Comprehensive campaign
Encyclopedia
A comprehensive campaign is labor union
organizing or a collective bargaining
campaign with a heavy focus on research, the use of community coalition-building, publicity and public pressure, political and regulatory pressure, and economic and legal pressure in addition to traditional organizing tactics.
The comprehensive campaign is a labor tactic primarily used in the United States
, where labor unions lack many of the legal protections
accorded their counterparts in the European Community and where cultural norms against unions are not as strong. However, as globalization
increases and capital and labor become more mobile, employers outside the U.S. are adopting American union-avoidance tactics
, and comprehensive campaigns are becoming more common in Europe and Asia.
Comprehensive campaigns are not commonly used in the United States due to their cost and the organizational expertise their require. However, they are gaining popularity in the U.S. labor movement, and many unions claim to be building comprehensive campaign capabilities.
," which arose out of a wave of labor union organizing
in the 1930s and 1940s, was no longer proving effective for a variety of reasons (innovations in union-avoidance and anti-union tactics, economic and cultural changes, statutory and case law alterations in federal labor protections, etc.).
Innovations in grass-roots community organizing
, developed outside the labor movement in the 1960s, offered American unions a new way with which to exercise power vis-a-vis employers. In 1971, radical activist Saul Alinsky
published Rules for Radicals, a book which outlined the new strategy of the "community campaign." Activists believed that suburbanization
, the rise of multinational corporation
s, economic dislocation and the alienating
effects of modern life had eroded communal norms against corporate greed and misbehavior. By rebuilding a sense of community by uniting existing organizations into new coalitions, or creating new organizations and then educating the coalition members about various causes, these activists believed they could alter the balance of power in their communities. The concept of the community campaign was quickly transferred to the labor movement.
Community campaigns frequently use the strategy of labor-community coalitions, or coalitions between unions and community organizations. Coalitions have varying forms and success, depending on the context in which they are organized and the strategies used to build them.
The corporate campaign was developed to augment, and sometimes supplant, the community campaign. The corporate campaign identified and influenced members of a company's board of directors
, or the company lenders, customers and/or suppliers. The goal was to uncover conflicts of interest
, inefficiency, waste, fraud, or mismanagement and use this information, either publicly or privately, to win economic leverage over an employer and achieve the union's goals.
Again, employer adaptations undercut the effectiveness of the corporate campaign. Additionally, labor unions found it less expensive to build community coalitions, and relied more heavily on staff-driven corporate campaigns. Many union activists also argued that the publicity generated by a rowdy shareholder
meeting, for example, or an embarrassing report about conflict of interest on a board of directors, supplanted the community campaign by building the necessary community pressure. These arguments proved incorrect. But declining union fortunes (literally) made it difficult to employ the staff and resources necessary to build full-fledged community campaigns. More and more unions came to rely on the corporate campaign even as it became less and less effective.
and an early theorist of comprehensive campaigns, argued in 1987:
At the heart of the comprehensive campaign is research concerning the company and a broad-based community campaign which disseminates this research. The comprehensive campaign seeks to utilize all the levers of influence and power against an employer. State or local legislation antithetical to the employer's interests is introduced. Pressure is exerted through business license, zoning
and regulatory processes. Political pressure is applied by electing local, state and federal officials, and seeking the appointment of union-friendly bureaucrats. Lawsuits may be filed. Reports and "white paper
s" may be issued, and relationships with members of the press built. Picketing may occur at charity events, at the homes of board members or senior corporate officers, at the workplace, or at the place of business of subsidiaries, customers or suppliers. The support of religious, community
, civic, consumer
, environmental and other groups is won and continuously displayed to the employer and the public. As information is uncovered, it is assessed and fit into a strategic plan extending (in some cases) several years into the future. Escalation is planned, back-door channels sought (through which negotiations may be conducted), and new allies found. The comprehensive campaign is a pressure campaign, one which seeks to continuously apply pressure until the employer makes an egregious error (for example, harms the community in some way or overreacts to union pressure) or the union uncovers embarrassing or damaging information.
. For example, Bronfenbrenner
and Hickey define a comprehensive campaign as one which contains the following elements:
Since nine of the 10 elements listed by Bronfenbrenner and Hickey are elements of "good organizing practices" used in traditional union organizing campaigns, it is clear that they are referring not to the term of art "comprehensive campaign" but to a traditional organizing campaign which is comprehensive (e.g., uses most or all of the traditional organizing tactics).
Other sources exhibit confusion over the term "comprehensive campaign" because they lack knowledge about the state of labor union organizing. In some cases, writers do not appear to understand what a comprehensive campaign is, and equate the term with community campaign or corporate campaign.
Subsequently, use of the term "comprehensive campaign" varies widely among labor activists, employers, attorneys or academics. This may cause confusion when an author or speaker refers to a comprehensive campaign but means something more restricted. Context is often the key to determining exactly what a person means, and speeches and written works must be closely read to determine the actual meaning of the descriptive phrase used.
(NLRB) election, to sign a neutrality agreement or code of conduct for the organizing election, to agree to hold an election under the auspices of a neutral third-party, or to recognize the union once it was won an NLRB-sponsored election.
One or all of these may be the goal of the comprehensive organizing campaign.
Comprehensive campaigns are not limited to organizing, however. They may also be aimed at winning an initial or successor collective bargaining agreement, or to achieve a collective bargaining goal or goals (such as a union security
clause). Comprehensive campaigns have also been used to prevent plant closings, prevent plant openings, or to encourage the employer to take some action (such as opposing a business competitor, withdrawing support for legislation, etc.).
Comprehensive campaigns vary in length. Many elements of a comprehensive campaign take one or more years to be effective. Subsequently, comprehensive campaigns are often expected to last over many years. But they may last only months or only one or two, if the union's goals are achieved quickly.
or negotiations have begun.
Various elements make up a comprehensive campaign. Chief among these is research. Research into the employer's finances, business strategy, governance, structure, leadership, board of directors, vendors and suppliers, building plans, staffing, billing, and operations (among other things) occurs six months or more before the comprehensive campaign begins. Research into other areas, such as state law and regulatory regimes, community demographics, workplace health and safety, local and state labor union strength, political support and other non-employer issues also occurs. Although the most intense research phase begins before the comprehensive campaign is publicly announced, research continues throughout the comprehensive campaign. Comprehensive campaigns are research-driven: The information discovered is analyzed, assessed and fit into short- and long-term strategies, which then drive additional research as well as dictate the pace, timing, and actions undertaken in the media, legal, community and other realms.
Forging ties and working relations with other groups—the community campaign—is a secondary but vital component of the comprehensive campaign. The goal of the community campaign element varies, depending on the research outcomes. Community campaign tactics may merely extend to coordinating publicity and or joint lobbying
, but may also encompass boycott
s, information-gathering, electoral politics
, educating the community about labor unions, enhancing or impugning reputations, viral marketing
and more. Establishing community-based "workers' rights boards
"—led by prominent religious or civic leaders—or other investigatory bodies is also common.
Another element of the comprehensive campaign is writing, introducing and seeking the passage of local, county, state or federal legislation inimical to the employer's business interests. Such legislation may be aimed at the business interests of suppliers, vendors, customers, subsidiaries or co-owners as well. The goal of legislative activity may merely be to force the employer to divert resources to lobbying, election politics or other legislative activity, or it may be to enact legislation. Proposed legislation may be as broad as universal healthcare or comprehensive workplace safety laws or as narrow as requiring the employer to collect and publicly report information which is not otherwise available (and which the union may later analyze and use).
An extensive publicity effort is a second and subsidiary, although vital, aspect of the comprehensive campaign. Publicity—often called "the air war"—is one of the primary vehicles by which information gleaned from employer research may be used. The use of "white papers", press conferences, advertising (in all media) or the distribution of research (independent or not) often is an important aspect of the publicity campaign. The creative release of information to the public is increasing. Demonstrations, the use of street theater
and music, picketing, leafleting, bannering and disruptive tactics (such as projecting images on a plant's walls at night or using "human flies" to climb buildings and hang banners) are increasingly common means of attracting public attention in an age where information overload is common. Although the timing and duration of the "air war" varies widely, experience suggests that the publicity campaign takes up half to two-thirds of the comprehensive campaign timeline.
