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Libertarian Labor Review #14
Winter 1992-93, pages 31-33
Reviews
Revolutionary Syndicalism: An International Perspective, edited by
Marcel van der Linden and Wayne Thorpe. Scolar Press (Old Post
Road, Brookfield VT 05036), 1990, $59.95 (hard-cover).
The editors of this important volume have compiled 12 essays
offering an overview of revolutionary syndicalism in Argentina,
Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Mexico, Portugal,
Spain, Sweden and the United States. An opening essay by the
editors offers an international perspective, noting that
revolutionary syndicalism was--at least for a time--a strong (if
minority) international movement which "incorporated more fully
than any current within the organized workers' movement a vision of
the revolutionary power and creative efficacy of self-reliant
workers, an insistence on their right to collective self-
management, and a faith in their capacity to administer their own
affairs" (p. 1). While it took different forms, syndicalist
movements appeared in the opening decades of this century virtually
everywhere there was a working class. Syndicalists published daily
newspapers in Argentina, Spain, Sweden and the United States (the
latter in Finnish). For a short time revolutionary syndicalism
appeared on the verge of overtaking all other radical currents.
Several chapters acknowledge that the organizations and
movements they discuss continue to exist to this day, a welcome
change from the common academic sport of burying us back in 1918,
1920, 1925, 1939 (take your pick). However, the editors set out to
chart "the rise and fall" of revolutionary syndicalism. A list of
the 12 organizations or movements discussed in the book puts their
"period of maximum influence" as over, in most cases, by 1920 (the
SAC's is listed from 1924-34, the CNT's from 1936-37). A footnote
explains that they have "usually used" the number of members to
reach this conclusion--however, while they list the IWW as peaking
in 1916-17 it reported its largest paid-up membership (on an annual
basis) in 1924.
Similarly, the contributors usually treat their subjects as
national movements, even though revolutionary syndicalism was
avowedly internationalist from its inception. Lennart Persson's
chapter on the Central Organisation of Swedish Workers (SAC)
acknowledges this, noting in particular the organization of SAC
sections in Norway (which ultimately formed the Norwegian
Syndicalist Federation in opposition to efforts by other
syndicalists to bore from within the trade unions). And Wayne
Thorpe offers a useful, if too brief, chapter on Syndicalist
Internationalism before World War II. (Readers interested in more
detail might turn to his book, The Workers Themselves:
Revolutionary Syndicalist and International Labour, reviewed in LLR
#10.) Thorpe stresses the "inherently international" nature of
revolutionary syndicalism and the close personal and organizational
relations between syndicalist movements around the world.
Many chapters focus on the debate between "syndicalists" who
favored working within the established trade unions to reorganize
them on a revolutionary basis (boring from within), and those who
argued that revolutionary syndicalists needed to build their own
unions. Thorpe makes it clear that from the outset the IWA was
committed to the latter approach: "Only through revolutionary
unions, the natural locus of producers' power, could the workers
hope ultimately to end economic exploitation and political
oppression.... Workers' groups founded on syndicalist principles
were therefore to be established at every economic level, from
trade unions up through international industrial federations... At
each level these organizations were to have a dual objective: the
immediate one of improving conditions within the existing
capitalist system, and the final one of destroying capitalism and
taking possession and control of the means of production" (p. 245).
The IWA, in 1925, called for the immediate formation of
international federations of seamen, construction workers and
metalworkers (industries in which their sections had particular
strength; the IWW's Marine Transport Workers IU was for several
years affiliated as well). Thorpe notes the intense repression
visited on IWA sections, which included the destruction of its
headquarters in 1933 by the Nazis. He discusses the conflicts
within the International over how to respond to events in Spain,
when IWA sections were torn between solidarity and criticism of the
CNT's disastrous collaboration with the Spanish government. And
while there is little discussion of the IWA from the 1940s on,
Thorpe is clear that it continues to exist, if in weakened form.
