i think a militant caucus focused on an industry and not a union is definitely a good thing.
not sure about everything else.
IWW and Dual Carders-- a strategy?
ftony wrote:
stop stirring. keep it on the other thread in organise if you want a scrap.
Is that all you have to say? This is a union that signs no strike deals, agrees to binding arbitration, and lets managers into their branches.
The IWW seems to me to be as yellow as the yellow unions.
...And you want us not to criticise in the name of 'non-sectarianism'.
The IWW is a disgrace to its historic legacy.
Devrim
To be fair to the IWW the no-strike contracts were negotiated in secret from the rest of the IWW and only in the US. The membership would have put it's foot down IF it had been notified of the contents. The problem is that the internal life of the IWW in the US encourages secrecy, informal factions, etc.
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Is that all you have to say? This is a union that signs no strike deals, agrees to binding arbitration, and lets managers into their branches.
The IWW seems to me to be as yellow as the yellow unions.
...And you want us not to criticise in the name of 'non-sectarianism'.
The IWW is a disgrace to its historic legacy.
WTF does this have to do with the topic? This is trolling pure and simple, there are plenty of other threads to bring this issue up in.
fnbrill wrote:
To be fair to the IWW the no-strike contracts were negotiated in secret from the rest of the IWW and only in the US. The membership would have put it's foot down IF it had been notified of the contents. The problem is that the internal life of the IWW in the US encourages secrecy, informal factions, etc.
nevermind the fact that they registered with the british government, making them responsible for any action workers take in their name, including any strikes which do not go through appropriate channels at appropriate times.
OliverTwister wrote:
nevermind the fact that they registered with the british government, making them responsible for any action workers take in their name, including any strikes which do not go through appropriate channels at appropriate times.
"They"? Change in political orientation?
I'm not very familiar with UK system, I can't say what registration changed. I do know that a SPGBers got a couple of interesting IWW workplace groups together pre-2000. First were workers in several groceries in Devon as a minority union against the official union. The other was workers at a University in Edinb. again as a minority against the official unions.
EdmontonWobbly wrote:
Are you so sure that any association, or individuals involved can't be held liable for unofficial strike action too? That's certainly the case in Canada.
Unofficial strikes are legal, but unlawful - so there's no protection against being sacked etc.
However, if there's a union, and an unofficial strike, everyone from the very lowest level of the union upwards is required to repudiate the strike action, and get the workers back to work. If they don't, then the union is subject to sequestration of funds and I think individuals can be held legally liable. So essentially registration legally requires you to assist in breaking the strike if there's a wildcat. The UK wobblies would say that when there's a wildcat, it's simply got nothing to do with the IWW at all and think they can avoid the laws like this - I'm not so sure (although afaik, it's not been tested).
The advantages to registration are that you can't get sacked for simply being a member of a union here - has happened to a bunch of people in one shop who joined in Hull (I think) a few years back, and of course you can go on official balloted strike action without getting into trouble as well. In the case of dual carders this is a bit moot, as is having recourse to official ballots.
This circular written during the firefighters dispute gives you an idea: http://www.lge.gov.uk/lge/aio/51630
and this goes into detail on the law a bit further: http://www.berr.gov.uk/employment/employment-legislation/employment-guidance/page17758.html
note this bit: any other committee of the union or any official (2) of the union, including those who are employed by the union and those, like shop stewards, who are not.
So basically, if you wildcat, then you're liable either way, but if you're an unpaid shop steward upwards, you're additionally liable if you don't assist in breaking the strike. Thus you get people (especially in the CWU where there's loads of wildcats) who both organise wildcats in the background, then condemn them in the press the same day.
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The UK wobblies would say that when there's a wildcat, it's simply got nothing to do with the IWW at all and think they can avoid the laws like this - I'm not so sure (although afaik, it's not been tested).
Unions have done this bit successfully in Canada, it sounds like your laws are pretty similar to ours, not surprising really. Not being able to be sacked for organizing is a pretty big incentive to register, especially when
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if you wildcat, then you're liable either way
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Here unofficial strikes are illegal, and met with a 10,000$ a day fine if the labour board chooses to nail you with it. If you are in a union, the union gets fined and sometimes the leaders, if you aren't in one potentially everyone can get fined but in practice its often just the leaders.
