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| "Solidarity Divided" questions labor's futureSolidarity Dividedby Bill Fletcher and Fernando Gapasin; University of California Press, ISBN 978-0-520-25525-8 Reviewed by Michael G. Matejka Who does the labor movement represent: union members or the working class? That’s a century-old, complicated question that gets fresh analysis from Bill Fischer and Fernando Gapasin in their new book: “Solidarity Divided.” Fletcher, former AFL-CIO Education Director, is co-founder for the Center for Labor Renewal. Gapasin is a central labor council president. Starting with the 2005 Change to Win (CTW) split from the AFL-CIO, these two labor activists first detail labor’s historic development and then question what direction labor needs for the 21st century. They call for a broadly-based working class movement, rooted in social justice concerns like living wages, equality, safety and jobs for all workers. According to their analysis, the labor movement took a fatal when it concentrated on achieving power through winning contracts for specific worker groups. At that point, the union movement began to lose its broad, popular base and was cast as a narrow self-interest group. These two analysts also criticize the union movement for accepting the strident anti-communism of the 1950s and aiding the U.S. government in international interventions. They claim that this foreign policy support lulled labor into believing it had won protection from business attack. They also criticize the CTW split as a lost opportunity, a moment to open a real dialogue with members about where labor was going and why. Finally, they question the current union push on organizing more members. They agree that the union movement needs to grow, but say that it first needs a clear vision of where it is going and why, that “growth for growth’s sake” is not enough to rescue organized labor. Their call is for “social justice” unionism, linking with community organizations, the unemployed and immigrant workers to build a union movement rooted in working class needs. These are hard, critical questions from two labor practitioners, who learned the movement from the shop floor up. For a brief and insightful historic analysis, this book is first rate. Not everyone will agree with their conclusions, but their probing questions are worth discussion as the labor movement slowly watches its numbers diminish and struggles to reaffirm its place in American society. |