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<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message -----
<DIV style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A
title=astridjb@comcast.net href="mailto:astridjb@comcast.net">Astrid Berkson</A>
</DIV>
<DIV><B>To:</B> <A title=centralILJwJ@yahoogroups.com
href="mailto:centralILJwJ@yahoogroups.com">JWJ C-U</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Sent:</B> Sunday, January 09, 2011 5:52 PM</DIV>
<DIV><B>Subject:</B> [CentralILJwJ] interesting</DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV class=print-site_name>Published on <EM>Truthout</EM> (<A
href="http://www.truth-out.org">http://www.truth-out.org</A>)</DIV>
<P></P>
<HR class=print-hr>
<H1 class=print-title>A Union Activist's Call for Change </H1>
<DIV class=print-submitted>Nick Egnatz | Friday 31 December 2010</DIV>
<P><IMG style="PADDING-RIGHT: 2em; FLOAT: left" alt=""
src="cid:002601cbb06c$fff8e7d0$6501a8c0@yourze8cxvr8tt"><BR></P>
<DIV class=print-content>
<P class=rteleft>Kim Scipes’ new book “AFL-CIO’s Secret War against Developing
Country Workers” (Lexington Books, 2010) documents the history of AFL-CIO
leadership in supporting the U.S. government policy of Empire in the developing
world. AFL-CIO leadership, in secret and completely without the consent and
support of their rank and file membership, has worked to thwart popular
bottom-up organic democracy in the developing world and instead supported elite
top-down democracy, friendly to U.S. corporate interests.</P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>Specifically what is Scipes charging labor with?</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“ . . . that since the end of World War II, U.S. Labor has
intervened in a number of countries. These interventions fall into three
categories:</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>directly operating to help undermine democratically elected
governments which, in each case, led to the establishment of a reactionary
military dictatorship, the death and/or imprisonment of thousands, and
decimation of respective labor movements (as in Guatemala during 1954; in Brazil
in 1964; and Chile in 1973);</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>supporting reactionary governments and their affiliated
labor movements against workers and their organizations seeking democratic
changes (Indonesia during the 1970s-late 1990s; El Salvador throughout the 1980s
and into the 1990s; the Philippines, 1980s-early 1990s; and South Korea,
1970s-late 1980s;</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>indirectly operating with local labor movements to attack
pro-labor, progressive governments (in Guyana in 1963; Dominican Republic in
1965; Nicaragua in the late 1980s; and Venezuela in the late 1990s to 2002-03 .
. .<BR><BR>“Each of these interventions, ironically, limited if not destroyed
militant labor movements in these countries, providing safe haven for U.S.
corporate investment. Thus, the foreign policy activities of the AFL-CIO
provided places for U.S. corporations to invest, taking jobs from and/or
providing increased competition to companies that had American
employees.”</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft>Was the labor leadership simply carrying the water for the CIA
and U.S. Empire? One might make that assumption, but Scipes demolishes the
theory that labor leadership were merely accomplices to Empire.</P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“The fear of “communism” by labor leaders--beginning with
(Samuel) Gompers, and then of subsequent AFL/AFL-CIO leaders--has been based on
these labor leaders’ ideology, and not some rational evaluation of what really
was taking place. In other words, these labor officials have tended to believe
automatically that anyone who would challenge the status quo (and most
especially, capitalism) and sought to fight for the well-being of
workers--especially if they took a broader and more militant approach than that
of AFL/AFL-CIO leaders--was a communist; these labor officials did it here in
the United States, especially in response to the CIO, and they have done it all
around the world, particularly in the so-called “developing countries” of
Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. It has not mattered if that
person was a member of a communist party or just a militant trade unionist: a
broader vision, militancy, and especially willingness to engage in more than
negotiations for collective bargaining agreements, have been long seen as signs
of the communists . . .</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“Thus, the fear of “communism,” in reality, has been used
against anyone or any project that might get out of labor leaders’ control. This
is different than what has been claimed: labor leaders have claimed that members
of a competing political system were trying to impose their control
undemocratically upon workers; that, if successful, they would force workers to
do whatever these competing political system leaders demanded; and, therefore,
they were a threat to the workers’ lives, liberty and pursuit of happiness--and
that the AFL/AFL-CIO leaders were there to ensure that this was not allowed to
happen. The reality has been the AFL/AFL-CIO leaders used this “thing” this
amorphous threat called “communism,” as a tool to ensure their continued control
over “their” labor organizations and “their” members--and they did this by
