Organize!

Whether we are engaging in acts of resistance or creating new, alternative institutions, we need to create sustainable, democratic organizations that empower their members while also protecting against disruption. This section provides articles about effective organizing, creating democratic decision-making structures, building coalitions with other groups, and more. Visit the Resources Page for tools to assist your organizing efforts.

Labor Activists Launch New Organization To Challenge AFL-CIO Foreign Policy

June 6, 2022 Kim Scipes, Counter Currents. Organize! AFL-CIO, Foreign Policy, Labor Movement, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

This is the first project to focus on AFL-CIO operations around the globe since efforts to pass the “Build Unity and Trust Among Workers World-wide” Resolution at the 2005 National Convention in Chicago. This new project, LEPAIO, is hoping to build support for the 2022 national conference in Philadelphia this June 12-15. Speakers at the educational conference spoke on a number of issues, noting that the education conference on April 9th came on the 20th anniversary of the attempted (but failed) coup against democratically-elected President of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez. Speakers Margaret Flowers, William Camacaro, and James Patrick Jordan spoke of the on-going US attacks on Venezuela that continue today, particularly through economic sanctions supported by the AFL-CIO.

Intelligentsia Coffee Workers Join Starbucks And Colectivo In Unionizing

June 6, 2022 Jeff Schuhrke , In These Times. Organize! Chicago, Illinois, Labor Movement, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

Chicago, Illinois - As Starbucks Workers United racks up victory after victory in union elections across the country, workers at Intelligentsia Coffee — a small, specialty coffee company based in Chicago — are also aiming to improve their pay and working conditions by unionizing. Last week, dozens of workers at Intelligentsia’s five Chicago cafes and roasting works center filed for a union representation election with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). They are seeking to organize with the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 1220, a union they’ve been in contact with since November. Intelligentsia also has cafes in Los Angeles, Boston, New York and Austin, Texas. So far, the union effort is limited to Chicago.

Austin Starbucks Employees Become First To Unionize In Texas

June 5, 2022 Drew Knight, Kvue. Organize! Labor Movement, Starbucks, Texas, Unions

Austin, Texas - A local Starbucks location celebrated victory Friday, becoming the state's first unionized store. KVUE first learned about the 45th Street and Lamar Boulevard location's attempts to unionize in March. The location had sent a letter to the CEO of Starbucks after another local store also announced its plans to attempt a union. At the time, Starbucks provided KVUE with the following statement: We are listening and learning from the partners in these stores as we always do across the country. From the beginning, we’ve been clear in our belief that we are better together as partners, without a union between us, and that conviction has not changed.

I Went On Strike To Cancel My Student Debt And Won

June 4, 2022 Ann Bowers, In These Times. Organize! Debt Forgiveness, Education, Student Loans, Victory

This week, former students of Corinthian Colleges — a predatory for-profit school that once boasted more than 100 campuses across the country — received news that their student loans will be canceled. In an announcement, a Department of Education (DOE) press release called the move “the largest single loan discharge the Department has made in history.” As a former student of Everest College, which is a branch of Corinthian, I am overjoyed that everyone who attended the scam school will finally be made whole. The action, announced on June 2, will impact 560,000 former Corinthian students and $5.8 in total student debt will be cancelled. This amounts to a stunning victory for debtors who took collective action to win relief.

A Progressive Vision To Counter US Dominance

June 1, 2022 Sheila Xiao and Manolo De Los Santos, LA Progressive. Organize! Cuba, Joe Biden, Latin America, Summit of the Americas, US Imperialism

In a recent interview, Brian Nichols, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs, was asked the question that is on everyone’s mind ahead of the June 2022 Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles, California: Will three particular countries in Latin America (Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua) be invited? Nichols responded with neither hesitation nor equivocation that the answer was no. Speaking on behalf of President Joe Biden, he further added that countries whose “actions do not respect democracy”—as the U.S. government views these three countries and others like them—“will not receive invitations.” Nichols’ seemingly offhand comment, said with the usual arrogance of U.S. officials and calling the three countries “regime[s that] do not respect [democracy],” sent a shockwave through the region that the U.S. was likely not expecting.