A third vital, but secondary, element is traditional organizing. Known as "the ground war" in the labor movement, traditional organizing often occurs late in a comprehensive campaign. In part, this is because research, publicity, building community coalitions, legislative work, legal pressure and other elements of the comprehensive campaign are time-consuming and not immediately effective. But "the ground war" is also staff-intensive (which is to say, expensive), so it is often implemented only in the final stages of the campaign, when the employer has been so weakened that success becomes more likely than not. Research also suggests that workers cannot be "activated" for long periods of time without encountering burnout or discouragement. Hence, the "ground war" is saved for the final stage of the comprehensive campaign.
"The inside game," in which workers apply pressure from within, may also form part of the comprehensive campaign. "The inside game" consists of activities which can be done on the shop floor or in the workplace. They can be as varied as symbolic demonstrations, petitioning a supervisor for changes, filing strategic grievance
s, slowdown
s or working to rule
.
A legal strategy also plays an important role in the comprehensive campaign. Part of the legal strategy may use labor laws to cause the employer to divert management resources to employee relations and away from the anti-union effort. This may involve the strategic filing of unfair labor practice
charges or grievances, picketing, leafleting or bannering. Advantage is often taken of workplace health and safety laws, with unions filing health and safety or environmental complaints against the employer. Business and professional licensure, zoning procedures, building permitting and other laws and regulations may also be advantageously (and legitimately) used to hinder, harass and influence the employer to recognize the union, negotiate a contract, or achieve other goals.
As globalization has become more prevalent, international activity has also become an increasingly prominent element of comprehensive campaigns. In many ways, the building of international coalitions of trade unions, environmental groups, consumer federations and others has been an element of comprehensive campaigns since the mid-1980s. American labor unions had little occasion to engage in international activity in the past. In the 2000s, international coalition-building—especially with unions in Western Europe
(who represent workers at, and have strong working relationships with, the parent companies of American subsidiaries)—became far more important in the U.S.
Other research is less sanguine, arguing that comprehensive campaigns are most effective only in the context of collective bargaining context. Some preliminary research suggests that comprehensive campaigns tend to fail more often in organizing drives, and appear to have little effect as a non-strike weapon.
Some early evidence suggests that comprehensive campaigns build strong unions. Weakened employers are unable to counter newly-built unions, providing union leaders and members with a much less steep learning curve
. Some scholars also find that union members involved in comprehensive campaigns are more active in the collective bargaining process and in the life and culture of the new union.
But other studies find that corporate campaigns are too staff-intensive and discourage member activism. One early analysis showed that comprehensive campaigns tend to be used only against companies that produce brand-name consumer products or that are service-oriented. These campaigns focus heavily on public pressure to force the employer to recognize the union, and fail to engage rank-and-file workers in the development and analysis of research, strategizing, campaign implementation and the "ground war."
The first true comprehensive campaign (which utilized, to some degree, all of the elements described herein) occurred in the mid-1970s. Ray Rogers
, a staff organizer with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America
(ACWA), ran a comprehensive campaign against J.P. Stevens
, a large textile manufacturer in the South
. The union eventually organized more than 3,000 Stevens workers at 10 plants. The organizing drive was featured in the Academy Award
-winning film Norma Rae
in 1979
.
A second major comprehensive campaign occurred roughly a decade later. In 1984, the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union (OCAW) waged a comprehensive campaign against the German chemical company BASF
. OCAW mounted a campaign that involved environmental groups and unions in West Germany
, and ultimately pressured BASF to end the lockout and sign a contract.
That same year, a corporate campaign run by the Farm Labor Organizing Committee
(FLOC), AFL-CIO
, ended a six-year strike and boycott and won the union its first contract. In 1978, 2,000 FLOC members walked off their jobs in the Midwest
. While some growers were willing to negotiate, big canners such as the Campbell Soup Company
were unwilling to pay the higher prices which would accompany a unionized workforce. FLOC initiated a boycott of Campbell's. Six years later, not much had changed. In 1984, FLOC asked Ray Rogers (who had left ACWA and founded a consulting firm that helped unions run comprehensive campaigns) for help. Rogers developed a comprehensive campaign strategy which included a well-publicized demonstration at a Campbell Soup shareholder meeting and targeted three members of Campbell's board of directors for economic pressure. In February 1986, Campbell and its growers recognized FLOC as the workers' representative and signed a collective bargaining agreement which provided for wage increases, grievance resolution, insurance, and committees to study pesticide safety, housing, health care, and day care issues. Shortly thereafter, FLOC reached deals with Vlasic
, Heinz
, Green Bay Foods (now part of Dean Foods
), Aunt Jane's (now part of Dean Foods) and Dean Foods
.
The first widely acknowledged failure of a comprehensive campaign occurred in 1985. Under pressure from international competition, the U.S. meat packing industry
had seen one major bankruptcy and a number of plant closings. In 1984, six of the eight major United Food and Commercial Workers
(UFCW) locals in the Hormel
chain prepared to re-negotiate wages under wage re-opener. In July, all locals except Local P-9 in Austin, Minnesota
, agreed to strike Hormel in September. But by that time, all the locals except P-9 had reached an agreement setting wages at $9.00 an hour, with a $1.00-an-hour increase to occur in 1985. In October 1984, Hormel reduced wages at the Austin plant from $10.69 to $8.25 an hour. Local P-9 subsequently hired Ray Rogers to run a comprehensive campaign to restore wages to their former level. But in December 1984, UFCW refused to support the comprehensive campaign. The workers struck in August 1985. UFCW initially supported the strike, but refused to sanction a boycott of Hormel products. In January 1986, Hormel re-opened the Minnesota plant with replacement workers, and the strike—and the local—collapsed. The Hormel strike was featured in the 1990
Academy Award-winning documentary American Dream
.
Comprehensive campaigns began attracting academic attention in 1985. The first known publication of a work examining comprehensive campaigns was Lawrence Mishel's article, "Strengths and Limits of Non-Workplace Strategies," published in the Fall 1985 issue of Labor Research Review.
Another important comprehensive campaign failed in 1988. In June 1987, workers at the International Paper
company mill in Androscoggin, Maine struck to resist company-demanded concessions. Led by Maine AFL-CIO
organizer Peter Kellman
, the moribund local became a hotbed of worker activism and community organizing. However, inadequate protections of federal labor law and internal union politics (especially those at international union headquarters as well as rivalries between the local union and its parent) led the parent union to refuse to fund the comprehensive campaign. After the company hired replacement workers, the strike ultimately failed.
A comprehensive campaign helped the United Steelworkers
(USW) win a contract at Ravenswood Aluminum. In November 1990, Ravenswood Aluminum locked out 1,700 employees as their contract expired and hired replacement workers. USW began a comprehensive campaign which involved a heavy research component. USW eventually publicized the plant's poor safety record, applied political pressure in Congress to protect the domestic aluminum smelting industry, and discovered that Ravenswood Aluminum was controlled by fugitive billionaire Marc Rich
. The campaign is notable because of the extensive international pressure the USW brought to bear on Ravenswood and for the creative legal strategies the union employed. Most importantly, however, the Ravenswood effort showed that, properly undertaken and financed, a comprehensive campaign could put so much pressure on an employer that even recourse to permanent replacements could not defeat the union (as the tactic had at Hormel and International Paper).
In 1993, UFCW undertook a comprehensive campaign in the food industry. The UFCW had conducted a decade-long organizing effort against Food Lion
, a nonunion chain of warehouse-style grocery stores. By the early 1990s, however, UFCW became convinced that traditional organizing methods were no longer working, and the union initiated a comprehensive campaign. An essential part of the union strategy was an innovative class-action lawsuit
by about 400 current and former Food Lion workers, who alleged they had been forced by their employer to work off-the-clock
. Eventually, the United States Department of Labor
fined Food Lion, which delivered $16 million in back-pay to the workers. UFCW quickly undertook a second class-action suit, in which workers claimed wrongful termination and violation of COBRA
rights. Again, UFCW was successful. However, Food Lion retaliated by filing a $300 million lawsuit against its workers and UFCW for violating the federal RICO Act
. Although Food Lion's lawsuit was eventually dismissed, UFCW was unable to organized the workers, achieve recognition of the union or negotiate a collective bargaining agreement.
By 1996, comprehensive campaigns had drawn the attention of Congress
. Rep. Pete Hoekstra
(R
--Mich.
