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Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and a New Path toward Social Justice
The U.S. trade union movement finds itself today on a global battlefield filled with landmines and littered with the bodies of various social movements and struggles. Candid, incisive, and accessible, Solidarity Divided is a critical examination of labor's current crisis and a plan for a bold new way forward into the twenty-first century. Bill Fletcher and Fernando Gapasin, two longtime union insiders whose experiences as activists of color grant them a unique vantage on the problems now facing U.S. labor, offer a remarkable mix of vivid history and probing analysis. They chart changes in U.S. manufacturing, examine the onslaught of globalization, consider the influence of the environment on labor, and provide the first broad analysis of the fallout from the 2000 and 2004 elections on the U.S. labor movement. Ultimately calling for a wide-ranging reexamination of the ideological and structural underpinnings of today's labor movement, this is essential reading for understanding how the battle for social justice can be fought and won.
304 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2008
14 people are currently reading
626 people want to read
About the author
Bill Fletcher Jr.
8 books23 followersBill Fletcher, Jr., is the Chairman of the Board of Directors for the International Labor Rights Forum, Executive Editor of The Black Commentator and founder of the Center for Labor Renewal. A longtime labor, racial justice and international activist, he is the immediate past president of TransAfrica Forum, a national non-profit organization organizing, educating and advocating for policies in favor of the peoples of Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America. Fletcher is also a founder of the Black Radical Congress and is a Senior Scholar for the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, DC.
Fletcher is the co-author (with Fernando Gapasin) of Solidarity Divided, The Crisis in Organized Labor and A New Path Toward Social Justice (University of California Press). He was formerly the Vice President for International Trade Union Development Programs for the George Meany Center of the AFL-CIO. Prior the George Meany Center, Fletcher served as Education Director and later Assistant to the President of the AFL-CIO.
Fletcher got his start in the labor movement as a rank and file member of the Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America. Combining labor and community work, he was also involved in ongoing efforts to desegregate the Boston building trades. He later served in leadership and staff positions in District 65-United Auto Workers, National Postal Mail Handlers Union and Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
Fletcher is a graduate of Harvard University and has authored numerous articles and speaks widely on domestic and international topics, racial justice and labor issues.
Fletcher is the co-author (with Fernando Gapasin) of Solidarity Divided, The Crisis in Organized Labor and A New Path Toward Social Justice (University of California Press). He was formerly the Vice President for International Trade Union Development Programs for the George Meany Center of the AFL-CIO. Prior the George Meany Center, Fletcher served as Education Director and later Assistant to the President of the AFL-CIO.
Fletcher got his start in the labor movement as a rank and file member of the Industrial Union of Marine and Shipbuilding Workers of America. Combining labor and community work, he was also involved in ongoing efforts to desegregate the Boston building trades. He later served in leadership and staff positions in District 65-United Auto Workers, National Postal Mail Handlers Union and Service Employees International Union (SEIU).
Fletcher is a graduate of Harvard University and has authored numerous articles and speaks widely on domestic and international topics, racial justice and labor issues.
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
July 6, 2008
Z-Net Interview with the Author
Can you tell ZNet, please, what Solidarity Divided is about? What is it trying to communicate?
"Solidarity Divided" is an attempt to provide a framework for activists who, in looking at the US trade union movement, are trying to figure out the origin and nature of the current crisis. It is NOT an attempt to examine every question relative to the development of the US working class, nor is it an exhaustive examination of each reform effort. It is particularly focused on efforts that began around 1995 with the coming to power of the John Sweeney administration in the AFL-CIO.
The book additionally attempts to situate the current crisis within the context of the failures of a certain approach to unionism that is grounded in the thought and practice of Samuel Gompers, later amended with virulent anti-communism.
Can you tell ZNet something about writing the book? Where does the content come from? What went into making the book what it is?
