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Workers Must Take Control

Wed, 08/29/2012 - 10:43 — Dave Culver
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  • If Labor’s policies are going to change to rise to today’s challenges, it cannot be done without some stress and storm within the leadership bodies of Labor and their cozy relations with the corporate dominated Democratic Party.
  • Rank-and-file members need to organize themselves within their unions to demand democratic control of their leadership in order to adequately defend themselves and to make gains.
  • Is Labor a Lost Cause?

Mark Vorpahl, Workers' Action

Submitted by Evergreene Digest Contributing Editor John Stoltenberg

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RJ Matson

(August 18, 2012) Many of today’s social expectations and political outlooks of the Labor Movement, and workers in general, were formed in the post World War II economic expansion. While the economy was expanding and there were steady jobs to be had, it appeared to be enough for many people to focus on improving their immediate community or individual union and expect that, if things did not get better, at least they wouldn’t get drastically worse.

Those days are long gone. Since the World War II expansion, the nation’s wealth and power have grown dangerously concentrated in a few hands. This has been accompanied by 30 years of a declining standard of living for workers and a devastating drop in union membership. The total control big business has gathered over the political system has assured that their priorities rule the day at the cost to society as a whole. This accumulative process has resulted in a new historical phase of accelerating attacks against previous gains, such as Medicare and Social Security, and requires from workers a different outlook than that developed after World War II.

Full story...

Related:

Is Labor a Lost Cause? Bill Moyers, Bill Moyers & Company

  • Can unions rebound and once again act strongly in the interest of ordinary workers?
  • American Crystal Sugar lockout

Labor and the Struggle Against Racism, Emergency Labor Network / Workers World

  • Capitalist crisis amounts to a war on Black America
  • Labor movement must organize the South
  • Workers Must Take Control
  • Is Labor a Lost Cause?
     

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