) introduced legislation to outlaw union corporate campaign tactics. Hearings were held, but the legislation died in subcommittee.
More recent examples of comprehensive campaigns include those waged by SEIU
and its Justice for Janitors
campaign against custodial firms, the Teamsters
against Quebecor World
, UNITE HERE
against the laundry company Cintas
, and SEIU and UFCW against Wal-Mart
. There are reports that SEIU is beginning a comprehensive campaign which involves hospitals and other healthcare providers in and around Boston, Massachusetts.
of the National Labor Relations Act
(NLRA), and that—through the use of neutrality and card check
agreements—they violate workers' freedom of speech and choice. Some critics argue further that, absent the protection of federal labor law, employees are coerced or misled into signing union authorization cards (e.g., duped into forming a union which can then not be dislodged). A second, but related, criticism is that comprehensive campaigns organize a workplace because union bosses want it organized, not because workers want a union.
Many emerging arguments against comprehensive campaigns are legal in nature. For example, a number of employers have asserted that unions file frivolous lawsuits as part of such efforts, clogging the courts, taking the organizing process out of workers' hands and putting it into those of judges, and diverting resources from useful and efficient causes to "wasteful" legal causes.
A second legal claim is that comprehensive campaigns are not protected activity under the NLRA. In 1958, the Supreme Court
ruled in NLRB v. Wooster Division of Borg-Warner Corp., 356 U.S. 342, that unions are prohibited from striking over subjects of bargaining not encompassed by "wages, hours, and other terms or conditions of employment" (the phrase used in the NLRA). Legal critics of comprehensive campaigns claim that the Borg-Warner ruling prohibits unions from exercising economic pressure against an employer when that pressure is not explicitly and directly aimed at changing the terms and conditions of employment.
A third legal argument is that comprehensive campaigns run afoul of federal and state RICO statutes, which prohibit racketeering. "Perhaps the most interesting and significant of the predicate acts likely to be present in a corporate campaign is state law blackmail
, which is a species of extortion. Indeed, applying RICO to corporate campaigns comes down, in large measure, to understanding the crime of blackmail under state law, and recognizing that—legally speaking—corporate campaigns are, at bottom, a pattern of blackmail." In the Steelworkers' comprehensive campaign against Bayou Steel, the employer filed a federal RICO action which, although settled before a judge had ruled, "forced the union to devote extensive staff and financial resources to defend themselves, distracting attention and energy from the[comprehensive] campaign itself." In October 2007, Smithfield Foods
filed a RICO suit against UFCW over that union's campaign to organize 4,600 workers, and Wackenhut
sued SEIU over a campaign to organize that company's security guards.
A fourth legal argument is that comprehensive campaigns violate federal anti-trust law. As unions work with other organizations, it is claimed that they form, essentially, a commercial enterprise which seeks to economically dominate the market much in the same way that a monopoly does. In support of this claim, critics note that the Supreme Court has read the Sherman
, Clayton
and Norris-LaGuardia
acts in such a way that unions are held exempt from federal antitrust laws but only so long as a union acts in its own self-interest and does not lose its primary character as a labor union by combining with other, non-labor groups or organizations. In crafting community and comprehensive campaigns, critics say, unions lose their exemption under these acts.
First, they argue that comprehensive campaigns undermine the nature of collective activity (e.g., the union). Unions, these critics claim, are democratic
organizations which empower members so that they may establish their own goals in the workplace and seek to meet them. The comprehensive campaign, however, replaces worker activism and involvement with staff-driven organizations. Instead of a powerful local union, the comprehensive campaign relies on the power of organizational partners in the community campaign. Worst of all, the comprehensive campaign diverts attention away from employees' goals and needs and toward the economic weaknesses of the employer, and It also subordinates the timing of the organizing drive to court calendars.
Second, such critics argue that comprehensive campaigns waste valuable union resources by engaging in costly litigation. Lawsuits in state or federal court are far more expensive than the hearings and adjudications held under the auspices of the NLRB, and take longer to resolve. In an era in which the employer's primary advantage over the union is financial, critics say, shifting the focus of the organizing drive to the courts exposes the union to high legal costs. In the Food Lion comprehensive campaign, for example, the UFCW paid over $1 million in legal fees litigating its two class-action suits.
Third, some critics allege that the legal strategies of comprehensive campaigns leave workers, unions and elected labor leaders open to legal retaliation. Increasingly, they point out, workers and unions are being sued for libel, slander
, tortious business interference
and a variety of other state and federal claims which carry heavy fines. Even labor scholars who have spoken publicly about employer misbehavior have been sued. A more conservative organizing approach would be less litigious and less costly.
A fourth, related, legal argument against comprehensive campaigns is that their elements may be used against unions as well. Union leaders, like their corporate counterparts, may engage in insider-dealing, have conflicts of interest, or engage in questionable or embarrassing financial expenditures. For example, a CEO's high pay may be the subject of a comprehensive campaign's publicity effort. But then, so may a union president's high salary. Lawsuits are not the only domain of unions; employers may seek to pre-empt union legal action by filing suits against unions first. They may choose a venue (such as a state court) where judges are less experienced or a court which has proven historically favorable to business claims. Too few unions assess the risks of a "counter-attack" by businesses, critics argue, and end up in trouble themselves.
Finally, an emerging union-side argument against comprehensive campaigns is that legal action may expose the union's internal operations and strategies to employer scrutiny. Many legal actions, whether initiated by a union or an employer, turn on questions of fact. Employers can make plausible arguments for extensive discovery
. In at least one case, an employer has used discovery procedures to force the union to disclose pro-union supporters within the workplace, the number of organizers working on the campaign, its organizing strategies, its organizing budget and the amount and kind of information it had collected regarding the employer. Unions, critics say, can ill-afford to have such information made known to employers, especially during an organizing campaign.
Trade union
A trade union, trades union or labor union is an organization of workers that have banded together to achieve common goals such as better working conditions. The trade union, through its leadership, bargains with the employer on behalf of union members and negotiates labour contracts with...
organizing or a collective bargaining
Collective bargaining
Collective bargaining is a process of negotiations between employers and the representatives of a unit of employees aimed at reaching agreements that regulate working conditions...
campaign with a heavy focus on research, the use of community coalition-building, publicity and public pressure, political and regulatory pressure, and economic and legal pressure in addition to traditional organizing tactics.
The comprehensive campaign is a labor tactic primarily used in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, where labor unions lack many of the legal protections
United States labor law
United States labor law is a heterogeneous collection of state and federal laws. Federal law not only sets the standards that govern workers' rights to organize in the private sector, but also overrides most state and local laws that attempt to regulate this area. Federal law also provides more...
accorded their counterparts in the European Community and where cultural norms against unions are not as strong. However, as globalization
Globalization
Globalization refers to the increasingly global relationships of culture, people and economic activity. Most often, it refers to economics: the global distribution of the production of goods and services, through reduction of barriers to international trade such as tariffs, export fees, and import...
increases and capital and labor become more mobile, employers outside the U.S. are adopting American union-avoidance tactics
Union busting
Union busting is a wide range of activities undertaken by employers, their proxies, and governments, which attempt to prevent the formation or expansion of trade unions...
, and comprehensive campaigns are becoming more common in Europe and Asia.
Comprehensive campaigns are not commonly used in the United States due to their cost and the organizational expertise their require. However, they are gaining popularity in the U.S. labor movement, and many unions claim to be building comprehensive campaign capabilities.
Community campaigns
The comprehensive campaign is an evolution of labor union tactics, a process which has been ongoing in the United States since the 1960s. The identification of "good organizing practicesOrganising model
The organising model, as the term refers to trade unions , is a broad conception of how those organisations should recruit, operate and advance the interests of their members...
," which arose out of a wave of labor union organizing
Labor history of the United States
The labor history of the United States describes the history of organized labor, as well as the more general history of working people, in the United States. Pressures dictating the nature and power of organized labor have included the evolution and power of the corporation, efforts by employers...
in the 1930s and 1940s, was no longer proving effective for a variety of reasons (innovations in union-avoidance and anti-union tactics, economic and cultural changes, statutory and case law alterations in federal labor protections, etc.).
Innovations in grass-roots community organizing
Community organizing
Community organizing is a process where people who live in proximity to each other come together into an organization that acts in their shared self-interest. A core goal of community organizing is to generate durable power for an organization representing the community, allowing it to influence...
