Brainstorming for a new type of strike

[Havet]

Hello all! I begin this topic with a recent experience of mine, which im sure many of you (in europe at least) experience occasionally.

Due to austerity measures, the public train company union has declared strike for a whole month. Now, the reason they get 'away' with it is not that they simply dont work for a month, but they announce 'complications' throughout the several lines they operate in, which in practice means suppressed trains, delays, etc.

It is certainly important for workers to express their discontent, buti think that this type of strike (or the traditional ones where they just dont go to work for a day) does not take into account the fact that it IS a part of capitalism

Currently, when there is a strike, it is consumers that are hurt first, not the employers, and since we are in a capitalist framework, consumers choose to go to competitors as long as the strike lasts.

This makes no sense to me. Strikes should target employers first, not consumers, because employers are the ones that supposedly are causing the problem in the first place.

So this thread will serve as a way for us to brainstorm on some new type of strike that will enable workers to more effectively strike, with the 'blessing' of the customers instead of going after them. Any ideas?

For example, and this is only an idea, instead of collectively deciding not to work for a certain amount of time, why not collectively seize the public company (ie: not giving the revenue to the employers) for a small amount of time, to prove the point? this way, the services can keep on running, and its employers not customers that are hurt the most.

[danyboy27]

well, its easy, allow people to enter without asking them to pay.

capitalism is not so much about good or service providing but about making money out of it, you could easily still give a service and avoid the capitalist to gain something from it.

For exemple canada post could have decided to allow everybody except the governement to send letters and packages for free.

air canada unions could also attack the buisness by giving away free rides.

Workers could get away with it of done properly.

[Havet]

well, its easy, allow people to enter without asking them to pay.

capitalism is not so much about good or service providing but about making money out of it, you could easily still give a service and avoid the capitalist to gain something from it.

For exemple canada post could have decided to allow everybody except the governement to send letters and packages for free.

air canada unions could also attack the buisness by giving away free rides.

Workers could get away with it of done properly.

Thats an interesting idea, but suppose the employers just play along. then who pays the workers? i think that alternative can backfire, and not in a good way... this is why my alternative above takes that into account, making sure striking workers still get payed, except skipping the middle men (the employers)

[danyboy27]

Thats an interesting idea, but suppose the employers just play along. then who pays the workers? i think that alternative can backfire, and not in a good way... this is why my alternative above takes that into account, making sure striking workers still get payed, except skipping the middle men (the employers)

and the mean of productions will loose of their values over time without a return on their initial investement.

take a bus for exemple, a bus need regular maintenance, new parts, gas etc etc.

if you use it without getting a return on your investement, the mean of production will break down, sometimes beyond repair.

and the one who will be forced to pay for the repair and replacements will be the bosses and without a return on their investements, this will translate in dirrect losses, forcing them to use their initial surplus to cover those losses.

even tho many buisnesses have large amount of money stacked in bank, if they dont get a return on their investement and are forced to use this initial surplus to cover for the mean of production, it will run out, or at least make the owner of the surplus think about how much he could save by ending the strike by paying the worker their dues.

[danyboy27]

By the way seizing the company is pretty neat, the only problem is, the law prohibit it, and in a matter of hour the police will smoke the folks out with tear gas and baton.

[Havet]

By the way seizing the company is pretty neat, the only problem is, the law prohibit it, and in a matter of hour the police will smoke the folks out with tear gas and baton.

good point

[danyboy27]

good point


resisting to the police make sense only if you can get some political gain out of it, for exemple, the canada post worker could try to block the purolator and ups distribution hub illegally and resist to their arrest. Beccause even if the action fail, it would show to everyone the brutality the state is using against workers and would ridicule the governement.

[RGacky3]

The French are the most creative when it comes to strikes, bossnappings, occupations.

The best type of strike is a general strike, remember consumers are both workers and capitalists, strikes should always try and hurt the capitalists more than the workers, be it in the workplace or as consumers.

Its almost impossible to not give the revenue to the capitalists, becaues almost always the workers never touch the money, the consumer gives it to the capitalist, who drops the pennies on the workers.

