What Are the Labor’s Best Strategies and Tactics? Essay

In recent years, the American labor movement has suffered a loss of political influence. Many observers, such as Garin and Molyneux, had significant impact on labor’s political strategy when they argued a decade ago that labor should change the way that unions sought to affect politics. Due to the two-party system, the labor movements face many challenges on the way to the successful strategies and tactics employed in the fight for a greater political influence. Previously, the power of labor movement was rather influential thus directing their work to elect those candidates all over the country and presenting their interest to legislative procedures. Nowadays, labor unions are under considerable pressure from the well financed governmental and local business organization that are determined to decrease the power of labor movement. In that regard, the labor organizations are searching for the new tactics to resist this pressure and involve more working class people in the political life of the country.

According to the political surveys conducted by the Pew Research Center, the voter are divided into several categories, specifically, regular voters, intermittent voters, registered but rare voters, and unregistered voters. In the survey, the groups under consideration expressed their attitude to the elections, the extent of their interest in the voting campaigns presented by the candidates of the midterm elections in November, 2008. The result showed the unregistered and intermittent voter count together about 40% that is mostly the half of the American population. As a result, the guaranteed amount is only 35% among whom there mostly appear welfare people with a full-fledged family and a successful job. Especial consideration requires the intermittent voters who are still registered but are unlikely to acknowledge the eligibility of the elections and the candidates (Pew Research Center unpaged).

The Pew Survey was also aimed at identified the behavior and basic life style of the voters and non-voters thus highlighting the interdependence of the results and the standards of living. Hence, the intermittent voters appeared to be bored with politics since the policy of the government pays little attentions the working class. It is should noted that this group of voters includes the young generation and those who are not married. To solve this problem, the Republicans and Democrats started working out strategies that would persuade the non-voters to participate the elections (Pew Research Center unpaged).

The eternal fight of the workers for the national and political recognition could be traced in the history, beginning from the nineteenth century. Hence, in 1877, the United States observed the Great Uprising (Babson 1); it was the declaration of the rise of the workers as a separate class. In the fist decade of the Uprising, there appeared the first American movement when “workers initiated the first Labor Day marches” (Babson 2). In the period, there emerged the first labor organization, the Knights of Labor striving to build the first national movement. Further, the AFL and United Mine Workers, the followers of the Knights of Labor, headed the labor movement. Due to the effort of this organization and to the development of the Industrial Revolution, the country witnessed a desperate confrontation between the working class and the capitalist class (Babson 5). In comparison with our present situation, the newly established labor union and the followers of AFL-CIO movement failed to oppose the pressure of the higher classes. In addition, the strategies invented by them are not appropriate regarding to the results of the 2004 elections and the 2008 elections. Therefore, the labor movements should be aimed at provoking the self-awareness and interest of the political life among worker and at stimulation the respect for the American nation and people irrespective of the race and social status. The Great Uprising should serve as an incentive for the political representatives to invent the new strategies for the living standard increase.

The above study triggered the work of the labor unions who strive to improve the demographic and political situation among the workers through the mobilization of activist organization whose policy is directed at immigrant policy and health care problems. Among the most outstanding groups are the American Federation of Labor-Congress of Industrial Organizations and the Change to Win Federation appeared in 2005 (Ashby et al. 282). Hence, throughout their existence the AFL was striving to resolve the working disputes and to improve the situation in the political and social sphere. Currently, the organization, however loses her respectable position in the United States, which was explicitly proved by Staley case in 1992-1995 when the company’s employees launched a vigorous fight thus practicing the innovated strategies and tactics even known in the labor history (Ashby et al. 1). Hence, the workers decision to launched a nine-month strike succeeded by the outburst of national solidarity movement triggered the wave of resentment and indignation among the witnesses of this ‘war’. AFL-CIO organizations called this case as “War in Decatur” (Ashby et al 1) thus revealing the story as a great contribution to the present proliferation of labor movements and as the lesson other labor union to work out the appropriate tactics in future. In addition, the labor campaign in Decatur proved that U.S. labor movement has evident weaknesses that should be eliminated. The defeat of the Staley’s fight for the workplace was also due to the incapability of other labor organization to influence the outcome. The event, still, fostered the national mobilization of the labor group to support the working classes, specifically the welfare improvement; to provoke the self-awareness among the work, as well as the political interest.