, developed outside the labor movement in the 1960s, offered American unions a new way with which to exercise power vis-a-vis employers. In 1971, radical activist Saul Alinsky
Saul Alinsky
Saul David Alinsky was a Jewish American community organizer and writer. He is generally considered to be the founder of modern community organizing, and has been compared in Playboy magazine to Thomas Paine as being "one of the great American leaders of the nonsocialist left." He is often noted...
published Rules for Radicals, a book which outlined the new strategy of the "community campaign." Activists believed that suburbanization
Suburbanization
Suburbanization a term used to describe the growth of areas on the fringes of major cities. It is one of the many causes of the increase in urban sprawl. Many residents of metropolitan regions work within the central urban area, choosing instead to live in satellite communities called suburbs...
, the rise of multinational corporation
Multinational corporation
A multi national corporation or enterprise , is a corporation or an enterprise that manages production or delivers services in more than one country. It can also be referred to as an international corporation...
s, economic dislocation and the alienating
Social alienation
The term social alienation has many discipline-specific uses; Roberts notes how even within the social sciences, it “is used to refer both to a personal psychological state and to a type of social relationship”...
effects of modern life had eroded communal norms against corporate greed and misbehavior. By rebuilding a sense of community by uniting existing organizations into new coalitions, or creating new organizations and then educating the coalition members about various causes, these activists believed they could alter the balance of power in their communities. The concept of the community campaign was quickly transferred to the labor movement.
Community campaigns frequently use the strategy of labor-community coalitions, or coalitions between unions and community organizations. Coalitions have varying forms and success, depending on the context in which they are organized and the strategies used to build them.
Corporate campaigns
As employers learned about the techniques of the community campaign and discovered sophisticated ways to neutralizing the advantages it gave a union, labor unions expanded their repertoire of tactics as well.The corporate campaign was developed to augment, and sometimes supplant, the community campaign. The corporate campaign identified and influenced members of a company's board of directors
Board of directors
A board of directors is a body of elected or appointed members who jointly oversee the activities of a company or organization. Other names include board of governors, board of managers, board of regents, board of trustees, and board of visitors...
, or the company lenders, customers and/or suppliers. The goal was to uncover conflicts of interest
Conflict of interest
A conflict of interest occurs when an individual or organization is involved in multiple interests, one of which could possibly corrupt the motivation for an act in the other....
, inefficiency, waste, fraud, or mismanagement and use this information, either publicly or privately, to win economic leverage over an employer and achieve the union's goals.
Again, employer adaptations undercut the effectiveness of the corporate campaign. Additionally, labor unions found it less expensive to build community coalitions, and relied more heavily on staff-driven corporate campaigns. Many union activists also argued that the publicity generated by a rowdy shareholder
Shareholder
A shareholder or stockholder is an individual or institution that legally owns one or more shares of stock in a public or private corporation. Shareholders own the stock, but not the corporation itself ....
meeting, for example, or an embarrassing report about conflict of interest on a board of directors, supplanted the community campaign by building the necessary community pressure. These arguments proved incorrect. But declining union fortunes (literally) made it difficult to employ the staff and resources necessary to build full-fledged community campaigns. More and more unions came to rely on the corporate campaign even as it became less and less effective.
Comprehensive campaigns
The comprehensive campaign combines the elements of the community campaign and corporate campaign, but is much more far-reaching. Bob Harbrant, then-president of the Food and Allied Service Trades Department of the AFL-CIOAFL-CIO
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, commonly AFL–CIO, is a national trade union center, the largest federation of unions in the United States, made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 11 million workers...
and an early theorist of comprehensive campaigns, argued in 1987:
- This is where comprehensive campaign organizing programs come into existence and why I say not a corporate campaign. A corporate campaign, per se, is too narrow in focus. When I say comprehensive campaign, I am talking about having the widest possible net and scooping up everything...
At the heart of the comprehensive campaign is research concerning the company and a broad-based community campaign which disseminates this research. The comprehensive campaign seeks to utilize all the levers of influence and power against an employer. State or local legislation antithetical to the employer's interests is introduced. Pressure is exerted through business license, zoning
Zoning
Zoning is a device of land use planning used by local governments in most developed countries. The word is derived from the practice of designating permitted uses of land based on mapped zones which separate one set of land uses from another...
and regulatory processes. Political pressure is applied by electing local, state and federal officials, and seeking the appointment of union-friendly bureaucrats. Lawsuits may be filed. Reports and "white paper
White paper
A white paper is an authoritative report or guide that helps solve a problem. White papers are used to educate readers and help people make decisions, and are often requested and used in politics, policy, business, and technical fields. In commercial use, the term has also come to refer to...
s" may be issued, and relationships with members of the press built. Picketing may occur at charity events, at the homes of board members or senior corporate officers, at the workplace, or at the place of business of subsidiaries, customers or suppliers. The support of religious, community
Community organization
Community organizations are civil society non-profits that operate within a single local community. They are essentially a subset of the wider group of nonprofits. Like other nonprofits they are often run on a voluntary basis and are self funded...
, civic, consumer
Consumer organization
Consumer organizations are advocacy groups that seek to protect people from corporate abuse like unsafe products, predatory lending, false advertising, astroturfing and pollution.Consumer organizations may operate via protests, campaigning or lobbying...
, environmental and other groups is won and continuously displayed to the employer and the public. As information is uncovered, it is assessed and fit into a strategic plan extending (in some cases) several years into the future. Escalation is planned, back-door channels sought (through which negotiations may be conducted), and new allies found. The comprehensive campaign is a pressure campaign, one which seeks to continuously apply pressure until the employer makes an egregious error (for example, harms the community in some way or overreacts to union pressure) or the union uncovers embarrassing or damaging information.
Continuing confusion over term of art
There is, however, still some confusion over the term "comprehensive campaign". In part, this is because some writers use the term "comprehensive" as an adjective for the word "campaign" rather than as a term of artTechnical terminology
Technical terminology is the specialized vocabulary of any field, not just technical fields. The same is true of the synonyms technical terms, terms of art, shop talk and words of art, which do not necessarily refer to technology or art...
. For example, Bronfenbrenner
Kate Bronfenbrenner
Kate Bronfenbrenner is the Director of Labor Education Research at the Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations. She is a leading authority on successful strategies in labor union organizing, and on the effects of outsourcing and offshoring on workers and worker rights.-Life...
and Hickey define a comprehensive campaign as one which contains the following elements:
- ... 1) adequate and appropriate staff and financial resources; 2) strategic targeting; 3) active and representative rank-and-file organizing committees; 4) active participation of member volunteer organizers; 5) person-to-person contact inside and outside the workplace; 6) benchmarks and assessments to monitor union support and set thresholds for moving ahead with the campaign; 7) an emphasis on issues which resonate in the workplace and in the community; 8) creative, escalating internal pressure tactics involving members in the workplace; 9) creative, escalating external pressure tactics involving members outside the workplace, locally, nationally and/or internationally; and 10) building for the first contract during the organizing campaign...
Since nine of the 10 elements listed by Bronfenbrenner and Hickey are elements of "good organizing practices" used in traditional union organizing campaigns, it is clear that they are referring not to the term of art "comprehensive campaign" but to a traditional organizing campaign which is comprehensive (e.g., uses most or all of the traditional organizing tactics).
Other sources exhibit confusion over the term "comprehensive campaign" because they lack knowledge about the state of labor union organizing. In some cases, writers do not appear to understand what a comprehensive campaign is, and equate the term with community campaign or corporate campaign.
Subsequently, use of the term "comprehensive campaign" varies widely among labor activists, employers, attorneys or academics. This may cause confusion when an author or speaker refers to a comprehensive campaign but means something more restricted. Context is often the key to determining exactly what a person means, and speeches and written works must be closely read to determine the actual meaning of the descriptive phrase used.
Elements of a comprehensive campaign
Comprehensive campaigns contain a number of different elements. Some or all of them may be used, and use varies over time and according to circumstances. According to labor union strategists, use of a given element is dictated by strategy and research.Goals and length
There may be one or more goals to a comprehensive campaign. Most often, the goal is to form a union at an employer's workplace or multiple workplaces simultaneously. In organizing, the goal of the comprehensive campaign may be to encourage the employer to recognize the union without recourse to a National Labor Relations BoardNational Labor Relations Board
The National Labor Relations Board is an independent agency of the United States government charged with conducting elections for labor union representation and with investigating and remedying unfair labor practices. Unfair labor practices may involve union-related situations or instances of...