Also what your talking about is criminal, i.e. theft, which would ultimately just put people in prison, its skimming the register, which could be effective, but is just as risky as a takeover or boss napping.

[RGacky3]

Good thread BTW.

[human strike]

How about a strike that doesn't end? I hear they're pretty good.

[Jimmie Higgins]

For example, and this is only an idea, instead of collectively deciding not to work for a certain amount of time, why not collectively seize the public company (ie: not giving the revenue to the employers) for a small amount of time, to prove the point? this way, the services can keep on running, and its employers not customers that are hurt the most.

This has happened many times in situations where struggle is really heightened. Militant unions have done things like organize or offer help to the unemployed in order to prevent them from becoming scabs and get their support of worker actions; they have reached out to small businesses; and they have occupied workplaces and run essential services themselves in general strikes and other major actions.

The problem is that it would be illegal and many workers are too under-confident at this point to try and go beyond the tactics laid out by the union leaders. But even still, most of the strike actions I have been a part of or supported went to great lengths to inform the public and let them know why and when they are taking action so other workers can support them and make other arrangements. The media always go out of their way to talk about how commuters or customers were "inconvenienced" by the strike action - but this is just divisive propaganda on their part. These customers and commuters are largely just other workers who are probably also inconvenienced at their own workplaces by having their health benefits taken away or having to work harder for the same wages or less due to the economic crisis.

[Viet Minh]

It depends on the industry, but yeah a general strike works best. For Government-run operations there seems to be a lot of solidarity between unions, and a great success rate. For private owned business they could be badly hurt by anonymous 'exposes'. For example someone could film the conditions that chickens live in that will go into KFC restaurants. I'm not sure of the legality of that though..

[Leftie]

For example someone could film the conditions that chickens live in that will go into KFC restaurants. I'm not sure of the legality of that though..

Whistle-blowers are protected by law.

[Pioneers_Violin]

A strike should be all that's needed. A good old-fashioned one.

We used to have effective unions. A strike was absolute and although customers were inconvenienced and would go elsewhere, the businesses were just about completely shut down especially as other unions would never cross a picket line. This would cripple what little they could accomplish without workers.
Without the workers producing surplus value, the expenses will ruin them quickly.

Scabs were hated and not tolerated. If suspected of selling out, the "Rat Patrol" would come over and ask you nicely to not sell out your co-workers. Well, the first time they asked would be relatively nice. If seen as a scab, sellout or any sort of company person, your co-workers would taunt you continually until you left.

Crossing a picket line was taking your life in your hands. You just didn't do it, not ever.

I noticed a shift away from this starting around 1990. Our first sellout scab started doing his damage around 1996 or so.
Now we've got a few more rats and a substantially weaker union.

Because the union is weakened, Management now sets ridiculous work schedules, ignores state and federal employment laws, fires people at will, cuts pay and generally reminds us of why unions were invented in the first place.

It appears that 100 years or so of union progress has largely been demolished.

I'm one of the lucky ones. I still have a union, weakened or not.

[genstrike]

There are plenty of creative ways to take job action and put economic pressure on the employers beyond just the traditional strike. Of course, not all of these are defined in the state-sanctioned labour law system that we are so familiar with in the US and Canada (I personally can't really speak for the labour relations systems in other countries because I have only studied the US and Canada).

The IWW has and still does use all sorts of creative job action tactics - things like slowdowns, work to rule, strike on the job, etc.

Sit down strikes, such as the ones at auto plants were an important part of building the labour movement in the US. There was also the Republic windows factory occupation that UE workers pulled off.

Some other examples of militant workplace actions that I have seen or read about are: no-uniform days, rotating strikes, fare strikes (for transit), slowdowns, work to rule, marching on the boss, etc - basically anything that puts pressyre on the employer.

Unfortunately, as the labour movement accomodated the state-sanctioned labour relations system, we lost a lot of the creativity that we used to have - due to both the carrot-and-stick labour relations system and the bureaucratization of the labour movement over the decades.

That said, we shouldn't get too upset when we are inconvenienced by strikes. It's just the price we pay to defend our rights.