How Amazon And Starbucks Workers Are Upending The Organizing Rules

June 1, 2022 Chris Brooks, In These Times. Organize! Amazon, Labor Movement, Starbucks, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

“Workers are reaching out to our union in unprecedented numbers,” says Alan Hanson, organizing director for United Food and Commercial Workers Local 400 in the Washington, D.C., area. “And they’re coming to us in a way I’ve never seen. “The checklist that staff organizers have — get a list, identify leaders, make sure the organizing committee is diverse and represents all departments and classifications — these workers are coming to us and they have already done all of that. I haven’t had four successful worker-generated organizing campaigns in my entire career and we just had four in four months.” At one of those shops, Union Kitchen, a D.C.-based grocery store, workers went on a three-day strike before their union was even certified, a level of militancy that seemed all but extinct but has now begun reappearing in nascent organizing campaigns.

Berlin Housing Rights Conference Demands Immediate Socialization Of Large Real Estate Holdings

May 30, 2022 People's Dispatch. Organize! Germany, Housing, Landlords, Socialization

Berlin, German - A three-day conference organized by the housing rights group Deutsche Wohnen & Co Enteignen (DWE) or Expropriate Deutsche Wohnen und Co. in Berlin has demanded that the Berlin State government immediately socialize large real estates in the city. The conference held from May 27 to 29 at the Technical University of Berlin discussed tactics for building major housing rights coalitions across the country to tackle the worsening housing crisis. The expropriation initiative also criticized maneuvers by the ruling Social Democratic Party (SPD) to place technical and legal hurdles in delivering the mandate of the Berlin referendum held in September 2021 for expropriating the property of big landlords.

Labor Notes Conference 2022: It’s Gonna Be Big

May 29, 2022 Alexandra Bradbury, Labor Notes. Organize! Chicago, Labor Movement, Strikes, Worker Rights and Jobs

This year’s Labor Notes Conference (June 17-19, Chicago) will be one for the record books. About 4,000 people are coming—more than ever before—after a long wait. There’s plenty to celebrate this year, starting with phenomenal new organizing wins at Starbucks and Amazon. Dozens of shop floor organizers from both companies will be there, including plenary speakers Amazon Labor Union President Chris Smalls (“We want to thank Jeff Bezos for going to space, because while he was up there we were organizing a union”) and Michelle Eisen of Starbucks Workers United. Conference-goers will hear firsthand from Amazon and Starbucks workers in many workshops. But they’re coming not only to inspire the rest of us but also to connect with their co-workers across the country and make big plans.

Hundreds Of Bottling Workers At Gatorade Factory Triumph

May 29, 2022 Noah Styzkgold, Liberation News. Organize! Labor Movement, New Jersey (NJ), Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

Wharton, New Jersey - 240 workers at a Refresco bottling plant in Wharton, New Jersey won their election for union recognition May 21. After two years of intense struggle and against all of the dirty tricks the boss could muster, these workers have made it clear that they won’t back down until they get what’s right. Workers at the Wharton plant began organizing in February 2020. They had faced years of abusive supervisors, poor safety conditions, low wages, and an unforgiving attendance and scheduling system. Anthony Sanchez, an employee at the plant for 15 years, said he started organizing with his co-workers to stop the “despotic attitudes of our supervisors and the management.” The company had plans of their own though.

Colombia: Groups Launch Electoral Mission To Monitor Human Rights

May 27, 2022 Afro Resistance. Organize! Colombia, Democracy, Elections, Human Rights

Cali, Colombia - AfroResistance and Grassroots Global Justice Alliance have launched an international electoral expert mission to monitor human rights processes during the upcoming Colombian presidential election. The delegation consists of human rights experts, racial and gender justice activists, grassroots organizers, cultural workers, attorneys, and journalists, gathered to assess and monitor the safety, fairness and human rights protection in the upcoming Colombia primary elections taking place Sunday, May 29th, 2022. AfroResistance, an advocacy and solidarity building organization focused on the human rights of Black Women and Girls throughout the Americas and Grassroots Global Justice, **a multi-racial, multi-sectoral alliance building a grassroots movement for peace, democracy and a sustainable world, has assembled a team of experts that have all been accredited by the Colombian electoral authorities.

