Labor's Foreign Policy Heads in
a New Direction
by Tom Sherrock
ZNet, August 18, 2005
Lost amidst the publicity about the breakup
of the AFL- CIO at its convention last month were two events that,
in their own ways, could point to a radically new foreign policy
for American unions and workers. The first was the convention's
passage of a resolution placing organized labor squarely behind
a rapid withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq--the first time that
the AFL-CIO has ever taken a public stance against an ongoing
U.S. war. The significance of the resolution was slightly muted
by the fact that the Service Employees International Union (SEIU),
Teamsters, and other members of the Change to Win Coalition that
had just left the federation did not vote. But it sent the unmistakable
message that labor is single-minded in its opposition to an illegal
war that has now cost 1,800 American and countless Iraqi lives.
The resolution itself was a triumph of
grassroots organizing, primarily by U.S. Labor Against the War,
a coalition of unions and labor councils that has brought the
concerns of Iraqi workers to scores of union halls across the
country. The bridge between what has historically been a foreign
policy chasm between conservative and radical unions was made
possible by a slight change in wording concerning the speed of
U.S. withdrawal, from "as soon as possible" to "rapidly."
This might seem like a small, semantic victory, pointed out CounterPunch
labor correspondent Joann Wypijewski, "Until you consider
the historic magnitude. From the floor, no one spoke against the
resolution: not the building trades; not Tom Buffenbarger of the
Machinists, who after 9/11 called for "vengeance," not
justice; not the American Federation of Teachers, which has typically
held high the flame of intervention."1 Moreover, noted Wypijewski,
not a single resolution was introduced seeking support for the
war.
The second event unfolded on the conference
floor in the waning hours of the convention, and went virtually
unmentioned in the mainstream and left-wing press. This was an
unsuccessful resolution, advanced by the California Federation
of Labor with the support of a dozen other labor councils, calling
on the AFL-CIO to make a thorough examination and public explanation
of its foreign policy activities, from the Cold War to the present,
and to "exercise extreme caution" about seeking or receiving
money from instruments of U.S.
foreign policy, particularly the National Endowment for Democracy
and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Together,
these two agencies account for more than 90 percent of the funds
provided to the American Center for International Labor Solidarity
(ACILS--aka the Solidarity Center), the AFL- CIO's foreign policy
arm and the successor to four institutes that became notorious
during the Cold War for working with USAID, the Labor Department,
and the Central Intelligence Agency to manipulate and control
union movements in Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Eastern Europe.
Unity and Trust Resolution
The debate behind the Unity and Trust
resolution has been raging in earnest for several years. In 2002,
several West Coast labor councils, citing the example of the AFL-CIO's
involvement in Chile prior to the 1973 coup, demanded an explanation
from the Sweeney administration and his International Affairs
Department
(IAD) about labor's past misdeeds, and sought to open a dialogue
on the future direction of labor's foreign affairs.2 The ramification
of the debate became clear last June, when Sweeney--responding
to a financial crisis partly brought on by the imminent departure
of the Change to Win coalition of unions--announced it was eliminating
the IAD altogether and transferring its director, Barbara Shailor,
to run the Solidarity Center.
In effect, this meant that AFL-CIO unions
would no longer be represented overseas by an independent arm
of the federation, but by a government-funded organization that
aligns its policies with the U.S. government. This, too, has received
virtually no attention in progressive circles and blogs. But it
should: as an institution based solely on government funds, the
Solidarity Center lacks the legitimacy to represent U.S. unions
at multilateral venues like the International Labor Organization,
where policy is set by "tripartite" organizations representing
states, business, and legitimate union federations. Moreover,
global labor union coalitions that have worked with the AFL-CIO
in the past, such as the International Transport Workers Federation,
might well be suspicious of maintaining in their ranks a new organization
that could not exist without its government largesse. After all,
if the AFL-CIO can challenge the legitimacy of state-run unions
in China and Cuba at these venues, what's to stop a genuine labor
federation from challenging the credentials of an ACILS delegation?