The authors address several issues that remain important to
this day, ranging from the futility of labor partyism (once widely
acknowledged, even outside syndicalist circles), to the degree to
which a revolutionary movement can function within collective
bargaining regimes hostile to its principles (which remains very
much an issue for the IWW and the SAC, and which played a central
role in the split in the post-Franco CNT), to the previously
mentioned "boring from within" controversy. Several chapters make
it clear that far from syndicalists imposing revolutionary, anti-
parliamentary and anti-militarist views these positions had wide
support. Indeed, syndicalist "leaders" often proved more prone to
compromise than did the rank-and-file. When prominent Italian
revolutionary syndicalists came out in favor of Italy's war against
the Ottoman Empire they were quickly repudiated. "As the
syndicalists and the anarchists denounced the war, support for the
Committee for Direct Action increased dramatically" (p. 143), and
the Italian Syndicalist Union was quickly established as an
independent revolutionary union.
The contributions are, of course, uneven in quality. Melvyn
Dubofsky, for example, holds to his line that the IWW was "put out
of business as a functioning syndicalist labor organization" by the
end of 1918, though he at least acknowledges that the organization
continued. But even the weakest essays include useful bibliographic
information. And while it is far from comprehensive, many readers
will be unfamiliar with several of the syndicalist movements
discussed in Revolutionary Syndicalism's 260 pages. The price is,
of course, a bit steep for us wage slaves, but if your library
doesn't own a copy they could certainly obtain one through inter-
library loan.
The Overworked American: The Unexpected Decline of Leisure, by
Juliet Schor. Basic Books, 1991.
"We could now reproduce our 1948 standard of living... in less
than half the time it took in 1948. We actually could have chosen
the four-hour day..." So reads the jacket copy for Harvard
economist Juliet Schor's important new book. Important not because
it says anything anarcho-syndicalists have not been saying for the
last five decades, but because it forces issues into the public
spotlight that have been too long swept under the rug.
Schor documents that American workers are putting in on
average 163 hours more per year than we were 20 years ago as a
result of women's increased participation in the paid workforce
(men's hours increased by 98 hours a year, women's by 305),
increased overtime, moonlighting (required by falling real wages
over the same period), unpaid hours expected of salaried and
"professional" workers and shorter vacations. This figure excludes
commuting time, which increased by 23 hours per year over the last
twelve years.
While working hours have fallen from the monstrous 70-hour
work weeks that prevailed in the mid 1800s, today we put in
hundreds more hours each year than did workers in thirteenth
century England. As Schor notes, capitalism has literally sentenced
workers to "a life at hard labor."
(Nor are long hours necessarily productive--Schor cites
examples that have demonstrated that small cuts in hours actually
increase productivity.)
However, Schor accepts the common wisdom that we have traded
off productivity increases for increased income (even though
elsewhere acknowledging that wages have indeed been falling, when
adjusted for inflation), suggesting that workers be allowed to
choose between pay hikes and shorter hours. Surveys indicate that
most workers would choose shorter hours; over a mere ten years such
a trade-off would allow two-month vacations or a 6 1/2 hour day.
But we have already earned those shorter hours by the
uncompensated productivity increases of the past 25 years, even as
our working hours (by Schor's data) have been increasing. Now its
up to us to organize to take them back from the employers who have
been robbing us of our wages, our dignity, and enormous (and
growing) chunks of our lives for centuries. [JB]
With Just Cause: Unionization of the American Journalist, by Walter
Brasch. University Press of America (4720 Boston Way, Lanham MD
20706), 1991, 448 pages, $24.50 (paper).
With Just Cause collects 44 articles addressing unionization
in U.S. print and broadcast journalism. The preface indicates that
the book was conceived as a corrective to the anti-union sentiments
imparted in many journalism programs, and it might well prove a
useful introduction to unionism for many media workers. However, as
a survey of historical work in the area--let alone advancing in its
own right our understanding of media unions--it falls seriously
short.
The book opens with a series of congratulatory articles (often
by officers) about several trade unions in the field, then turning
to the claim that federal labor law "protecting" collective
bargaining is the bedrock of workers' rights (but including an
excellent article on how non-union newspapers abuse their workers),
even though the first newsworkers union predates these laws by
nearly 150 years. The third section addresses historical roots,
including an article by Brasch claiming (on scanty evidence) that
William Randolph Hearst, among others, was a voice for labor--but
also discussing the foreign-language and socialist press. Daniel
Leab's book on The Newspaper Guild is excerpted to demonstrate the
shabby pay and working conditions faced by reporters before they
organized. It offers useful case studies of several labor disputes
from the past three decades, and concludes with several articles on
current issues facing media unions and media workers.