training their workers to stop thinking once the words “communism” or
“communist” were mentioned. And a key tactic to undercut labor dissidents and
activists has been to label them as “communists,” and therefore discredit them,
no matter how valuable their efforts.</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“In other words--and we will see this again in the
future--efforts to ensure social control in the unions have often preceded
efforts by the U.S. Government, basically showing the government “how to do it”:
we have seen this in the United States, and we have seen it overseas.”</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft>Scipes traces the origin of AFL-CIO collusion and support of
U.S. Empire with AFL founder Samuel Gompers and his philosophy of <EM>“business
unionism that accepts the domination of society by corporate power; that
organizes worker-members to fight for their limited interests instead of those
of all working people: that is isolated from the community and resources outside
of the trade union movement; and that keeps its members subordinated and does
not educate them . . .”</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft>Scipes on U.S. Empire:</P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“We are taught, particularly through our primary and
secondary school systems, that the United States is the greatest country on the
planet and that, of course, our efforts around the world are benign, when they
are not life-affirming. Unfortunately, the historical record challenges this
interpretation of reality. It will be argued, again, that a more accurate
understanding recognizes that the U.S. is an imperialist nation, and that the
entire set of imperialist relations should be recognized as constituting the
U.S. Empire.</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“From this perspective--that the U.S. Government’s foreign
policy since the middle of WWII has been designed to ensure that the United
States exerts hegemonic control over the world--we see that Labor has been
reincorporated into the U.S. Government’s foreign policy efforts. The process by
which this has occurred is described, initially by providing an account of the
development of Labor’s “institutes” in developing countries--with a particular
focus on AIFLD, the American Institute for Free Labor Development, in Latin
America--and the ideological efforts to get government and multinational
corporations to join in support of Labor’s efforts. This is followed with
accounts of the U.S. Government’s efforts to work with Labor through the Agency
for International Development (USAID), the National Endowment for Democracy
(NED), and the Advisory Committee on Labor and Diplomacy (ACLD). And through
this examination, it will be seen that Labor’s foreign policy leadership has
acquiesced, if not actively participated, in subordinating the labor movement to
the interests of the U.S. elites.”</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft>Concerning domination and hegemony. I am indebted to William
Robinson (“Promoting Polyarchy--Globalization, U.S. Intervention, and Hegemony,”
Cambridge University Press) for an understanding of hegemony, a word I, as a
typical American, was unfamiliar with a relatively short time ago. Robinson
refers to socialist intellectual Antonio Gramsci who wrote his “Prison Notebook”
from a Mussolini jail. Gramsci said that the domination of the majority by a
minority was hegemony when it became consensual. He further clarified it as
consensual, but backed by armor. The majority have bought into their subservient
position, but the armor was there for those who weren’t buying. Robinson’s
groundbreaking book is but one of many adroitly used by Scipes.</P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“ . . . Labor’s foreign policy leadership is wedded to the
idea of Empire: they believe that the United States should dominate the world,
that unlimited financial resources should be dedicated to ensuring this, and
that all other considerations are secondary or less. That they have been willing
to mistreat workers around the world, especially in the developing countries,
and disembowel labor democracy within the United States . . .”</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>“And that is why this struggle against the AFL-CIO foreign
policy program is so very important: we will be unable to change our labor
movement until we consciously repudiate the U.S. Empire and break AFL-CIO
leaders’ collaboration with it . . .</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>This requires us to act to transform the American version
of trade unionism in general, at least into social justice union forms of
economic trade unionism, and preferably into social movement unionism.”</EM></P>
<P class=rteleft>But Dr. Scipes is not some academic pontificating from an ivory
university tower. Rather he is a former Marine (Vietnam Era) of working class
background who has been a member of and involved in the organized labor movement
his entire life with careers as a printer, inner city high school teacher and
office worker before reentering academia and becoming Assistant Professor of
Sociology at Purdue University North Central (PNC) in Westville, Indiana. In
addition to “KMU: Building Genuine Trade Unionism in the Philippines, 1980-1984”
Kim has authored over 130 articles and reviews, largely on the international
labor movement.</P>
<P class=rteleft>While extremely critical of the foreign policy of the AFL-CIO
