Labor Notes Conference Report

by Bruce Allen

Since 1979 Labor Notes has sought to be the "voice of activists who want to put the movement back in the labour movement" and has been holding biennial conferences which routinely attract over a thousand people. These conferences are designed to be "launching pads for networks" and "a meeting place for activists".

Labor Notes Ninth Biennial Conference was held in Detroit the weekend of April 18-20 and measured up to these goals. The theme of the conference was "Labour on the Move". The conference theme was meant to reflect a new situation in the U.S. labour movement marked by changes in the leadership of the AFL-CIO and the recent re-election of union reformers to the top posts in the International Brotherhood of Teamsters among other things. However, the backdrop for the conference was the tragic situation faced by the 2,000 workers locked out by the Detroit Free Press and the Detroit News and efforts to mobilize mass actions in Detroit on the weekend of June 21 in support of these heroic workers.

The highlight of the conference was a massive rally in support of the locked out newspaper workers in Detroit’s Greek Town. The most inspiring moment involved a speech by Susan Mitchell from Liverpool, England. Flanked by former A.E. Staley worker and hunger striker Dan Lane, Susan Mitchell linked the struggle in Detroit to the two year long struggle in her own city being waged by 500 dockworkers who were fired for refusing to cross a picket line and replaced by casual scab labour.

Susan Mitchell had come to the conference as a representative of the dockworkers’ wives support group "Women of the Waterfront". Later she helped to lead a workshop about the struggle of the fired Liverpool dockers.

Otherwise, the conference featured dozens of workshops on many different topics. Notable among them were workshops about fighting lean production, the planned merger of the UAW, IAM and Steelworkers and concerning international struggles against the global corporate agenda. There were also sessions about the Days of Action in Ontario, cross-border organizing and fighting for union democracy.

The next conference will be held in April 1999 in Detroit. CAW members interested in broadening their horizons and learning how other workers are fighting the global corporate agenda would be well advised to attend.