(NLRB) election, to sign a neutrality agreement or code of conduct for the organizing election, to agree to hold an election under the auspices of a neutral third-party, or to recognize the union once it was won an NLRB-sponsored election.
One or all of these may be the goal of the comprehensive organizing campaign.
Comprehensive campaigns are not limited to organizing, however. They may also be aimed at winning an initial or successor collective bargaining agreement, or to achieve a collective bargaining goal or goals (such as a union security
Union security
A union security agreement is a contractual agreement, usually part of a union collective bargaining agreement, in which an employer and a trade or labor union agree on the extent to which the union may compel employees to join the union, and/or whether the employer will collect dues, fees, and...
clause). Comprehensive campaigns have also been used to prevent plant closings, prevent plant openings, or to encourage the employer to take some action (such as opposing a business competitor, withdrawing support for legislation, etc.).
Comprehensive campaigns vary in length. Many elements of a comprehensive campaign take one or more years to be effective. Subsequently, comprehensive campaigns are often expected to last over many years. But they may last only months or only one or two, if the union's goals are achieved quickly.
Three core elements
Comprehensive campaigns are notoriously expensive, and require significant lead-time to initiate. Many labor union activists advocate a six-month research effort before the comprehensive campaign begins, making it difficult to properly undertake a comprehensive campaign once a strikeStrike action
Strike action, also called labour strike, on strike, greve , or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to work. A strike usually takes place in response to employee grievances. Strikes became important during the industrial revolution, when mass labour became...
or negotiations have begun.
Various elements make up a comprehensive campaign. Chief among these is research. Research into the employer's finances, business strategy, governance, structure, leadership, board of directors, vendors and suppliers, building plans, staffing, billing, and operations (among other things) occurs six months or more before the comprehensive campaign begins. Research into other areas, such as state law and regulatory regimes, community demographics, workplace health and safety, local and state labor union strength, political support and other non-employer issues also occurs. Although the most intense research phase begins before the comprehensive campaign is publicly announced, research continues throughout the comprehensive campaign. Comprehensive campaigns are research-driven: The information discovered is analyzed, assessed and fit into short- and long-term strategies, which then drive additional research as well as dictate the pace, timing, and actions undertaken in the media, legal, community and other realms.
Forging ties and working relations with other groups—the community campaign—is a secondary but vital component of the comprehensive campaign. The goal of the community campaign element varies, depending on the research outcomes. Community campaign tactics may merely extend to coordinating publicity and or joint lobbying
Lobbying
Lobbying is the act of attempting to influence decisions made by officials in the government, most often legislators or members of regulatory agencies. Lobbying is done by various people or groups, from private-sector individuals or corporations, fellow legislators or government officials, or...
, but may also encompass boycott
Boycott
A boycott is an act of voluntarily abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with a person, organization, or country as an expression of protest, usually for political reasons...
s, information-gathering, electoral politics
Political campaign
A political campaign is an organized effort which seeks to influence the decision making process within a specific group. In democracies, political campaigns often refer to electoral campaigns, wherein representatives are chosen or referendums are decided...
, educating the community about labor unions, enhancing or impugning reputations, viral marketing
Viral marketing
Viral marketing, viral advertising, or marketing buzz are buzzwords referring to marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives through self-replicating viral processes, analogous to the spread of viruses...
and more. Establishing community-based "workers' rights boards
Jobs with Justice
Jobs with Justice is a national campaign for workers' rights in the United States. It was founded in 1987, and includes both individual members and affiliated organizations....
"—led by prominent religious or civic leaders—or other investigatory bodies is also common.
Another element of the comprehensive campaign is writing, introducing and seeking the passage of local, county, state or federal legislation inimical to the employer's business interests. Such legislation may be aimed at the business interests of suppliers, vendors, customers, subsidiaries or co-owners as well. The goal of legislative activity may merely be to force the employer to divert resources to lobbying, election politics or other legislative activity, or it may be to enact legislation. Proposed legislation may be as broad as universal healthcare or comprehensive workplace safety laws or as narrow as requiring the employer to collect and publicly report information which is not otherwise available (and which the union may later analyze and use).
An extensive publicity effort is a second and subsidiary, although vital, aspect of the comprehensive campaign. Publicity—often called "the air war"—is one of the primary vehicles by which information gleaned from employer research may be used. The use of "white papers", press conferences, advertising (in all media) or the distribution of research (independent or not) often is an important aspect of the publicity campaign. The creative release of information to the public is increasing. Demonstrations, the use of street theater
Street theatre
Street theatre is a form of theatrical performance and presentation in outdoor public spaces without a specific paying audience. These spaces can be anywhere, including shopping centres, car parks, recreational reserves and street corners. They are especially seen in outdoor spaces where there are...
and music, picketing, leafleting, bannering and disruptive tactics (such as projecting images on a plant's walls at night or using "human flies" to climb buildings and hang banners) are increasingly common means of attracting public attention in an age where information overload is common. Although the timing and duration of the "air war" varies widely, experience suggests that the publicity campaign takes up half to two-thirds of the comprehensive campaign timeline.
A third vital, but secondary, element is traditional organizing. Known as "the ground war" in the labor movement, traditional organizing often occurs late in a comprehensive campaign. In part, this is because research, publicity, building community coalitions, legislative work, legal pressure and other elements of the comprehensive campaign are time-consuming and not immediately effective. But "the ground war" is also staff-intensive (which is to say, expensive), so it is often implemented only in the final stages of the campaign, when the employer has been so weakened that success becomes more likely than not. Research also suggests that workers cannot be "activated" for long periods of time without encountering burnout or discouragement. Hence, the "ground war" is saved for the final stage of the comprehensive campaign.
Lesser elements
There are other, lesser, elements which make up comprehensive campaigns as well."The inside game," in which workers apply pressure from within, may also form part of the comprehensive campaign. "The inside game" consists of activities which can be done on the shop floor or in the workplace. They can be as varied as symbolic demonstrations, petitioning a supervisor for changes, filing strategic grievance
Grievance
A grievance is a wrong or hardship suffered, which is the grounds of a complaint.-History and politics:A grievance may arise from injustice or tyranny, and be cause for rebellion or revolution....
s, slowdown
Slowdown
A slowdown is an industrial action in which employees perform their duties but seek to reduce productivity or efficiency in their performance of these duties. A slowdown may be used as either a prelude or an alternative to a strike, as it is seen as less disruptive as well as less risky and...
s or working to rule
Work-to-rule
Work-to-rule is an industrial action in which employees do no more than the minimum required by the rules of their contract, and follow safety or other regulations to the letter in order to cause a slowdown rather than to serve their purpose. This is considered less disruptive than a strike or...
.
A legal strategy also plays an important role in the comprehensive campaign. Part of the legal strategy may use labor laws to cause the employer to divert management resources to employee relations and away from the anti-union effort. This may involve the strategic filing of unfair labor practice
Unfair labor practice
In United States labor law, the term unfair labor practice refers to certain actions taken by employers or unions that violate the National Labor Relations Act and other legislation...
charges or grievances, picketing, leafleting or bannering. Advantage is often taken of workplace health and safety laws, with unions filing health and safety or environmental complaints against the employer. Business and professional licensure, zoning procedures, building permitting and other laws and regulations may also be advantageously (and legitimately) used to hinder, harass and influence the employer to recognize the union, negotiate a contract, or achieve other goals.
As globalization has become more prevalent, international activity has also become an increasingly prominent element of comprehensive campaigns. In many ways, the building of international coalitions of trade unions, environmental groups, consumer federations and others has been an element of comprehensive campaigns since the mid-1980s. American labor unions had little occasion to engage in international activity in the past. In the 2000s, international coalition-building—especially with unions in Western Europe
Western Europe
Western Europe is a loose term for the collection of countries in the western most region of the European continents, though this definition is context-dependent and carries cultural and political connotations. One definition describes Western Europe as a geographic entity—the region lying in the...
(who represent workers at, and have strong working relationships with, the parent companies of American subsidiaries)—became far more important in the U.S.
