LabourStart and the U.S. Union Movement: Making Connections

by Seth Michaels, Aug 19, 2009

LabourStart founder Eric Lee talks with IBT campaign communications coordinator Elissa Laitin.

This week, at the first LabourStart conference ever held in the United States, one of the most important topics of conversation centered around strategies for connecting the United States and global union movements and the active, energetic community that LabourStart represents.

It’s an important question, participants agreed, because of how workers across the world are increasingly tied together by globalization. Workers in different countries, but working for the same company, could have much more in common than they realize, and workers across the world are facing many of the same issues that workers in the United States face, as is obvious from a look at LabourStart’s headlines.

In Australia and Canada, LabourStart has a strong ongoing relationship with union activists, who frequently take part in LabourStart’s e-mail campaigns, said Derek Blackadder of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) and Andrew Casey of the Australian Workers’ Union (AWU). That’s been the result of a process of building relationships between LabourStart and unions in those countries.

There are long-standing differences in the history of the union movement in the United States and that in other countries. In particular, U.S. unions often originated with more of a local, rather than cross-national, focus. That’s part of the challenge of getting members interested in LabourStart, said some of the American attendees.

However, as we’ve noted here, the U.S. and global union movements have begun important cooperation in support of the Employee Free Choice Act. LabourStart’s aggressive e-mail action campaigns also can benefit workers in this country. Mariya Strauss of the International Labor Communications Association (ILCA) noted that because of the cooperation between Workday Minnesota and LabourStart, LabourStart built a campaign for union rights among staff at the Minnesota Attorney General’s office that brought hundreds of e-mail messages from around the world in support of the state workers.

The most important way for LabourStart and U.S. unions to work together, LabourStart founder Eric Lee and others agreed, is for U.S. union members and communicators to sign up as LabourStart correspondents. It’s easy and quick to sign up, Lee said, and anyone who signs up as a correspondent can submit links. Posting more news from the United States can help make LabourStart more relevant to U.S. union activists and users, which can in turn drive more U.S. union members to get involved in and educated on global union issues. It’s an excellent way to amplify our voices across the wider international union movement.

Holding the LabourStart conference here in the United States, and bringing together members of the U.S. and global union communities face to face, is an important step to begin that process.

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