Abstract
Standard accounts of the 1960s and early 1970s focus on civil rights, antiwar protests, feminism, and Woodstock. Often overlooked is that the social upheavals of the era also spawned a massive outbreak of labor unrest. In the dozen years following 1968, a wave of strikes, over a third of them wildcats, swept U.S. autoworkers, farmworkers, public employees, and workers in traditionally female occupations, like nursing, all of which turned the labor movement upside down.
Rebel Rank and File, a product of a 2005 symposium at UCLA tries to make sense out of a major social movement, and while some of its assumptions can be questioned, the issues it raises are both challenging and relevant. As the title suggests, the editors see the unrest as directed in no small part at organized labor’s leadership, and the case histories they present feature workers in conflict with their unions. The Teamsters and the United Mine Workers, once-strong unions that had descended into gangsterism, were challenged by rank-and-file movements for democratic reform. The United Auto Workers and the American Federation of Teachers, whose leaders prided themselves on their support for civil rights, came under fire from black militants and responded with fury.
Essays by Robert Brenner, Judith Stein, and Kim Moody examine the roots of the unrest. The post-World War II boom, which allowed a middle-class standard of living for millions of unionized workers through the 1950s and early 1960s, was ending. Keynesian fiscal policies on which government policy makers had long relied to minimize the impact of business cycles were increasingly ineffective, as U.S. capital migrated overseas and U.S. manufacturers faced growing competition in the global market.
Demographic changes were important, too. African American refugees from the Deep South streamed into industrial centers, like Detroit, and women entered the workforce in unprecedented numbers. Entrenched union leaders did not know what to do with them; often, their response recalled an earlier generation of native-born AFL officials, who had regarded mass-production workers, largely recent immigrants and their offspring, as unworthy of their attention.
Labor leaders’ failure to respond effectively to these changes was, according to Kim Moody, the inevitable result of “business unionism.” As he defines it, this is not simply a matter of bargaining strategy or social philosophy (as in, “labor does better when business prospers”). Moody and the other editors argue that career union officials represent a distinct social class whose interests and outlook are separate from, and often in direct conflict with, the people they are supposed to represent. He sees autonomous collective action by workers at the point of production as both a wellspring of democratic values and the lifeblood of an effective labor movement. During the period covered in this book, union leaders often saw it as a threat.
A problem with this analysis, acknowledged in Rebel Rank and File, is that rank-and-file movements are often hard pressed to sustain themselves and, without a broader social vision, can be as parochial as the union official who cannot see beyond his or her own bargaining unit. A valuable aspect of the book is its frank assessment of the self-conscious revolutionaries who helped build the reform movement and tried to guide it politically. In his chapter on Teamsters for a Democratic Union, one of the anthology’s true success stories, Dan La Botz points out that International Socialists played a crucial role in launching the group, only to split into warring factions once it was up and running. Well-researched pieces by A. C. Jones and Kieran Taylor discuss the League of Revolutionary Black Workers, which exploded like a Roman candle in Detroit’s auto plants. Its leaders were superb agitators who captured the imagination of black autoworkers but failed to parlay their militancy and anger into an ongoing organization.
Frank Bardacke’s provocative piece on Cesar Chavez gives the issue another twist. Debunking the myth of the passive farm laborer who needed a charismatic leader to take him out of bondage, Bardacke describes workers who had extraordinary leverage over their employers at harvest time and knew how to use it. Unfortunately, their power evaporated once the crops were in. Clearly, job actions were not enough; farmworkers needed allies, and Chavez developed a sophisticated boycott strategy. But in the process, Bardacke argues, the workers were marginalized, and Chavez became increasingly autocratic and disconnected from his members. In following the trajectory of Chavez’s career, Bardacke effectively demystifies the Alinsky style of organizing that Chavez embodied. What Bardacke does not convey is Chavez’s importance as an icon of the nascent Chicano movement, which far outweighs his achievements as a union leader.
I found much to disagree with in Rebel Rank and File, but it throws a bold light on a crucial piece of labor history and invites us to struggle with its broader implications. It deserves serious attention.