I also think no strike clauses are mandatory in Alberta, as well as a grievance procedure that keeps work going on during the processing of the grievance.
Dundee_United wrote:
I will come back to this discussion. Dual carding in my view should be the most critical aspect of IWW strategy.
Some years ago Flint came to the conclusion that as a union the IWW is never going to be able to be really successful, but as a labor solidarity group that focuses on agitating for militancy and revolutionary politics in organized and unorganized workplaces it has nothing but huge potential.
I tend to completely agree with him and would be like a dual card strategy but not quite.
fnbrill wrote:
To be fair to the IWW the no-strike contracts were negotiated in secret from the rest of the IWW and only in the US. The membership would have put it's foot down IF it had been notified of the contents. The problem is that the internal life of the IWW in the US encourages secrecy, informal factions, etc.
That makes it worse not better. It means that you don't have internal democracy either.
Devrim
OliverTwister wrote:
nevermind the fact that they registered with the british government, making them responsible for any action workers take in their name, including any strikes which do not go through appropriate channels at appropriate times.
okay, so we just let our members get sacked if they ever try to organise, is that what you're saying? do you really have no grasp of how serious it is to have tens of union members get sacked because we simply didn't have any legal protection whatsoever (as what happened in Hull)? if the IWW in the UK didn't register we'd still have less than 100 members over here, we'd almost certainly not be growing, and we probably wouldn't have a GLAMROC either because it was BIROC wobs who've done a lot of the hard work to help them get a decent start. moreover we'd be significantly less of a real union than we are now. and that's saying soemthing 
ftony - do you really think they wouldn't have been fired if you were a registered union at the time?
They'd just have found another excuse. The problem was that the iww wasn't a union in practise, not legally. If you can't defend your members but call yourself a union, it doesn't matter if you have legal protection or not, you're still going to get fucked in the face.
Jack wrote:
ftony - do you really think they wouldn't have been fired if you were a registered union at the time?They'd just have found another excuse. The problem was that the iww wasn't a union in practise, not legally. If you can't defend your members but call yourself a union, it doesn't matter if you have legal protection or not, you're still going to get fucked in the face.
jack, this may be true, but it was 5 people who got sacked. they were wobbles already, and got 6 more to join out of 20. the bosses said "leave the iww or get sacked" - all the new ones left and the 5 already-wobs got sacked.
thugarchist wrote:
Dundee_United wrote:
I will come back to this discussion. Dual carding in my view should be the most critical aspect of IWW strategy.Some years ago Flint came to the conclusion that as a union the IWW is never going to be able to be really successful, but as a labor solidarity group that focuses on agitating for militancy and revolutionary politics in organized and unorganized workplaces it has nothing but huge potential.
I tend to completely agree with him and would be like a dual card strategy but not quite.
I tentatively agree with this - if you try to be a "real union" you do tie yourselves in these knots, that's why a network of militants would be much better. Then you don't have to compromise.
yea, but they use the incident as a reason why they needed to be registered, because it'd be unfair dismissal if it'd been because of union membership. But i reckon the same thing still would have happened, just the boss would've needed an excuse. I really don't think that the iww wasn't registered was the issue.
re. numbers - i was giving more of a hypothetical figure than the specific figure in hull. didn't know it was exactly five. and Jack you're right part of the issue was that the rest of the IWW at the time wasn't capable of supporting the workers in hull. until the IWW gets bigger (i mean four or five figures, rather than three), it still won't have much capability to defend itself unless what little of the law that can protect the workers is played along with. yeah, they might have sacked them for other reasons, but, thinking purely stategically here, the drive could have continued. after they got sacked for being in the IWW, that set a precedent, certainly in Hull, saying 'the IWW is not a registered union, don't join it because they can sack you and you can't do anything about it'. (there were other problems with the campaign aside from not being registered, of course...)