Graduate Student Workers Across The Country Help Each Other Unionize

May 27, 2022 Ella Fassler, Truthout. Organize! Education, Student Activism, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

As a first-year master’s student and associate instructor in the School of Music at Indiana University (IU), Chelsea Brinda was forced to sell her blood plasma to survive. Her stipend of just $9,000 was far below Bloomington’s living wage. Eventually, she stopped selling her biofluids, got her first credit card and took out student loans. Brinda, now a Ph.D. student at IU earning just $16,500 a year for teaching one or two courses a semester, told Truthout that she struggles to balance her own hefty workload as a student with her personal life, the courses she teaches and her part-time job as a COVID tester on campus. “I feel like I’m shortchanging my students. I’m not giving them the best that I could,” Brinda said.

Dollar General Workers Refuse To Be Silenced

May 26, 2022 Mike Kuhlenbeck, The Progressive Magazine. Organize! Dollar General, Low Wage Workers, Shareholders, Worker Rights and Jobs

Dollar General workers from across the country will be rallying at Peay Park on May 25 near its headquarters in Goodlettsville, Tennessee, during the company’s 2022 annual shareholders’ meeting. After years of being ignored, Dollar General workers are making their voices heard—by the retail chain’s executives, shareholders, and the public. Mary Gundel, thirty-three, started working as a store manager at a Dollar General store in Albany, Georgia, in February 2019. After working there for a year, she relocated to Florida to manage a store in Tampa with her husband and three children. Gundel, in an interview with The Progressive, describes the “horrible working conditions” that existed when she started working for Dollar General , such as mold in the cooler and a broken air conditioner when it was hot outside.

Bloomington Faculty Vote In Support Of Graduate Student Employee Union

May 26, 2022 Jeremy Hogan, The Bloomingtonian. Organize! Higher Education, Indiana, Student Activism, Unions

An electronic vote of all Bloomington faculty has expressed overwhelming support for efforts of the Indiana University graduate student employees to seek union recognition. Between April 13 and the end of the spring semester, graduate student employees at Indiana University Bloomington, organizing with the United Electrical Workers, struck for campus recognition. The strike was temporarily suspended on May 10th for the summer, with plans for broader and deeper participation should the strike resume in the fall. Faculty on the Bloomington campus were galvanized to support graduate employees by the anti-union response by the campus administration which refused any dialogue with representatives of the union, the Indiana Graduate Workers Coalition-United Electrical Workers (IGWC-UE).

Lessons From The Starbucks Union In Chile

May 24, 2022 Andrés Giordano, Labor Notes. Organize! Chile, Labor Unions, Starbucks, Worker Rights

The Starbucks union was founded in Chile in 2009, at the same time as big student mobilizations. These mobilizations were part of the seed that made it possible to form a union at Starbucks and in an area like fast food, which is very difficult to organize. The corporate culture of Starbucks is profoundly anti-union. Howard Schultz, who was the CEO of the company [he returned to that role in April —Eds.], is a megalomaniac who cannot bear to see his workers organizing and deciding for themselves what is right. Starbucks is one of the companies in Chile with the most fines for anti-union practices. All of that was conceived in Seattle, not in Chile. It was devised in the headquarters, where they are devising the tough campaign that you are experiencing now.

Call For ‘Workers Summit Of The Americas’

May 23, 2022 Workers World. Organize! Cuba, Latin America, Mexico, Nicaragua, OAS, Summit of the Americas, Venezuela

The Workers Summit of the Americas meeting, in Tijuana, Mexico, offers a space to join with all the peoples of “Our Americas.” We will counteract the OAS Summit of the Americas organized by the U.S. Department of State in Los Angeles. The countries of the continent besieged by the USA (Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba, among others) will not participate in the OAS farce. The Workers’ Summit gives us the opportunity to invite our comrades in struggle from North America who want to participate. Tijuana is a meeting place with the progressive forces of the South and the North at a moment when the working class is facing the most unprecedented challenges in the history of humanity.

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