Relying on this, the prominent event that singled out the main laps in their activities changed the present strategy of the labor movement. Labor organization are more inclined to support the Democrats, their conservative view still hampers the improvement of the political awareness. In the article, Victory and the promise of reform: labor and the 2008 election, Beachler emphasizes that the situation during the election forced the Republicans to think over their policy and the reason of their failure (Beachler 2007, 265). The labor leaders were striving to provide the exceptional strategies to enhance the workers’ motive during the elections. As for the Democrats candidate winner, Barrack Obama, the party managed to capture the majority of labor votes. It goes without saying that he Employee Free Choice Act (AFCA) greatly contributed to the victory at the election; moreover, such a policy contributed to the enhancement of the workers’ faith in the government and better future of the United States (Beachler 2007, 268). The act also significantly improved the work of the labor unions that established the control over the legislative and executive branches. However, the vigorous opposition to EFCA due to the business branches caused many difficulties in terms political control.

The defeat of the Republican Party was also predetermined by conservative political preferences of the workers, which is still on the agenda at the moment. According to the national polls based on the 2004 elections, there emerged much misconception pertaining to the working class preference and the reason of little attention paid to the Republicans. In the Beachler’s article, there were proposed the decisions concerning the ways to gain more votes from the low-waged classes. In order to alter the situation, the author takes in consideration of the impact of race, violence, and religions on the voting choice as the main reason of predicted outcomes at the elections. Arising from this, the unions are hard to increase gain the confidence among the low-waged classes (Beachler 2009 320).

The past results of the elections showed the failure to attract the worker to the political and both elections, as working class still stands for the democracy thus paying little attention to policy and electoral campaign. People lost their fate in a better future because the governmental programs, specifically the EFCA program turned to be a failure and therefore brought no relief to the living conditions of the working class. Analyzing the force coming 2010 elections, the situation is still unchanged. The Labor departments still give priority to the Democrats, judging on the donations given by the American population where 60% given to Democrats are opposed to 40% given to Republicans. Those figures prove that labor unions are solidly democratic. On the one hand, such a tactics is rather effective, as it is a well-trodden path for the workers are not ready to risk. On the other hand, in case the next elections could be won by Republican so that the working class policy must be changed. Nevertheless, such situation put the Republicans under the threat of failure, as mostly all the unions stand in favor Democrats (Center of Responsive Politics unpaged.).

It is obvious that the American election greatly influence the international politics and economy; therefore, the problems in society are also an international problem influencing the image of the United States. In the speech of Geoffrey Garin, American Voters and American Diplomacy (2009), the president of Hart Research expressed his opinion concerning the necessity to change the voting policy thus focusing more on building a respectable image of the county. The researcher also emphasized that he feels conscious of the present situation of voting behavior and reluctance of the people to vote. Garin proposed that there is a great necessity to provide a comfortable level and security for the population irrespective of the social positions. He recommends this strategy for labor unions to follow, as welfare and security are of primary importance for American people. In his Ten Rules for Union Political Action (Garin and Molyneux 113), he put forward the concepts for the union political action addressing the problems and a new model of labor politics. Hence, the rules are rather useful to follow, as they are more focused on the needs of the worker, where Garin recommends the unions to pay more attention to the availability of information and to the power of voice for the working class (Garin and Molyneux 115).

Works Cited

American Voters and Diplomacy. 2009.

Ashby, Steven K. & Hawking C.J. Staley: The Fight for a New American Labor Movement. US: University of Illinois Press, 2009.

Beachler, Donald. “Race, God, and Guns: Union voting in the 2004 presidential election” Working USA. vol 10.3 (2007). pp. 311-325.

Beachler, Donald. “Victory and the promise of reform: labor and the 2008 election”. Working USA. vol. 12. 2 (2009). pp. 265-277.

Garin, Geoffrey and Molyneux, Guy. “Informing and Empowering American Workers: Ten Rules for Union Political Action.” Not your father’s union movement inside the AFL-CIO, US: Verso, 1998.

“Who Votes, Who Doesn’t and Why”. Pew Research Center. 2009.

2010 Overview. Center of Responsive Politics 2009.