so it's also an issue of trust. someone joins a union and trusts that the union can help them and can help them make their lives better. if you can say "we're an officially recognised union, with A B C protections and X Y Z rights" people are more willing to trust that the IWW is worth it. i've had people come up to me asking about the IWW, and i've been able to tell them that we're formally registered as a [trade] union. that means a lot to people outside of the far-left milieu. it's problematic, yes, but the benefits to practical capabilities and confidence that registration brings tend to outweigh the problems.
anyway, dual carders...!
come on, this is old. i'm always honest about the size and capabilities of the IWW when talking to non members, and as far as i'm aware, this is true for pretty much all other IWW activists out there. anyway, i was talking generically about a union, not specifically the IWW.
I'm sure you are, but that still jibes with this:
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if you can say "we're an officially recognised union, with A B C protections and X Y Z rights" people are more willing to trust that the IWW is worth it. i've had people come up to me asking about the IWW, and i've been able to tell them that we're formally registered as a [trade] union. that means a lot to people outside of the far-left milieu.
oh, i see what you mean. well, the two aren't separate - i'd like to think i'd never say "we're an officially recognised union, with A B C protections and X Y Z rights" without also talking about the other stuff as well. not deliberately anyway! it's generally good to assume that whoever you're taling to (unless theyr'e a total politico) doesn't know much, if anything, about the IWW
So that just makes it sound like you have people joining who know next to nothing about the IWW and the clincher is the false sense of security gained by being registered. I'm sure you'll say that's not what happens, but it's essentially what your last few posts amount to.
Being in a registered union doesn't necessarily stop you getting sacked for organising.
Organising outside a registered union doesn't necessarily get you sacked if you do it right.
Registering hamstrings many of the things a revolutionary workplace group ought to be able to do.
More people will join if they think the IWW is an
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an officially recognised union, with A B C protections and X Y Z rights [...] formally registered as a [trade] union
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So that just makes it sound like you have people joining who know next to nothing about the IWW and the clincher is the false sense of security gained by being registered. I'm sure you'll say that's not what happens
amazingly, some people who start off knowing next to nothing about the IWW go on to become committed activists. anyhow, the last sentence is exactly right, so i won't bother - saves us both time and effort 
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Being in a registered union doesn't necessarily stop you getting sacked for organising.
Organising outside a registered union doesn't necessarily get you sacked if you do it right.
both true
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Registering hamstrings many of the things a revolutionary workplace group ought to be able to do.
i wouldn't say 'many'. but it does make some of the things a revolutionary workplace group ought to do much more difficult when officially tied to the union, yes.
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More people will join if they think the IWW is an [etc etc]
yes. even anarcho-lefties who don't like the whole registration thing, i'd say. i don't like it on principle, but i recognise that it was a sensible move, and therefore am prepared to accept it for the time being.
http://www.iww.org/en/node/3812
Did people see this on the forming cross union rail caucus? It think this is a good example of what the IWW's strategy for dual carders could be. The only thing I'm not the most happy about is the 'electing officers who support our program' part, but as long as in practice the focus is on rank and file stuff, then I can deal with it being there formally. If we could have someway to develop a relationship with groups like this, perhaps even sponsor them in a way and send our people to their confrences etc that would be great. The FAT union in Mexico does work along these lines of supporting caucuses in other unions. UE does a little too, but differently in that they are trying to recruit them for affiliation (but that's not totally bad either).
Another example is the blood campaign by the UK wobs and the MLK holiday campaign by SBX. These are good examples of nation-wide campaigns around issues. In UK, I have no idea of whether there is a TUC union presence with these workers. I guess what I'm thinking about is teachers-- that's an example where people could take up a industry-wide campaign that united workers across an industry and across existing unions and potentially even non-union workers.
*A note on why I think the rail caucus seems (at least at this point) different from something like TDU, is that it is focused across an industry, not a specific union. I think this changes the dynamics in that instead of focusing on changing 'the union' (which most likely leads towards factional and bureacratic struggles), it is focused on conditions and issues across an industry and across various unions, making me believe it will lead more toward workplace militancy.