Effectiveness of comprehensive campaigns
Within the American labor movement, there is widespread agreement that comprehensive campaigns—while expensive, time-consuming, and labor-intensive—are effective ways to encourage employers to recognize unions, negotiate collective bargaining agreements and achieve similar union goals.Assessment of organizing effectiveness
Recent studies indicate that comprehensive campaigns are highly effective at not only countering union-avoidance efforts and anti-union campaigns, but at winning NLRB-sponsored organizing elections:- In elections with moderately aggressive employer campaigns, when the union runs a comprehensive campaign, win rates average 93 percent overall and 75 percent in manufacturing. However, win rates drop to 35 percent overall, 29 percent in manufacturing, when the union fails to run a comprehensive campaign.
Other research is less sanguine, arguing that comprehensive campaigns are most effective only in the context of collective bargaining context. Some preliminary research suggests that comprehensive campaigns tend to fail more often in organizing drives, and appear to have little effect as a non-strike weapon.
Assessment of union-building effectiveness
Labor unions are deeply concerned with the viability of the local organization which emerges from an organizing drive. The process by which potential members are educated about unions and the labor movement, local leaders are trained, and effective, democratic organizations established is known as "union-building." It is well-recognized that some successful organizing techniques build strong unions, while other, equally successful techniques, do not.Some early evidence suggests that comprehensive campaigns build strong unions. Weakened employers are unable to counter newly-built unions, providing union leaders and members with a much less steep learning curve
Experience curve effects
Models of the learning curve effect and the closely related experience curve effect express the relationship between equations for experience and efficiency or between efficiency gains and investment in the effort....
. Some scholars also find that union members involved in comprehensive campaigns are more active in the collective bargaining process and in the life and culture of the new union.
But other studies find that corporate campaigns are too staff-intensive and discourage member activism. One early analysis showed that comprehensive campaigns tend to be used only against companies that produce brand-name consumer products or that are service-oriented. These campaigns focus heavily on public pressure to force the employer to recognize the union, and fail to engage rank-and-file workers in the development and analysis of research, strategizing, campaign implementation and the "ground war."
History of comprehensive campaigns
Comprehensive campaigns emerged in the 1970s.The first true comprehensive campaign (which utilized, to some degree, all of the elements described herein) occurred in the mid-1970s. Ray Rogers
Ray Rogers (labor activist)
Ray Rogers is an American labor rights activist, labor union strategist and organizer as well as a major figure of prominence in the American labor and human rights movement...
, a staff organizer with the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America
Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America
The Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America was a United States labor union known for its support for "social unionism" and progressive political causes. Led by Sidney Hillman for its first thirty years, it helped found the Congress of Industrial Organizations...
(ACWA), ran a comprehensive campaign against J.P. Stevens
J.P. Stevens
J.P. Stevens may refer to:*J.P. Stevens Textile Corporation, a constituent corporation of the WestPoint Home conglomerate*J.P. Stevens High School, named after the founder of the above*John Paul Stevens...
, a large textile manufacturer in the South
Southern United States
The Southern United States—commonly referred to as the American South, Dixie, or simply the South—constitutes a large distinctive area in the southeastern and south-central United States...
. The union eventually organized more than 3,000 Stevens workers at 10 plants. The organizing drive was featured in the Academy Award
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
-winning film Norma Rae
Norma Rae
Norma Rae is a 1979 American drama film that tells the story of a factory worker from a small town in North Carolina, who becomes involved in the labor union activities at the textile factory where she works...
in 1979
1979 in film
The year 1979 in film involved some significant events.- Major events :* March 5 - Production begins on Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.* May 25 - Alien, a landmark of the science fiction genre, is released....
.
A second major comprehensive campaign occurred roughly a decade later. In 1984, the Oil, Chemical and Atomic Workers International Union (OCAW) waged a comprehensive campaign against the German chemical company BASF
BASF
BASF SE is the largest chemical company in the world and is headquartered in Germany. BASF originally stood for Badische Anilin- und Soda-Fabrik . Today, the four letters are a registered trademark and the company is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, London Stock Exchange, and Zurich Stock...
. OCAW mounted a campaign that involved environmental groups and unions in West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
, and ultimately pressured BASF to end the lockout and sign a contract.
That same year, a corporate campaign run by the Farm Labor Organizing Committee
Farm Labor Organizing Committee
The Farm Labor Organizing Committee , AFL-CIO, is a labor union representing migrant farm workers in the Midwestern United States and North Carolina.-History:...
(FLOC), AFL-CIO
AFL-CIO
The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations, commonly AFL–CIO, is a national trade union center, the largest federation of unions in the United States, made up of 56 national and international unions, together representing more than 11 million workers...
, ended a six-year strike and boycott and won the union its first contract. In 1978, 2,000 FLOC members walked off their jobs in the Midwest
Midwestern United States
The Midwestern United States is one of the four U.S. geographic regions defined by the United States Census Bureau, providing an official definition of the American Midwest....
. While some growers were willing to negotiate, big canners such as the Campbell Soup Company
Campbell Soup Company
Campbell Soup Company , also known as Campbell's, is an American producer of canned soups and related products. Campbell's products are sold in 120 countries around the world. It is headquartered in Camden, New Jersey...
were unwilling to pay the higher prices which would accompany a unionized workforce. FLOC initiated a boycott of Campbell's. Six years later, not much had changed. In 1984, FLOC asked Ray Rogers (who had left ACWA and founded a consulting firm that helped unions run comprehensive campaigns) for help. Rogers developed a comprehensive campaign strategy which included a well-publicized demonstration at a Campbell Soup shareholder meeting and targeted three members of Campbell's board of directors for economic pressure. In February 1986, Campbell and its growers recognized FLOC as the workers' representative and signed a collective bargaining agreement which provided for wage increases, grievance resolution, insurance, and committees to study pesticide safety, housing, health care, and day care issues. Shortly thereafter, FLOC reached deals with Vlasic
Pinnacle Foods
Pinnacle Foods Group LLC is a leading packaged foods company headquartered in Mountain Lakes, New Jersey, owned by The Blackstone Group. Pinnacle Foods is a key player in the shelf stable and frozen food categories and their products can be found in more than 85% of American households.The company...
, Heinz
H. J. Heinz Company
The H. J. Heinz Company , commonly known as Heinz and famous for its "57 Varieties" slogan and its ketchup, is an American food company with world headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.Perhaps best known for its ketchup, the H.J...
, Green Bay Foods (now part of Dean Foods
Dean Foods
Dean Foods is an American food and beverage company with two operating divisions: Fresh Dairy Direct and WhiteWave-Morningstar. The company maintains plants and distributors in the United States and the United Kingdom. Dean Foods products are sold throughout the USA.-History:In 1925, Samuel E...
), Aunt Jane's (now part of Dean Foods) and Dean Foods
Dean Foods
Dean Foods is an American food and beverage company with two operating divisions: Fresh Dairy Direct and WhiteWave-Morningstar. The company maintains plants and distributors in the United States and the United Kingdom. Dean Foods products are sold throughout the USA.-History:In 1925, Samuel E...
.
The first widely acknowledged failure of a comprehensive campaign occurred in 1985. Under pressure from international competition, the U.S. meat packing industry
Meat packing industry
The meat packing industry handles the slaughtering, processing, packaging, and distribution of animals such as cattle, pigs, sheep and other livestock...
had seen one major bankruptcy and a number of plant closings. In 1984, six of the eight major United Food and Commercial Workers
United Food and Commercial Workers
The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union is a labor union representing approximately 1.3 million workers in the United States and Canada in many industries, including agriculture, health care, meatpacking, poultry and food processing, manufacturing, textile, G4S Security, chemical...
(UFCW) locals in the Hormel
Hormel
Hormel Foods Corporation is a food company based in southeastern Minnesota , perhaps best known as the producer of Spam luncheon meat. The company was founded as George A. Hormel & Company in Austin, Minnesota, U.S., by George A. Hormel in 1891. The company changed its name to Hormel Foods...
chain prepared to re-negotiate wages under wage re-opener. In July, all locals except Local P-9 in Austin, Minnesota
Austin, Minnesota
As of the census of 2000, there were 23,314 people, 9,897 households, and 6,076 families residing in the city. The population density was 2,168.2 people per square mile . There were 10,261 housing units at an average density of 954.3 per square mile...
, agreed to strike Hormel in September. But by that time, all the locals except P-9 had reached an agreement setting wages at $9.00 an hour, with a $1.00-an-hour increase to occur in 1985. In October 1984, Hormel reduced wages at the Austin plant from $10.69 to $8.25 an hour. Local P-9 subsequently hired Ray Rogers to run a comprehensive campaign to restore wages to their former level. But in December 1984, UFCW refused to support the comprehensive campaign. The workers struck in August 1985. UFCW initially supported the strike, but refused to sanction a boycott of Hormel products. In January 1986, Hormel re-opened the Minnesota plant with replacement workers, and the strike—and the local—collapsed. The Hormel strike was featured in the 1990
1990 in film
The year 1990 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* CGI technique is expanded with motion capture for CGI characters, used in Total Recall .* The first digitally-manipulated matte painting is used, in Die Hard 2....
Academy Award-winning documentary American Dream
American Dream (film)
American Dream is a cinéma vérité documentary film directed by Barbara Kopple and co-directed by Cathy Caplan, Thomas Haneke, and Lawrence Silk....
.
Comprehensive campaigns began attracting academic attention in 1985. The first known publication of a work examining comprehensive campaigns was Lawrence Mishel's article, "Strengths and Limits of Non-Workplace Strategies," published in the Fall 1985 issue of Labor Research Review.
Another important comprehensive campaign failed in 1988. In June 1987, workers at the International Paper
International Paper
International Paper Company is an American pulp and paper company, the largest such company in the world. It has approximately 59,500 employees, and it is headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee.-History:...
company mill in Androscoggin, Maine struck to resist company-demanded concessions. Led by Maine AFL-CIO
Maine AFL-CIO
The Maine AFL-CIO is a federation of AFL-CIO-affiliated labor unions in the state of Maine.The federation lobbies the state legislature and executive branch on issues important to its members, assists its state and local affiliate unions in organizing new members, conducts training and educational...
organizer Peter Kellman
Peter Kellman
Peter Kellman is an anti-war activist, author, and American labor union leader and activist.He is president of the Southern Maine Central Labor Council, and a member of the executive board of the Maine AFL-CIO....
, the moribund local became a hotbed of worker activism and community organizing. However, inadequate protections of federal labor law and internal union politics (especially those at international union headquarters as well as rivalries between the local union and its parent) led the parent union to refuse to fund the comprehensive campaign. After the company hired replacement workers, the strike ultimately failed.
A comprehensive campaign helped the United Steelworkers
United Steelworkers
The United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union is the largest industrial labor union in North America, with 705,000 members. Headquartered in Pittsburgh, U.S., the United Steelworkers represents workers in the United...
(USW) win a contract at Ravenswood Aluminum. In November 1990, Ravenswood Aluminum locked out 1,700 employees as their contract expired and hired replacement workers. USW began a comprehensive campaign which involved a heavy research component. USW eventually publicized the plant's poor safety record, applied political pressure in Congress to protect the domestic aluminum smelting industry, and discovered that Ravenswood Aluminum was controlled by fugitive billionaire Marc Rich
Marc Rich
Marc Rich is an international commodities trader and entrepreneur. He is best known for founding the commodities company Glencore. He was indicted in the United States on federal charges of illegally making oil deals with Iran during the late 1970s-early 1980s Iran hostage crisis and tax evasion...
. The campaign is notable because of the extensive international pressure the USW brought to bear on Ravenswood and for the creative legal strategies the union employed. Most importantly, however, the Ravenswood effort showed that, properly undertaken and financed, a comprehensive campaign could put so much pressure on an employer that even recourse to permanent replacements could not defeat the union (as the tactic had at Hormel and International Paper).
In 1993, UFCW undertook a comprehensive campaign in the food industry. The UFCW had conducted a decade-long organizing effort against Food Lion
Food Lion
Food Lion LLC is an American grocery store company headquartered in Salisbury, North Carolina that operates approximately 1,300 supermarkets in 11 Mid-Atlantic and South Atlantic states as well as Tennessee, Kentucky and West Virginia under the Food Lion, Harveys Supermarket, Bloom, Bottom Dollar...
, a nonunion chain of warehouse-style grocery stores. By the early 1990s, however, UFCW became convinced that traditional organizing methods were no longer working, and the union initiated a comprehensive campaign. An essential part of the union strategy was an innovative class-action lawsuit
Class action
In law, a class action, a class suit, or a representative action is a form of lawsuit in which a large group of people collectively bring a claim to court and/or in which a class of defendants is being sued...
by about 400 current and former Food Lion workers, who alleged they had been forced by their employer to work off-the-clock
Overtime
Overtime is the amount of time someone works beyond normal working hours. Normal hours may be determined in several ways:*by custom ,*by practices of a given trade or profession,*by legislation,...
. Eventually, the United States Department of Labor
United States Department of Labor
The United States Department of Labor is a Cabinet department of the United States government responsible for occupational safety, wage and hour standards, unemployment insurance benefits, re-employment services, and some economic statistics. Many U.S. states also have such departments. The...
fined Food Lion, which delivered $16 million in back-pay to the workers. UFCW quickly undertook a second class-action suit, in which workers claimed wrongful termination and violation of COBRA
Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985
The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985 is a law passed by the U.S. Congress on a reconciliation basis and signed by President Reagan that, among other things, mandates an insurance program giving some employees the ability to continue health insurance coverage after leaving...
rights. Again, UFCW was successful. However, Food Lion retaliated by filing a $300 million lawsuit against its workers and UFCW for violating the federal RICO Act
Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act
The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, commonly referred to as the RICO Act or simply RICO, is a United States federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization...
. Although Food Lion's lawsuit was eventually dismissed, UFCW was unable to organized the workers, achieve recognition of the union or negotiate a collective bargaining agreement.
By 1996, comprehensive campaigns had drawn the attention of Congress
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....
. Rep. Pete Hoekstra
Pete Hoekstra
Peter "Pete" Hoekstra is a former Republican U.S. Representative for who served in the House from 1993 until 2011. He was an unsuccessful candidate for Governor of Michigan in 2010 and is expected to run for the United States Senate against Debbie Stabenow in 2012.-Early life and education:Born...
(R
Republican Party (United States)
The Republican Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Democratic Party. Founded by anti-slavery expansion activists in 1854, it is often called the GOP . The party's platform generally reflects American conservatism in the U.S...
--Mich.
Michigan
Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....
) introduced legislation to outlaw union corporate campaign tactics. Hearings were held, but the legislation died in subcommittee.
More recent examples of comprehensive campaigns include those waged by SEIU
Service Employees International Union
Service Employees International Union is a labor union representing about 1.8 million workers in over 100 occupations in the United States , and Canada...
and its Justice for Janitors
Justice for Janitors
Justice for Janitors is a social movement organization that fights for the rights of janitors across the US and Canada. It was started in 1985 in response to the low wages and minimal health-care coverage that janitors received...
campaign against custodial firms, the Teamsters
Teamsters
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters is a labor union in the United States and Canada. Formed in 1903 by the merger of several local and regional locals of teamsters, the union now represents a diverse membership of blue-collar and professional workers in both the public and private sectors....
against Quebecor World
Quebecor World
Quebecor World Inc. was a printing subsidiary of Quebecor Inc. based in Montreal, Quebec. It comprised a number of small and large print shops throughout the world. In 2010, Quebecor World was acquired by Wisconsin-based Quad/Graphics....
, UNITE HERE
UNITE HERE
UNITE HERE is a labor union in the United States and Canada with more than 265,000 active members The union's members work predominantly in the hotel, food service, laundry, warehouse, and casino gaming industries...
against the laundry company Cintas
Cintas
Cintas Corporation , based in Mason, Ohio, is a publicly traded company that operates more than 400 facilities throughout North America. The company provides specialized services to businesses, including the design and manufacturing of corporate identity uniform programs, entrance mats, restroom...
, and SEIU and UFCW against Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. , branded as Walmart since 2008 and Wal-Mart before then, is an American public multinational corporation that runs chains of large discount department stores and warehouse stores. The company is the world's 18th largest public corporation, according to the Forbes Global 2000...
. There are reports that SEIU is beginning a comprehensive campaign which involves hospitals and other healthcare providers in and around Boston, Massachusetts.
Management-side critics
Critics of labor unions argue that comprehensive campaigns violate the spirit, if not letter, of federal labor law. They claim that comprehensive campaigns ignore the established policies and election proceduresNLRB election procedures
The National Labor Relations Board, an agency within the United States government, was created in 1935 as part of the National Labor Relations Act. Among the NLRB’s chief responsibilities is the holding of elections to permit employees to vote whether they wish to be represented by a particular...
of the National Labor Relations Act
National Labor Relations Act
The National Labor Relations Act or Wagner Act , is a 1935 United States federal law that limits the means with which employers may react to workers in the private sector who create labor unions , engage in collective bargaining, and take part in strikes and other forms of concerted activity in...
(NLRA), and that—through the use of neutrality and card check
Card check
Card check is a method for American employees to organize into a labor union in which a majority of employees in a bargaining unit sign authorization forms, or "cards," stating they wish to be represented by the union...
agreements—they violate workers' freedom of speech and choice. Some critics argue further that, absent the protection of federal labor law, employees are coerced or misled into signing union authorization cards (e.g., duped into forming a union which can then not be dislodged). A second, but related, criticism is that comprehensive campaigns organize a workplace because union bosses want it organized, not because workers want a union.
Many emerging arguments against comprehensive campaigns are legal in nature. For example, a number of employers have asserted that unions file frivolous lawsuits as part of such efforts, clogging the courts, taking the organizing process out of workers' hands and putting it into those of judges, and diverting resources from useful and efficient causes to "wasteful" legal causes.
A second legal claim is that comprehensive campaigns are not protected activity under the NLRA. In 1958, the Supreme Court
Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
ruled in NLRB v. Wooster Division of Borg-Warner Corp., 356 U.S. 342, that unions are prohibited from striking over subjects of bargaining not encompassed by "wages, hours, and other terms or conditions of employment" (the phrase used in the NLRA). Legal critics of comprehensive campaigns claim that the Borg-Warner ruling prohibits unions from exercising economic pressure against an employer when that pressure is not explicitly and directly aimed at changing the terms and conditions of employment.
A third legal argument is that comprehensive campaigns run afoul of federal and state RICO statutes, which prohibit racketeering. "Perhaps the most interesting and significant of the predicate acts likely to be present in a corporate campaign is state law blackmail
Blackmail
In common usage, blackmail is a crime involving threats to reveal substantially true or false information about a person to the public, a family member, or associates unless a demand is met. It may be defined as coercion involving threats of physical harm, threat of criminal prosecution, or threats...
, which is a species of extortion. Indeed, applying RICO to corporate campaigns comes down, in large measure, to understanding the crime of blackmail under state law, and recognizing that—legally speaking—corporate campaigns are, at bottom, a pattern of blackmail." In the Steelworkers' comprehensive campaign against Bayou Steel, the employer filed a federal RICO action which, although settled before a judge had ruled, "forced the union to devote extensive staff and financial resources to defend themselves, distracting attention and energy from the
Smithfield Foods
Smithfield Foods, Inc. is the world’s largest pork producer and processor. Headquartered in Smithfield, Virginia, it runs facilities in 26 U.S. states, including the world's largest meat-processing plant in Tar Heel, North Carolina, and has operations in Brazil, China, France, Mexico, Poland,...
filed a RICO suit against UFCW over that union's campaign to organize 4,600 workers, and Wackenhut
Wackenhut
G4S Secure Solutions is a private security company. It was founded as The Wackenhut Corporation in 1954, in Coral Gables, Florida, by George Wackenhut and three partners ....
sued SEIU over a campaign to organize that company's security guards.
A fourth legal argument is that comprehensive campaigns violate federal anti-trust law. As unions work with other organizations, it is claimed that they form, essentially, a commercial enterprise which seeks to economically dominate the market much in the same way that a monopoly does. In support of this claim, critics note that the Supreme Court has read the Sherman
Sherman Antitrust Act
The Sherman Antitrust Act requires the United States federal government to investigate and pursue trusts, companies, and organizations suspected of violating the Act. It was the first Federal statute to limit cartels and monopolies, and today still forms the basis for most antitrust litigation by...
, Clayton
Clayton Antitrust Act
The Clayton Antitrust Act of 1914 , was enacted in the United States to add further substance to the U.S. antitrust law regime by seeking to prevent anticompetitive practices in their incipiency. That regime started with the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, the first Federal law outlawing practices...
and Norris-LaGuardia
Norris-LaGuardia Act
The Norris–La Guardia Act was a 1932 United States federal law that banned yellow-dog contracts, barred federal courts from issuing injunctions against nonviolent labor disputes, and created a positive right of noninterference by employers against workers joining trade unions...
acts in such a way that unions are held exempt from federal antitrust laws but only so long as a union acts in its own self-interest and does not lose its primary character as a labor union by combining with other, non-labor groups or organizations. In crafting community and comprehensive campaigns, critics say, unions lose their exemption under these acts.
Union-side critics
Comprehensive campaigns are not universally supported within labor unions. These union-side critics point out a number of problems with comprehensive campaigns.First, they argue that comprehensive campaigns undermine the nature of collective activity (e.g., the union). Unions, these critics claim, are democratic
Democracy
Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...
organizations which empower members so that they may establish their own goals in the workplace and seek to meet them. The comprehensive campaign, however, replaces worker activism and involvement with staff-driven organizations. Instead of a powerful local union, the comprehensive campaign relies on the power of organizational partners in the community campaign. Worst of all, the comprehensive campaign diverts attention away from employees' goals and needs and toward the economic weaknesses of the employer, and It also subordinates the timing of the organizing drive to court calendars.
Second, such critics argue that comprehensive campaigns waste valuable union resources by engaging in costly litigation. Lawsuits in state or federal court are far more expensive than the hearings and adjudications held under the auspices of the NLRB, and take longer to resolve. In an era in which the employer's primary advantage over the union is financial, critics say, shifting the focus of the organizing drive to the courts exposes the union to high legal costs. In the Food Lion comprehensive campaign, for example, the UFCW paid over $1 million in legal fees litigating its two class-action suits.
Third, some critics allege that the legal strategies of comprehensive campaigns leave workers, unions and elected labor leaders open to legal retaliation. Increasingly, they point out, workers and unions are being sued for libel, slander
Slander and libel
Defamation—also called calumny, vilification, traducement, slander , and libel —is the communication of a statement that makes a claim, expressly stated or implied to be factual, that may give an individual, business, product, group, government, or nation a negative image...
, tortious business interference
Tortious interference
Tortious interference, also known as intentional interference with contractual relations, in the common law of tort, occurs when a person intentionally damages the plaintiff's contractual or other business relationships...
and a variety of other state and federal claims which carry heavy fines. Even labor scholars who have spoken publicly about employer misbehavior have been sued. A more conservative organizing approach would be less litigious and less costly.
A fourth, related, legal argument against comprehensive campaigns is that their elements may be used against unions as well. Union leaders, like their corporate counterparts, may engage in insider-dealing, have conflicts of interest, or engage in questionable or embarrassing financial expenditures. For example, a CEO's high pay may be the subject of a comprehensive campaign's publicity effort. But then, so may a union president's high salary. Lawsuits are not the only domain of unions; employers may seek to pre-empt union legal action by filing suits against unions first. They may choose a venue (such as a state court) where judges are less experienced or a court which has proven historically favorable to business claims. Too few unions assess the risks of a "counter-attack" by businesses, critics argue, and end up in trouble themselves.
Finally, an emerging union-side argument against comprehensive campaigns is that legal action may expose the union's internal operations and strategies to employer scrutiny. Many legal actions, whether initiated by a union or an employer, turn on questions of fact. Employers can make plausible arguments for extensive discovery
Discovery (law)
In U.S.law, discovery is the pre-trial phase in a lawsuit in which each party, through the law of civil procedure, can obtain evidence from the opposing party by means of discovery devices including requests for answers to interrogatories, requests for production of documents, requests for...
. In at least one case, an employer has used discovery procedures to force the union to disclose pro-union supporters within the workplace, the number of organizers working on the campaign, its organizing strategies, its organizing budget and the amount and kind of information it had collected regarding the employer. Unions, critics say, can ill-afford to have such information made known to employers, especially during an organizing campaign.