In fairness, the book does sometimes point in more promising
directions, as in an article by Upton Sinclair about Boston
pressmen refusing to print an issue of Life magazine until an
offensive cartoon was removed (p. 197) or in discussions of recent
efforts by some unions to establish their own channels of
communication. But the book is wholly uncritical of the disastrous
effects of trade unionism in this and other industries, and largely
ignores efforts to unite media workers into industrial unions that
could exercise real power. [JB]
Through Jaundiced Eyes: How the Media View Organized Labor, by
William Puette. ILR Press (School of Industrial & Labor Relations,
Cornell University, Ithaca NY 14853-3901), 1992, 228 pages, $.
Labor studies professor William Puette argues that the labor
movement has been unfairly depicted (when it is shown at all) in
films, television news and drama, newspapers and cartoons. This
general overview is supplemented with two case studies and a
discussion of recent efforts by labor unions to document anti-labor
bias and to improve their public image. Although no serious
observer of the media could dispute Puette's claim that the media
exhibit consistent, often virulent, anti-labor bias, his
methodology is often questionable and his historical discussion
shows little awareness of research in the field (for example, on
efforts to make labor films and newsreels spanning the period from
before WWI through the 1950s).
Puette's methods are badly flawed, as when he argues that
labor stories regularly run next to reports of criminal activity,
thereby associating labor with crime in readers' minds. But in
today's New York Times an ad for Texaco runs underneath two crime
articles, while an article on New York's mayor runs beside. On
another page, an article on the elections runs beside one on a rape
trial, while a prison brawl is boxed into an article on Long
Island's electric utility (next to one on the NY Daily News). This
jumble is natural in newspaper design--the only way to isolate
labor articles from such juxtapositions would be to bury them in
the Sports pages or the stock market listings. (I couldn't find any
articles about unions, though unions are mentioned briefly in an
article on layoffs at TWA and a piece on worker's compensation.)
Similarly, while some of his readings of cartoons are clearly on
target, Puette sees anti-union bias in the strangest places--such
as a Wizard of Id strip in which unionized soldiers stop the mayhem
for a coffee break, or another in which jailed strikers demonstrate
for better treatment.
Puette's book is strongest when it discusses unions' efforts
to improve their public image, although it is largely uncritical of
the AFL-CIO and their efforts to reshape the labor movement as a
responsible service agency within the broader corporate order.
Symptomatic of this is his total disregard of rank-and-file efforts
to counter this media bias by producing and distributing their own
media images--on cable television, through independent labor
newspapers, on computer networks and over the airwaves. [JB]
The Anarchist Press
Direkte Aktion is the monthly newspaper of the Freie Arbeiter
und Arbeiterinnen Union (FAU--Free Workers' Union), German section
of the International Workers Association (AIT). The most recent
issue reports on government attacks including plans to eliminate
sickness pay for the first three days of an illness, proposed tolls
on motorways, higher rent for public housing, efforts to lengthen
the work week, reducing the advance notice given to fired workers,
etc. "The 'good years' for the people in Germany are over. The
Welfare state is being taken to bits. The state wants to take
hundreds of marks out of ordinary people's pockets. So it is high
time to get in gear and show the ruling class what is what: for bad
wages, bad work; instead of a few days sick without a doctor's
certificate, a long certified sickness break paid for by the boss;
more frequent stoppages and working to rule; and better
organization."
The paper also reports on labor struggles in Germany and
around the world (including a report on the ongoing struggle by
Texan Levi Strauss workers whose jobs were moved to Central
America--the FAU has endorsed the international boycott against
Levis), and interviews members of the British Direct Action
Movement on their efforts to build industrial networks. Direkte
Aktion also, as usual, reports on the growth of neo-Naziism and
resistance to it, and criticizes links between the Green Party and
the extreme right-wing ODP (Ecological Democratic Party).