The book is a joint project between me--Bill Fletcher, Jr.--and Fernando Gapasin. Both of us have extensive experience in organized labor, holding various positions, inside and outside the formal structure. Fernando and I tried drawing upon our experiences but we also examined the record of efforts, particularly beginning with the Sweeney run for the AFL-CIO Presidency, to alter the path of organized labor. Fernando and I took different chapters to focus upon.
What are your hopes for the book? What do you hope it will contribute or achieve politically? Given the effort and aspirations you have for the book, what will you deem to be a success? What would leave you happy about the whole undertaking? What would leave you wondering if it was worth all the time and effort?
We are hoping that the book provokes a wide-ranging discussion and genuine debate concerning the future of the working class both here in the USA and globally. We would be excited if, for instance, the Resolution that was submitted to the AFL-CIO Convention in 2005 (see Appendix A of the book) was discussed within the movement and became an action item that unions, central labor councils, state federations of labor and the national AFL-CIO took up. We would hope that independent organizations, such as the emerging worker centers, would use the book to help think through how they can influence organized labor, but also think through their own strategies toward the birth of a new labor movement in the USA.
In all of this we are up against those who would wish to suppress debate and are more comfortable with sound-bites and rhetoric. Nevertheless, the initial responses we have received have been very positive and insofar as a debate is advanced, we will be very pleased.
Can you tell ZNet, please, what Solidarity Divided is about? What is it trying to communicate?
"Solidarity Divided" is an attempt to provide a framework for activists who, in looking at the US trade union movement, are trying to figure out the origin and nature of the current crisis. It is NOT an attempt to examine every question relative to the development of the US working class, nor is it an exhaustive examination of each reform effort. It is particularly focused on efforts that began around 1995 with the coming to power of the John Sweeney administration in the AFL-CIO.
The book additionally attempts to situate the current crisis within the context of the failures of a certain approach to unionism that is grounded in the thought and practice of Samuel Gompers, later amended with virulent anti-communism.
Can you tell ZNet something about writing the book? Where does the content come from? What went into making the book what it is?
The book is a joint project between me--Bill Fletcher, Jr.--and Fernando Gapasin. Both of us have extensive experience in organized labor, holding various positions, inside and outside the formal structure. Fernando and I tried drawing upon our experiences but we also examined the record of efforts, particularly beginning with the Sweeney run for the AFL-CIO Presidency, to alter the path of organized labor. Fernando and I took different chapters to focus upon.
What are your hopes for the book? What do you hope it will contribute or achieve politically? Given the effort and aspirations you have for the book, what will you deem to be a success? What would leave you happy about the whole undertaking? What would leave you wondering if it was worth all the time and effort?
We are hoping that the book provokes a wide-ranging discussion and genuine debate concerning the future of the working class both here in the USA and globally. We would be excited if, for instance, the Resolution that was submitted to the AFL-CIO Convention in 2005 (see Appendix A of the book) was discussed within the movement and became an action item that unions, central labor councils, state federations of labor and the national AFL-CIO took up. We would hope that independent organizations, such as the emerging worker centers, would use the book to help think through how they can influence organized labor, but also think through their own strategies toward the birth of a new labor movement in the USA.
In all of this we are up against those who would wish to suppress debate and are more comfortable with sound-bites and rhetoric. Nevertheless, the initial responses we have received have been very positive and insofar as a debate is advanced, we will be very pleased.
Currently reading
May 14, 2009A rough review: Good for background history on alot of the recent splits and fissure in the recent labor movement as well as some interesting political analysis. But the book overall has some problematic analysis for anyone who wants to approach the labor movement from a radical perspective. First, while the begining history is good on race and class formation in the US that most labor history tends to side step, his presentation of the history of the labor movement and the left is presented in a way that essentially writes out more radical moments and efforts such as the Haymarket era, the radicalism of the WFM, the IWW. According to him, the history of the labor movement is the history of the AFL-CIO. But I would argue that much of the most interesting history of the labor movement in the US can be found outside of rather than inside the AFL. Next is his perspectives on some of the more recent conflicts, while making a fair effort to present multiple viewpoints, largely reflects Fletchers vantage point as a high level member of the AFL-CIO bureacracy- which is interesting to hear but prevents a more critical perspective. Finally, the solutions he raises to reinvigorate the labor movement, such as revitalizing local labor councils and pointing to the LAMAP effort, seem fairly mild and given numerous examples of the bureacratic, incompetent, conservative, and anti-class struggle charactor that permeates the ALF-CIO, do not seem to present much of an alternative vision for labor.