leadership, Kim leaves no question of where his heart lies, “I am a strong
believer in unions.”</P>
<P class=rteleft>Dr. Scipes union credentials include past membership in the
Graphic Communications International Union, AFL-CIO; the American Federation of
Teachers, AFL-CIO; and the National Education Association. He is a current
member of the National Writers Union/United Auto Workers Union, AFL-CIO, serving
as the Chair of the NWU’s Veterans’ Committee and is long-time member of the
United Association for Labor Education (UALE).</P>
<P class=rteleft>It has been my great pleasure for the last five years to
consider Kim as a friend and fellow comrade in the struggle for social and
economic justice for all. Working with Kim on Indiana University Northwest’s
Conference on Participatory Democracy in Gary, Indiana, I can still see him
telling students “don’t let your learning get in the way of your education.”</P>
<P class=rteleft>Kim’s book builds on a rich history of largely ignored research
and documentation of the U.S. as an Empire vs. the accepted myth that U.S. is a
functioning representative democracy and the kindest and gentlest of nations,
the City on a Hill.</P>
<P class=rteleft>Dr. Scipes reports on the state of democracy within the
AFL-CIO. In 2004, four hundred delegates, representing 2.5 million workers (1/6
of the total national AFL-CIO membership), unanimously passed the “Build Unity
and Trust Among Workers Worldwide” resolution at the Biennial California State
AFL-CIO Convention. Among other reforms it demanded transparency in union
funding of the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) that had been used to
further U.S. Empire at the expense or organic workers movements in the
developing world through what was called the Solidarity Center. All done without
the knowledge or consent of AFL-CIO membership. National leadership under
President John Sweeney changed the resolution so that the actual resolution
presented to the national delegates in 2005 actually praised the Solidarity
Center’s actions and called for no transparency. When delegates attempted to
challenge the resolution they were undemocratically prohibited from speaking by
none other than the Chair of the Convention, AFSCME President Gerald
McEntee.</P>
<P class=rteleft>Kim was at the founding conference for United States Labor
Against War (USLAW) which subsequently succeeded in getting the 2005 National
AFL-CIO convention to pass a resolution demanding that U.S. troops be “rapidly
removed” from Iraq. This resolution, a direct slap in the face to leadership’s
support of U.S. Empire, was then ignored by the leadership. Democracy within
Labor appears no better than U.S. democracy in general.</P>
<P class=rteleft>The book was a real eye opener for me, as one outside the U.S.
labor movement, but committed to social and economic justice. When I first
started to read the book I sent out an email promoting it and mentioned that it
brought into question the relevance of the U.S. labor movement. A union
organizer on my list responded, “Gee, thanks Nick! I guess I’ll just go home and
quit my irrelevant attempt at organizing and representing workers! Btw,
irrelevant to whom or what?”</P>
<P class=rteleft>I issued an apology because I am sure that most within the U.S.
labor movement have the best of intentions and the highest of ideals and that
the relevance of their union membership is of paramount importance to them and
their families and I certainly meant no disrespect to them. I have no axe to
grind with rank and file workers, inside or outside of organized labor. On the
other hand, leadership that subverts internal democracy and upholds U.S. Empire
is irrelevant to those it leads within Labor. Those outside Labor who have no
one representing them in the workplace may actually depend more on organized
labor for support than labor’s rank and file membership.</P>
<P class=rteleft>With union membership of private workers now only 7percent, it
becomes clear, to me at least, that leadership’s embrace of U.S. Empire,
“business unionism” and disregard for internal democracy within labor has
created a cancer, that if neglected will result in the complete irrelevance of
the U.S. labor movement and the accelerated demise of what little is left of
U.S. democracy. There are activists like Kim Scipes within U.S. Labor and they
need the support of the rank and file to make Labor more democratic and less
imperial. With endless wars raging overseas and the lives of the U.S. working
class in tatters, the American people need U.S. labor to assume its rightful
position leading the fight for social and economic justice for all.</P>
<P class=rteleft>This must read, for both those inside and outside organized
labor, may be purchased from the publisher Lexington Books (LexingtonBooks.com).
Every purchase of it at the personally hefty price tag of $65 helps to bring the
price down for future publisher runs, including a possible future paper back
edition. It belongs in every library in the country.</P>
<P class=rteleft><EM>Nick Egnatz is a Vietnam veteran. He has been actively
protesting our government’s crimes of empire in both person and print for some
years now and was named “Citizen of the Year” for Northwest Indiana in 2006 for
his peace activism by the National Association of Social Workers. Contact Nick
at <A class=moz-txt-link-abbreviated
href="mailto:nickatlakehills@sbcglobal.net">nickatlakehills@sbcglobal.net</A>.
</EM></P></DIV>
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