proposed by the Congress of the People January 12, 2019, San Francisco

Unions should be the brains and conscience of society; union leadership positions should not be for life, union leaders should generally not earn higher salaries than the workers they represent (although the leaders should have adequate budgets for legitimate travel, organizing, and related activities). Unions should be more conscientious in protecting them most vulnerable workers. Unions should do a better job of using art, literature, and music for political causes. Unions should fight much harder against racial injustice–and interventionist wars, and imperialist and rapacious foreign policy to ensure that the U.S. military not continue to be a pawn of abysmally misguided foreign policy; and in general unions should advocate for society, not just our members.

The movement needs to learn from the past to look forward to a better future- Looking forward to contracts expiring election processes and find victories for FED workers, teachers on strike and rights for immigrants, dreamers and people of color.

Joe Berry: “Start with a committee, even if it’s with one other person. The key is to find someone to start. Now you have a committee. You can start to plan how to move, which means finding other people, developing issues and education yourself. And I would argue that that process is the essence of a union–any union. Not the structure, not the treasurer, not the recognition by the employer, not the contract. That relationship of solidarity, the willingness to stand up for each other. That’s the kernel of any workers’ organization or trade union.”

• This topic was modified 4 years, 10 months ago by asej.