Op-Ed: Thank The Wobblies For What?

Two IWW members argue that mainstream media misrepresents their union and completely misses the point on what the Wobblies contribute to the class struggle. 

By Jean-Carl Elliot and Sylvain Pankhurst

Put bluntly, Malcolm Harris’s recent article for The Nation, “We Can Thank the Wobblies for the Biggest Labor Story of the Year" doesn’t really say much of substance about Wobblies (members of The Industrial Workers of the World, or “IWW” for short). That’s not unusual for mainstream coverage of the IWW and, in his defense, he did a better job than many, even citing “Labor Law for the Rank-and-Filer”: a short book that is influential among American IWW organizers. Nevertheless, by focusing on the public campaigns (Starbucks and Burgerville), the emphasis remains on the tip of the iceberg and misses what it is that separates the IWW from mainstream business unionism.

Harris also repeats the most consistent sin of mainstream commentators, relegating the IWW to an historical object, rather than acknowledging it as an existing (and growing) organization. While his chronology is a bit different, and he thankfully admits to the existence of the IWW in this century, he still posits that the IWW’s value as inspiration, implicitly saying “We should thank the IWW for SEIU Starbucks organizing.” On the contrary, we should thank the IWW of the early 2000s for the IWW of today – the IWW that has learned from the mistakes Harris holds up as a model.

For example, Harris lauds the activist element of the Starbucks Workers Union in targeting “the brand itself,” in a public relations-focused dimension of the campaign. This approach resulted in numerous firings, and ultimately played a part in the IWW removing “Going Public” as a module in its Organizer Training 101. In other words, the lesson that was drawn from the experience is actually the opposite of what the article suggests. What gave the Starbucks Workers Union its power, led to relatively sustained organizing in some cases, and what separates it from heavily media-driven unionization efforts was building relationships on the ground and winning changes with direct action.

Direct action, as a term and as a concept, is conspicuously absent from The Nation’s version of the IWW. While it acknowledges that the IWW has made use of “wildcat” actions and sabotage, it doesn’t stop to dwell on what exactly these were, or of their significance. It quite explicitly posits actions of this type as a sign of weakness – a last-ditch effort that workers resort to out of desperation in the absence of legal protections or contract language. In fact, the opposite is true!

What makes the IWW revolutionary is that it sets direct action and direct democracy as the defaults in organizing. One famous story that The Nation neglects to mention involves a group of IWW baristas who walked off the job during a shift when the temperature got too hot. They left their supervisor alone to deal with the heat and the impatient customers. They came back with a fan which had “Courtesy of the IWW” written on it, plugged it in and got back to work. Management installed fans immediately and arranged for an AC unit to be installed. There are dozens more stories like this, where concessions were won through workers exercising their power to disrupt the workplace.

In an IWW campaign, actions of this type don’t culminate in formal recognition and signing a collective bargaining agreement (CBA). Even in instances where a collective agreement might be signed, it is not an end unto itself. Rather than pointing toward “partners becoming partners” with management, the IWW strategy is prefigurative, “forming the structure of the new society within the shell of the old.” In less highfalutin terms, wobbly organizing teaches workers the skills of running things for ourselves. Rather than seeing workers’ empowerment as stopping at negotiating conditions with Starbucks, Amazon, or whichever petty small-business tyrants, it is about transforming the ways we relate to each other, and realizing our collective power to transform the conditions of our lives.

CBAs are as often a barrier to collective power as an asset. As time passes from the initial union drive, their purpose tends to increasingly be preservation of the legal status of the bargaining unit. And what tends to result is that “the union” becomes synonymous for the staff and paid people at the top who administer the contract. Workers will come and go, and their membership in the union only lasts as long as their employment at that particular shop. Everything from grievance handling to contract negotiations becomes the turf of an entrenched leadership, and workers pay dues to keep a “subscription” to their services. When an issue arises, workers are compelled to “work now, grieve later.” Instead of being dealt with by unionized workers collectively, shop floor problems are handed over for legal wrangling to people who may have never set foot in the workplace. This is exacerbated by the fact CBAs almost always (and always in Canada) contain a “no strike clause” which prohibits collective action during the life of the agreement. In some cases, workers, including IWW “dual card” members, have actually organized and taken action in defiance of the terms of CBAs.

The IWW model of solidarity unionism teaches workers the tools to execute actions on the job, in a concerted fashion with their coworkers. It shows how small actions can demonstrate the power of solidarity in order to recruit more workers to a campaign. When a worker leaves, they remain an IWW member, and can take these skills with them to future workplaces (and teach them to other workers).

One campaign that came up a bit more recently than the IWW Starbucks Organizing was an effort at dual carding with CUPW in Edmonton Canada. The campaign lasted about a decade, but many of the tactics built on the Starbucks organizing including dozens of “march on the boss” actions that had over 100 people participating at times. The campaign eventually subsided but not without forcing management to hire 200 more staff at a time when they were actually considering downsizing and layoffs.

The IWW preserved the legacy of these wins through writing articles and pamphlets and incorporating the lessons learned into its organizer trainings. Each year, the union trains hundreds of members in the basic tools of solidarity unionism that have been learned from Starbucks Workers Union and the campaigns that followed. With each training comes new organizers, with new organizers come new campaigns, with each campaign come new lessons, and with each new lesson comes revisions to the training. In other words, the legacy from the IWW Starbucks Workers Union is not just more union cards being signed; it’s more and improved organizers. The legacy isn’t more CBAs; it’s more organizing where workers ourselves wield power.