SEAC and the Labor Movement

By Mike Pesa

In November 1999, the streets of Seattle were filled with the spirit of change, as activists from hundreds of diverse causes and movements united to shut down the World Trade Organization (WTO). The American people had finally woken up to join the rest of the world in a global challenge to the global financial institutions and multinational corporations that were wreaking havoc on the Earth and its people. The emerging wave of corporate globalization did not discriminate: workers’ rights, environmental protection, indigenous rights, product safety, and just about everything else that we depend on was being swept away in a massive worldwide “race to the bottom”. The powers that be vowed to remove every last barrier to profit, no matter what the human cost. It was the forces of greed vs. the forces of life. Against this backdrop, alliances were made that would have seemed impossible just a few years earlier. Union workers marched side by side with environmentalists against a common enemy. A now famous slogan captured the spirit of the new movement that was being born: “Teamsters and Turtles Together At Last!”

Four years later, the drive for profit continues to terrorize workers and the environment in the U.S. and around the world. Yet workers and environmentalists continue to distrust each other, often failing to see their common interests. Workers frequently see environmentalists as a threat to their job while environmentalists frequently see workers as destroyers of the environment. Workers may also be reluctant to support environmentalists because they (often correctly) view them as part of a privileged elite that doesn’t have to face the same obstacles in life. This rift threatens to defeat both the student/youth environmental movement and the labor movement.

As a student environmentalist who cares deeply about workers rights, I decided in 2003 to do something to help bridge the communication gap. I applied and was accepted to the fall semester of New York City Union Semester, an internship program that places students from across the country with various NYC labor unions for four months and also includes classes on US Labor History, Contemporary Labor Issues, and NYC Culture and Politics. Due to some complications, I did not have much choice over which union I was to intern with. I was placed with the New York City District Council of Carpenters, an affiliate of the conservative, top-down, United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America (UBC). The Carpenters—like most unions in the building trades—have historically been wary of students, progressives, and environmentalists. In fact, I was the first student intern the NYC Carpenters had ever had. Although initially uncomfortable and a little disappointed with my placement, I decided to make the best of my situation by learning all that I could and hopefully teaching a few things as well. In retrospect I was actually quite privileged to witness the inside workings of such a closed organization, and I learned much more about unions and their problems than I would have if I had interned with a more “progressive”, student-friendly union.[1]

While in New York, I spent a lot of time studying labor history. This country has a rich and fascinating history of workers’ struggles that is usually ignored by mainstream historians. Particularly of interest to me was the history of alliances between environmentalists and workers. Many readers may be familiar with the story of Judi Bari, the Earth First!er and Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) member who helped organize timber workers who had been exposed to PCB-contaminated water and forged bonds with formerly hostile timber workers by renouncing tree spiking in favor of new direct action tactics that did not harm workers. Some of these workers became involved in the Redwood Summer campaign to protect old growth forests or otherwise contributed to the environmental movement.

Other, more permanent, “blue-green alliances” also exist, like the Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment (ASJE), a group that fights for workers rights and the environment while building new eco-social jobs and institutions that work for both. However, groups like ASJE are few and far between. It’s time for young environmentalists to reach out to workers and workers organizations on every level.

In this twisted system, workers are often forced to work for corporations that destroy forests, demolish mountains, or fill the air and water with poison. Most workers would prefer to have a job that allows them to do meaningful work to make the world a better place, but their options are often limited. When workers display open hostility toward environmentalists it is often the result of a deliberate misinformation campaign designed by dirty corporations and their politician and media lackeys—and sometimes the bureaucratic leaders of unions themselves.

But workers aren’t stupid. When activists offer to fight together against a common enemy, workers will respond. Sustainability is in the interest of workers. When a forest is destroyed or a mountaintop is blown to oblivion, the jobs involved also disappear forever. But we can’t expect workers to join the environmental movement en masse until we support their struggles and demonstrate that we’re more than a bunch of spoiled middle-class hippies who see workers as just another threat to the environment. We can’t afford to sit back and wait for people to come to us for solidarity. We in the youth environmental movement have a momentous struggle ahead of us, and we won’t succeed by ourselves.

Many environmental organizations limit their activism to narrow campaigns that most people will never recognize as relevant to their lives. If SEAC wants to be different, we must begin reaching out to the labor movement (which is to say the workers themselves, not necessarily the self-absorbed bureaucrats at the higher echelons of unions) and we must do it soon. If you are interested in making this vision a reality, contact me at mpesa@kent.edu