September 14, 2020
Fletcher and Gapasin do a great thing with this book. Using the 2005 split between the AFL-CIO and what would become the CTW, dividing into two lumbering union federations, the authors present the split as a case study and illustration in the failures of the union movement. Rife with divisions especially since the radical purges during the Red Scare, Fletcher and Gapasin write a critical analysis of a movement that has struggled with race and gender (and by struggled, I mean it’s been a racist and sexist movement for too long), and with the fight between revolutionary ideology/militancy and a conservative unionism partnering with US business interests. I found that the authors stumbled a bit, or at least I disagreed with them, in some of their remedies and conclusions. But the bulk of the book is damn good, going as far as to have an internationalist/anti-US foreign policy take and making the bold claim that unions in the US will die if they don’t change drastically and fast to find true solidarity with all of the working and poor class. Even if the answers they pose to these issues (like unions staying away from forming their own political party in favor of putting pressure on, and pushing candidates through, the corrupt, capitalist, and hegemonic two-party political system in place) are barking up the wrong fucked up tree, they’re barking for the good of the labor movement.
May 31, 2015
This is a fine companion to Moody’s U.S. Labor in Transition and Trouble. Fletcher Jr. and Gapasin trace the labor movement’s decline, especially during the period just preceding and following the split of the movement between the AFL-CIO and the Change to Win Coalition in 2005.
The authors forcefully argue for a framework of values to understand the crisis of the movement and to guide a left-wing way forward. Indeed, they argue that it was precisely the Cold War-era expulsion of leftist unionists that facilitated the move towards conservative business unionism that increased the standard of living for the unionized section of the working class, but at the exclusion of the non-unionzed section of the class. The effect, of course, ultimately weakened both the union and the class as a whole.
They argue that it is not sufficient to organize new members: “Those who advocate organizing new members into existing unions as the solution to the crisis of U.S. labor are essentially refilling a slow-leaking tire” (165). Unions must also build political power.
The authors very neatly lay out the desired political positions (inclusivity, militancy, internationalism) and practices (city-based organizing with allied political blocs, ties with other movement organizations). They also provide an appendix of “case studies” of local unions in order to urge practical considerations for such a vision. Nonetheless, the task overwhelms, and the authors fall short of providing a hopeful plan for moving forward. At its heart, this book argues for a value-based approach to the movement. Fletcher and Gapasin often write in phrases like “we must,” “the movement needs to,” etc. That is, calls for action. The main section of the book lacks an acknowledgement and discussion of the very real tensions that arise between progressive union leaders and more conservative members. How is it that leaders can lead with this framework? Yes, political education of the membership is paramount, but the reader is left without much insight as to how to navigate a socially and politically-fractured membership. Only in the appendices is there such a discussion. Its separation from the main discussion in book prevents it from delivering as strong a message as it could.
The authors forcefully argue for a framework of values to understand the crisis of the movement and to guide a left-wing way forward. Indeed, they argue that it was precisely the Cold War-era expulsion of leftist unionists that facilitated the move towards conservative business unionism that increased the standard of living for the unionized section of the working class, but at the exclusion of the non-unionzed section of the class. The effect, of course, ultimately weakened both the union and the class as a whole.
They argue that it is not sufficient to organize new members: “Those who advocate organizing new members into existing unions as the solution to the crisis of U.S. labor are essentially refilling a slow-leaking tire” (165). Unions must also build political power.
