UNION DEMOCRACY = UNION POWER

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(Part One of a $100 Plus Club News Special Report on a University of Illinois Forum on Union Democracy & Effective Union Leadership)

Incumbent union officers tend to think of union democracy as a threat to incumbent power. This is a basic misconception. Union democracy is about union member power, and union member power is union power. Because union democracy activism usually focuses on deposing corrupt, ineffectual, or uncaring union officers, it is not widely understood that an effective union is one that cultivates its members' power.

This key to realizing the true potential of union power was understood by Ron Carey, whose full slate won control of the Teamsters Union in the 1990 campaign organized by the rank-and-file caucus, Teamsters for a Democratic Union. During his years in office, from 1991-1998, Carey used the power of union members to transform the Teamsters Union, the AFL-CIO, and the U.S. labor movement.

To illustrate the point, look at the greatest strike in recent U.S. labor history: the 1997 national UPS strike. The big issue was the company's insidious ongoing transfer of work from full-timers - who were entitled to health and pension benefits - to part-timers, entitled to no benefits. If not reversed in that contract negotiation, the UPS workforce would have become a part-time workforce. But the fears of a strike were many: Wouldn't the public and regular UPS customers be angry about losing their UPS service? What if the huge workforce of part-timers became an army of scabs? Did anyone remember the last successful strike?

Carey started strike preparations two years before the contract expired. His goals included these: (1) to educate the UPS membership about why all of them, including the part-timers, needed to win this battle; (2) to make sure that all members would be familiar with strike tactics and comfortable about using them; and (3) to transform the UPS workforce into the Union's ambassadors into the community and to the media. In other words, he set out to empower the UPS membership. All UPS Teamsters were encouraged to become engaged in the process.

When it came time to strike, the Union was ready - meaning that the members were ready. The UPS members were part of the team. They knew the issues and were ready to explain them in a few clear sentences. UPS package car drivers fanned out across the country to explain the strike issues to their customers. Local television camera crews followed them and broadcast their live interviews on the local evening news, where, smiling calmly, they compellingly explained that all Americans needed the part-timers to become full-timers, to protect full-time jobs, with health and pension benefits. They were so clearly proud to be Teamsters. UPS customers, news reporters, and the public all "got it." The strike received overwhelming support. All the workers were on board; there was no scabbing problem. In short order, the strike was over, with a new contractual formula for the automatic conversion of part-time jobs to full-time jobs - a huge victory. That strike became a textbook illustration of how union member power can become union power.