Struggle by Indianapolis GM workers raises crucial issues

(2PM EST – promoted by Nightprowlkitty)

Original article, Struggle by Indianapolis GM workers raises crucial issues, by Jerry White via World Socialist Web Site:

A year after the United Auto Workers union collaborated with the Obama administration in the restructuring of the auto industry and the assault on auto workers’ wages and living standards, determined workers at the General Motors Indianapolis stamping plant have rebelled against the UAW and taken a stand to defend the right to a job and a decent wage.

The first question is how do workers stand up for their jobs, living standards and working conditions? The answer has been to organize themselves and workers in other plants in their industries in the form of unions. Unions which were responsive to the needs of the workers who formed the union’s membership allowed the workers to fight against their corporate overlords. While not every battle was won, living standards and work conditions improved for many of the workers.

On August 15, hundreds of workers shouted down UAW International officials and threw them out of their local union meeting for negotiating a cut in wages from $29 an hour to $15.50. The UAW International had secretly negotiated the deal with JD Norman, a 34-year-old ex-stockbroker, who said he would buy the plant and keep it open only if wages were cut in half. Last May, UAW Local 23 workers overwhelmingly voted to reject any negotiations with Norman, a decision that the UAW ignored.

The second question is how do the bosses subvert a strong union? If you look at the history of labor relations, you’ll see that is very rare that company managements rarely accept workers’ organization into unions without fighting them. They would fight the unions tooth and nail, but the organized workers would fight back. The workers had one advantage: If no work was done, there would be no profits for the bosses. One of the ways the bosses found to subvert the unions was to integrate the union bureaucracy into management and ownership of the companies. The union bureaucracy would then have a financial stake in keeping the workers under the thumbs of the companies. The auto companies formed such an arrangement with the UAW.

On August 15, hundreds of workers shouted down UAW International officials and threw them out of their local union meeting for negotiating a cut in wages from $29 an hour to $15.50. The UAW International had secretly negotiated the deal with JD Norman, a 34-year-old ex-stockbroker, who said he would buy the plant and keep it open only if wages were cut in half. Last May, UAW Local 23 workers overwhelmingly voted to reject any negotiations with Norman, a decision that the UAW ignored.

Among workers there is a deep sense that the UAW International is running roughshod over their democratic rights and is motivated by the corrupt self-interest of the union bureaucracy. It has not escaped them that the UAW now owns a substantial piece of GM.

The third question, and the one which the article asks, is what should workers do when the financial interests of the union bureaucracy overrides the interests of the membership of the union? To answer the question, or at least to for a basis in which to start to answer it, you have to ask another question: If the union bureaucracy no longer serves the needs of the workers who form it (and from which it draws it’s actual reason to exist), has that union bureaucracy lost the right to represent the workers who are members of the union? This is a particularly important question as far as the UAW and GM are concerned. The UAW owns, as White points out in the article, 17% of GM and controls the VEBA trust (as part of the UAW restructuring). If nothing else, this ownership stake in GM forms a powerful conflict of interest for the union bureaucracy: If the good of the interests of the workers who form the membership of the union runs counter to the interests of the ownership interests of the bureaucracy, which wins? It’s a question which both the union bureaucracy and workers need to answer, and it’s a question which may have two different and opposing answers.

I’ll let you read the rest of the article. You may not agree with the answer which White comes up with. You may even side with the union bureaucracy, seeing their position as being in the best interest of the membership of the union (or seeing the overseeing of of the ownership stake by the bureaucracy as being what Marxists might call the ownership of the means of production). Has this ownership stake fundamentally changed the nature of the union? If so, does this change run counter to the needs of the workers who the union represents? This is the fundamental question the membership of the union have to ask, and getting the answer right may well change the nature of how (and even if) workers will organize themselves in the future.