Beyond ‘Buy American’: Sorting Allies and Enemies

[dcsmart]

— Judy Ancel

A union rep discussing the possible strike at AT&T said the work of his members came and went from locations all over the world. The production chain was so extensive that the union couldn’t track it. He then said, sadly, “In this time of high unemployment, the company could be a leader and bring those jobs back here and be patriotic.”

AT&T patriotic? They dropped “American” from their name a long time ago.

A UAW local president explained that buying American cars meant buying cars from the Big 3 automakers, because the transplants shipped their profits overseas, so we should shun even union-made cars of Toyota and Mitsubishi.

Does that mean that if Fiat buys Chrysler, we shouldn’t buy their cars anymore?

On April 7 Steelworkers in Granite City, Illinois, held a Rally to Restore American Manufacturing, to protest the use of pipe from India on a mammoth oil pipeline from Alberta to Illinois. Two thousand workers at U.S. Steel’s Granite City plant, which could make the hot-rolled steel for such pipes, are laid off. The rally was sponsored by the union and the Alliance for American Manufacturing, a partnership between the Steelworkers, U.S. Steel, and Allegheny Technologies.

But U.S. Steel and Allegheny Technologies also produce metals in England, Canada, China, Mexico, Slovakia, Serbia, and Brazil.

This “us or them” approach to jobs is happening everywhere. The rampage of job-killing is creating desperation among workers and their unions. They are being seduced by “Buy American” and steering toward economic nationalism—the doctrine that we will prosper by taking care of the American economy first and exclusively.

But Buy American is a giant distraction. It targets consumers rather than the corporations and governments who’ve made the decisions that are killing our jobs.

When unions side with nationalism they confuse workers about who our allies are, who our enemies are, and what will advance our own interests. Without alternative strategies economic nationalism seems logical, but our history suggests it will take us onto the rocks. Why?
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This is the wrong debate, where the alternatives are either corporate-led globalization, with multinationals roaming the world for cheap labor, or protectionist nationalism, with these same multinationals distracting us with a phony show of patriotism to divide us from other workers.

So how should labor frame the discussion? How do we support good jobs without playing workers against each other at home and globally?
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FULL ARTICLE
http://labornotes.org/node/2224

I think this article raises some real pressing issues. How can labor respond in a way that promotes universal solidarity.

"The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of the working people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life. "
from the IWW preamble
http://www.iww.org/culture/official/preamble.shtml