with a much younger apprentice)
The Antifada
2023-09-27 21:56:34 +0000 UTCEdited to include them ;)
The Antifada
2023-09-27 21:53:26 +0000 UTCYeah sorry, I forgot! I edited the post to put the links in, enjoy - Sean
The Antifada
2023-09-27 21:53:15 +0000 UTCLong time hospital staff Nurse, steward, labor activist. I love the ongoing coverage provided here. My short take on McAlevey is that her organizing training is fantastic. But it runs so contrary to the existing labor bureaucracy that it’s all but impossible to implement. Essentially the union crushes all rank and file organizing equally. I don’t think the union heads really know or care about “organizing” as such. They (union power holders) seem equally threatened by any sort of change. Anyone trying to implement change is suppressed equally. Long story short… Based on the severity of repression I might postulate that McAlevey is the best as her methods have aroused the greatest level of anger from union heads. It’s a great big complicated mess however. Because the union staff organizing department often speaks as if it was actually attempting to implement “organizing” changes. Although this runs contrary to what is actually implemented. So we end up with McAlevey or Labor notes influenced power point slides playing to a audience of almost nobody. Meanwhile the actual power holders carry on business as usual. Staff organizers who rock the boat are laid off. It’s a great big complicated mess, in other words. There are people trying to make positive changes who are not aligned with a well defined political position. But that being said, cynicism and back room politics rules the day. And also just a level of meanness that kind of has to be seen to be believed
Trebor
2023-09-27 19:42:59 +0000 UTCmac-uh-lee-vee
Shane
2023-09-27 16:47:52 +0000 UTCI’m loving the ongoing conversations about labor organizing issues (as a labor organizer and rank and filer). I wanted to share my recent experience with Labor Notes EWOC. For years I’ve been a fan of Labor Notes and still think highly of the resources they provide. However, I participated in a recent Labor Notes training held in conjunction with EWOC/DSA and it soured me on doing any more of those. The vibe was very McAlevy (not hating on her but not fully in agreement either) and other than a handful of us who are actually rank and file organizers, most of the people on the zoom training were paid staffers (who wanted to argue they were also rank and file) and so much of the discussion was around legalism and party oriented which is (IMO) not going to emancipate workers.
Andrew Miller
2023-09-27 15:17:21 +0000 UTCGood stuff, could you link to the articles? Thanks
Mark Brian Wilson
2023-09-27 13:49:35 +0000 UTCHell yeah
E
2023-09-27 11:56:01 +0000 UTCExcited for this! Can you link to the articles? Cheers
Jim
2023-09-27 11:17:43 +0000 UTC
