Tag Archives: Sweden

The Unions’ Life After Death: Recipes for a new labor movement

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“Solidarity means that we stand up for one another and expect something from each other, even if we don’t like the other very much or even understand each other.”

— Frances Tuuloskorpi

Syndicalism is a movement of labor unions that aims for a vision beyond both capitalism and the nation-states. In two previous essays, Rasmus Hästbacka touched on this vision and strategies to reach it. The following essay concludes with recipes for rebuilding the labor movement.

A vision is pointless without strategies to reach it. Strategies are pointless without a movement that can pursue them. At least in Europe and North America, we need to “bring back the movement in the labor movement,” to quote Labor Notes. Continue reading →

(R)evolution in the 21st Century: The case for a syndicalist strategy

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“Those who work in the mills ought to own them, not
have the status of machines ruled by private despots.”

— The Mill Girls of Lowell, 1845

Syndicalism is a movement of labor unions that aims for a vision beyond both capitalism and the nation-states. The syndicalist SAC—Central Organization of Workers in Sweden—neither advocates armed struggle to reach the vision nor revolt through a general strike. So, what do Swedish syndicalists propose? Rasmus Hästbacka addresses this question in the second in a series of three essays.

ASR is presenting this series in the spirit of debate and an exchange of ideas across national borders. We do not agree with every formulation. The SAC’s evolutionary approach is, we believe, unique in the international syndicalist movement. It is certainly possible to fetishize the general strike, transforming it into an idle fantasy that serves as a substitute for the day-to-day struggle in the workplaces for workers’ control and better conditions. But this is to violate the very essence of syndicalism: its emphasis on building revolutionary unions that battle for better conditions today while building the capacity and power to take over the industries and bring them under workers’ self-management. Continue reading →

Another World is Phony? The Case for a Syndicalist Vision

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“Most people live most of their lives within totalitarian institutions. It’s called having a job.”

— Noam Chomsky

Syndicalism is a movement of labor unions that aims for a vision beyond both capitalism and nation-states. But isn’t the nation-state the guarantor of all citizens’ security? What alternatives do syndicalists propose? These issues are addressed by Rasmus Hästbacka in the first in a series of three essays that will be posted to our website.

We are presenting this series in the spirit of debate and an exchange of ideas across national borders. We do not agree with every formulation, and have been quite explicit in our rejection of “participatory economics,” which fails to offer a vision of a free society, is unworkable, and seems to have given no thought as to how their bureaucratic utopia could be brought into being. We also reject the notion expressed below that markets are compatible with syndicalism, or indeed with any vision of social solidarity and emancipation. Continue reading →

Syndicalists shouldn’t have a black-and-white view on organizing

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a response by Rasmus Hästbacka, member of the Umeå Local of SAC

In a previous article I made a distinction between three types of organizations: narrow cadre unions, broad popular movement unions and networks of workplace organizers. I hope that we in Sweden will develop the syndicalist SAC as a popular movement union (or, if one prefers the term: open class organization). Such a union can also build various forms of cross-union cooperation: forums, groups and networks of workplace organizers. Continue reading →

Keeping up with the times: More on syndicalist strategy

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by Gabriel Kuhn, published in ASR 84

Rasmus Hästbacka has written an interesting article titled “Greetings from Sweden: A dual-track syndicalism?” Rasmus cites a few texts that I have written, some of them together with comrades from Sweden and Germany. I interpret Rasmus’s article as an invitation to continue the debate about the future of the SAC and syndicalist unions that find themselves in a similar position. My response reflects my own thoughts and not necessarily those of the comrades I have collaborated with. Continue reading →

Greetings from Sweden: A dual-track syndicalism?

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A slightly condensed version of this article appears in ASR 83 (Summer 2021)

In 2022, the Swedish syndicalist union SAC holds a congress. Some say that SAC is at a crossroads. But what exactly are the choices? In the following essay, Rasmus Hästbacka argues that the choice is between building a popular movement union or a “revolutionary” cadre union. Hästbacka believes in a popular movement that progresses on dual tracks, i.e. a movement that builds both syndicalist sections and cross-union cohesion among workers.

The Swedish labor market has recently been highlighted in Anarcho-Syndicalist Review and on the Counterpunch website. Two articles concern the anti-strike law of 2019 and a new strategy for collective agreements that SAC has developed. Two more general texts on the future of syndicalism have been written by Gabriel Kuhn and Torsten Bewernitz on the Counterpunch website, and by Gabriel and Frederick Batzler in Anarcho-Syndicalist Review (issue #79, 2020). The new collective agreement strategy is being tested (at the time of publication) by warehouse workers at Ingram/Zalando in Stockholm. More such experiments await. Continue reading →

Organizing on the job at Zalando

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from ASR 83 (Summer 2021)

More than 100 workers at Europe’s leading online store for fashion and shoes, Zalando, have turned to the SAC, the Central Organization of Swedish Workers, to battle the “new Swedish model,” which many workers describe as modern slavery. After workers demanded their own union agreement and safety representatives, management announced plans to fire several SAC members. Continue reading →