Sweeney's team may have grasped the logic
of this situation only too well. Over the past three years, while
saying little about its own programs, it has been mostly in a
defensive crouch, fending off the demands for a full accounting
of the AFL-CIO's institutes around the world and defending its
bungled attempts (using NED money) to fund the anti-government
union federation in Venezuela that sought through illegal means
to bring down the government of Hugo Chavez in 2002. Last spring,
however, after it became clear that the Unity and Trust resolution
would be presented to the convention, the Sweeney forces quietly
began floating their own resolution on international affairs to
labor councils in Georgia, North Carolina, and other states. Essentially,
they sought an official AFL-CIO blessing on the Solidarity Center
and completely ignored the requests from a huge number of workers
(the California federation represents a full one-sixth of union
members nationwide) for either an open look at the past or a change
in course in the future. Using bureaucratic techniques borrowed
from the Lane Kirkland era, convention organizers--led by AFSCME
President Gerald McAntee--allowed only a cursory debate on the
subject and approved their own resolution--submitted by the AFL-CIO's
executive council--by voice vote. A key section reads: "The
Solidarity Center will continue to seek public funds, while at
the same time it will work to diversify its funding base."
The question now is, what will the unions
who have left the AFL-CIO do in response? As the debate about
labor's future played out over the last year, with the SEIU and
Teamsters pressing for a huge infusion of resources into direct
organizing and the AFL-CIO arguing for equal focus on political
campaigns, little was said by either side about foreign policy.
It will be intriguing to see what, if any, attention is paid to
the need for cross-border campaigns and an independent foreign
policy center at the Change to Win coalition's opening convention
in September. The only indication of the coalition's position
is a short section on its website stating that the "central
thrust" of labor's international work "must be developing
united strategies and actions" around multinational corporations
and what the coalition calls the "Wal- Martization"
of the global economy. According to one labor veteran now working
with the SEIU, the breakaway unions will henceforth focus "on
global trade union action against global companies, as opposed
to either altruistic 'solidarity' or traditional 'subversion'."
There are plenty of contradictions, however,
and neither the AFL-CIO nor Change to Win can claim the progressive
mantle in international affairs. While the Solidarity Center was
promoting U.S. policies in Latin America and Africa as a client
of NED and USAID, Teamster President James Hoffa was a member
of the White House-backed Committee for the Liberation of Iraq,
which was organized by the neoconservative think- tanks Project
for the New American Century and the American Enterprise Institute
to drum up public support for the 2003 invasion. Even as they
criticize the AFL- CIO's approach, the SEIU and other unions make
many of their international contacts through ACILS--although Solidarity
Center staff, fearing retribution from their funders, play down
any work that could be publicly construed as anti-corporate. And
in 2002, SEIU President Andy Stern bucked strong opposition from
the AFL-CIO when he led a union delegation to China that included
a top aide to AFSCME President McAntee.
Still, there are signs that unions on
both sides of the split have abandoned the AFL-CIO's old-style
labor diplomacy in favor of direct contacts with workers and unions
overseas. The SEIU, for example, is engaged in a global campaign
to organize security workers employed by Wackenhut Corp., and
has built strong alliances with members of UNI, a coalition of
service and telecom unions, to pressure the UK's FirstGroup to
stop the union-busting tactics of its U.S. busing subsidiary.
The Teamsters' Port Division has been working with unions in Central
America and Europe to pressure Maersk Inc., the giant Danish shipping
line, to allow thousands of port drivers worldwide to bargain
for wages and benefits. The Communications Workers of America,
also a UNI member, recently helped a group of Taiwanese telecom
workers bring their fight against privatization to the Securities
and Exchange Commission. It is in such campaigns, emerging directly
from workers' struggles and demands rather than from the dictates
of labor bureaucrats or government funding, where the future of
labor's foreign policy lies.
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