Portside

A New Model for Worker-Led Organizing

Until yesterday, U.S. steelworkers hadn’t experienced an attack as sweeping as that of 1892.

“All those who care about the lives of seafarers – or a global supply chain that keeps its workers safe – must call for a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. Peace is the best way to end the attacks on ships in the Red Sea."

A majority of workers at Ultium Cells in Tennessee have signed cards to join the UAW and the company has agreed to recognize their union.

The strike comes as 40,000 Unite Here hotel workers across 20 cities face expiring contracts this year. Negotiations for new four-year contracts have been taking place since May; about 15,000 of those workers have authorized strikes in 12 markets.

A close look at data suggests unions could be doing a lot more to organize and build the labor movement in this moment.

UTLA’s transformation story surfaces critical lessons that respond to the most important question facing the labor movement today: How do we ensure that the recent years of labor upsurge across economic sectors becomes durable, transformative power?

In the United States and Canada, we’ve seen an increase in labor militancy. This upsurge is a chance to inject working-class politics into the political arena, which has so far been mostly unresponsive to workers’ demands.

In Blue Collar Empire, Jeff Schuhrke documents how many AFL and CIO leaders participated in witch hunts against UE and other unions in the U.S., and actively conspired with the U.S. government to undermine militant unions around the world.

The Teamsters won a ban on any further outsourcing, wrested back some previously outsourced jobs, and for the first time won the right to honor strikes by other Kroger Teamsters.