The authors very neatly lay out the desired political positions (inclusivity, militancy, internationalism) and practices (city-based organizing with allied political blocs, ties with other movement organizations). They also provide an appendix of “case studies” of local unions in order to urge practical considerations for such a vision. Nonetheless, the task overwhelms, and the authors fall short of providing a hopeful plan for moving forward. At its heart, this book argues for a value-based approach to the movement. Fletcher and Gapasin often write in phrases like “we must,” “the movement needs to,” etc. That is, calls for action. The main section of the book lacks an acknowledgement and discussion of the very real tensions that arise between progressive union leaders and more conservative members. How is it that leaders can lead with this framework? Yes, political education of the membership is paramount, but the reader is left without much insight as to how to navigate a socially and politically-fractured membership. Only in the appendices is there such a discussion. Its separation from the main discussion in book prevents it from delivering as strong a message as it could.
January 8, 2011
This provides some good detail on organized labor in the U.S. from the twentieth century into the previous decade. Its history is a bit AFL-CIO centered, which is not entirely surprising since one of the authors (Fletcher) worked for the AFL-CIO.
There are surprising exceptions to the above, however. NAFTA does not get as much attention as I would have expected -- this surely merited a chapter of its own, both in how it was marketed to labor and the actual results. There is also little or no mention of efforts to organize workers outside of the NLRA process, such as Starbucks Workers Union shepherded by the IWW.
They make a good argument for what is here called "social justice unionism," openly acknowledging class struggle and organizing not for the benefit of an organization and its members, but for the working class as a whole.
There are surprising exceptions to the above, however. NAFTA does not get as much attention as I would have expected -- this surely merited a chapter of its own, both in how it was marketed to labor and the actual results. There is also little or no mention of efforts to organize workers outside of the NLRA process, such as Starbucks Workers Union shepherded by the IWW.
They make a good argument for what is here called "social justice unionism," openly acknowledging class struggle and organizing not for the benefit of an organization and its members, but for the working class as a whole.
January 19, 2009
a wide-ranging radical view of the labor movement from two
insiders...It has some fascinating details about the recent
split of the AFL-CIO.
Excellent. Hopefully it will provoke a democratic debate within the labor movement.
insiders...It has some fascinating details about the recent
split of the AFL-CIO.
Excellent. Hopefully it will provoke a democratic debate within the labor movement.
February 28, 2009
unfortunately, this is probably the best book out there on the current ideological and pragmatic divisions within labor. the book sometimes presses a little hard on the marxist rhetoric, but it's an important read for anyone who cares about labor and where we're headed ...
March 5, 2009
If you're reading this right now, and you're thinking, "wow, I don't know much about the labor movement in 21st century America," you should pick this one up. It's an odd book at places, but it's well worth reading if you're at all interested in how unions organize and strategize.
August 3, 2008
lots of incite and deep background on split of AFL-CIO and what is really needed instead.
December 12, 2008
A useful and insightful discussion of the recent AFL-CIO split.
October 8, 2009
A wonderful look at unions. Explains a lot about current events in the union to which I belong. Rough times ahead!
June 11, 2011
Read the vast majority of this book for class. A strong critique that included a racial analysis but was still pro-union.
November 29, 2012
Pretty much the go-to text on how promising labor movements get sabotaged and destroyed under the wright of racism, conservatism and more.
March 12, 2025
Useful, especially if you're involved with CLC or state fed work. I don't agree with all of it, and I think the analysis is a bit shallow/lacking in concreteness at points, but a useful response to the bread and butter unionism and its 'just organize workers' outgrowth which even pervades modern progressive labor thinking. Not much has fundamentally changed in the labor movement since then- Change To Win wasn't a real split in any useful sense and the reunification hasn't been very useful or meaningful either.
October 11, 2020
This book had several very valuable ideas and suggestions, but needed a much stronger editor and could have been much stronger as a long essay.
November 7, 2012
thank you, Bill and Fernando.
Rare voice, clear essays that awaken.
Rare voice, clear essays that awaken.
Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews