By
Harry Targ / The Rag Blog /
February 29, 2012
“Of course, Big Labor's coercion of employees into
paying union dues to subsidize its political agenda isn't new, since this
practice is as old as the 1935 National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). But with
AFL-CIO president John Sweeney beating his chest about the Federation's
political spending, the coercion of workers to fund the AFL-CIO's political
operations became news.” -- National Right to Work Legal Defense
Foundation, Inc, September 9, 1997
“A source with direct knowledge of decision-making at Komen's headquarters in
Dallas said the grant-making criteria were adopted with the deliberate
intention of targeting Planned Parenthood. The criteria's impact on Planned
Parenthood and its status as the focus of government investigations were
highlighted in a memo distributed to Komen affiliates in December.” -- Associated
Press, February 7, 2012
"WHEREAS, the Association of Community
Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) was founded in 1970 with the mission of
increasing voter participation, delivering services to inner-city
neighborhoods, community organizing, and carrying out issue campaigns;
(followed by a list of financial and other transgressions)
THEREFORE BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that ALEC calls on all states to immediately
end support for ACORN and groups linked to ACORN." -- From the
website of the American Legislative Executive Council (ALEC)
Academics define social movements in different ways
and believe they arise for a variety of reasons. They can come from groups that
already exist, a growing availability of resources, the rise of crises of one
sort or another, and/or from specific issues.
Such movements may take a long time to gestate and grow, or emerge in moments
of spontaneity, sometimes rising from inspirational examples. Often they have
their roots in the need to react to powerful and negative initiatives by
opposing political or economic groups.
The forces of reaction may have as their project immediate efforts to destroy
existing rights or prerogatives embedded in public policies. In addition they
may see in the policies and groups they oppose the seeds of new ideas that
could lead to fundamental social changes that must be challenged.
While reactionary forces may arise to oppose specific changes in policy, their
most important legacy is the long-term efforts they employ to crush
organizations of people that could see the need for fundamental social change.
Therefore, as in the cases of labor, women’s rights, and people’s movements, reactionary
forces are fundamentally committed to long-term organizing, rolling back the
very forces that have provided some services to those not part of the ruling
class.
We can see examples of the rise of social movements out of reactionary programs
in the recent battles over “Right-to-Work for less” legislation in the state of
Indiana and the spreading campaigns to bring similar legislation to states
throughout the industrial heartland. Right-to-Work campaigns have followed on
efforts to diminish worker power to destroy rights of public employees to
organize and to make difficult worker organizing in any venue.
The data comparing the conditions of workers in Right-to-Work states with
others clearly shows that the former experience lower wages, health benefits,
ashop-floor safety, and their families fewer rights to health care and
retirement security.
More generally, in a thorough recent report on the role of unions in American
life, the authors of a Center for American Progress Action Fund study (David
Madland and Nick Bunker) point out that virtually every positive social change
in the United States has received strong support from organized labor.
Historically, during periods of high union density (high percentages of workers
in unions), all American workers have benefited in terms of wages, benefits,
and workplace rights.
In addition, organized labor has been among the strongest institutional
supporters of the Democratic Party, and on occasion, some trade unionists have
supported progressive third party campaigns (from the Henry Wallace campaign
for president in 1948 to Green Party campaigns by candidate Ralph Nader).
Further, the existence of a vibrant labor movement is vital for workers
everywhere. Those who oppose organized labor, such as the National Right to
Work Legal Defense Foundation quoted above, do so for reasons of short term
gain. Right-to-Work laws may weaken unions, lead to declining wages, and create
larger profits.
But more important, destroying the labor movement and the very idea that
workers have rights and those rights have the potential of being realized in
strong organizations of their making seems vital to economic and political
elites who are always striving to create a society dominated even more by
industrial and finance capital.
Trade unions, while driven by the defense of basic interests today, imply the
possibility of creating a society that privileges worker rights and democracy.
From the standpoint of big capital, this remains the ultimate danger that must
be stamped out.
Just as trade unions embody the possibility of real democracy for workers,
women’s rights to make choices about their own bodies constitute the same kind
of immediate and long-term reality. The signature target of the reactionary
right is Planned Parenthood of America. Planned Parenthood provides a broad
array of reproductive health services for women, particularly poor women. Only
a small percentage of their resources are allocated for abortions.
In addition the mission of Planned Parenthood is to create the conditions in
which each individual can manage his/her own fertility, what they refer to as
“reproductive self-determination.” To achieve this goal Planned Parenthood
works to provide reproductive and comprehensive health care, including advocating
public policies to achieve the mission.
Reactionary forces, from the American Legislative Executive Council (ALEC) to
various national anti-abortion groups, and most recently Susan Komen for the
Cure (ostensibly apolitical) have mobilized not only to shrink Planned
Parenthood services to women but to eliminate the organization itself.
For some, abortion is anathema for theological reasons. But for most, Planned
Parenthood represents institutionally the basic rights of women to control
their own bodies and by implication the provision of accessible and
comprehensive health care.
The rising of the poor, women and men, black and white, employed and
unemployed, the young and old, constitutes another fundamental challenge to the
economic and political power of reactionary forces in America.
Organizations such as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now
(ACORN), until it was destroyed by an orchestrated campaign of lies in 2010,
received public funding to support programs for low and moderate income
families. It promoted voter registration in communities, and advocated for
health care reform, public housing, and living wage legislation.
From the vantage point of economic and political elites, power and privilege
could be challenged in cities and towns across America if community
organizations such as ACORN developed programs of action and service.
These three organizations together represent labor, women, and grassroots poor
people’s campaigns. They are the embodiment of popular forces which seek to end
exploitation, sexism, and racism. Implicitly they stand for the construction of
a different kind of society in which these pathologies do not exist.
That is why all three -- organized labor, Planned Parenthood, and ACORN -- have been and continue to be under assault. And that is why progressive campaigns need to be organized around the fundamental connections between class, gender, and race and to defend labor, women’s, and community organizations.
