First Published: Workers Viewpoint, Vol. 5, No. 21, June 16, 1980.
Transcription, Editing and Markup: Paul Saba
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GRIEVANCES–Every union worker hears this word a lot. Every problem you have, the union says, “grieve it,” and that’s the last you hear until another problem comes around.
Every steward, including communists, is even more familiar with this word. Even those who have dedicated their lives to revolution find themselves getting lost in the swamp of grievances and trade unionist politics. Stewards and union officials ground down by trade unionist politics find themselves standing under the waterfall of never-ending grievances. After a while your skin stings with every drop–this is how many union activists who start out loving their fellow workers, turn into their opposite, ending up hating the workers, crossing the street to avoid them because they have come to mean just another grievance, more paperwork. Trade unionist politics makes you just try to keep from drowning in the waterfall– but you have to understand its coming from the lake–and the lake is the capitalist system.
Briefly, the grievance procedure is the legal procedure worked out between the company and the union to handle workers’ demands day to day. It is part of the collective bargaining process. Most grievance procedures consist of three formal steps. The first is discussion on the lowest level, the second a written complaint and the third is a hearing at the highest level of company management. A few grievances lost in the third step will go to court arbitration, with the workers losing most cases. This way workers almost hopelessly get lost in the red tape and further delay.
In the early days of trade unions in the U.S. (late 1800’s), unions had no “gentlemanly” cooperative means to deal with companies. They would simply withhold their labor until the workers got what they demanded. But thanks to bourgeois democracy, this became coopted into “collective bargaining,” and confrontation became replaced with compromises. Now the grievance procedure is very elaborate, part of the developed superstructure in the U.S. today. Along with the National Labor Relations Board, Dept. of Labor, the EEOC (Equal Employment Opportunity Commission), and the courts, the grievance procedure is part of the whole array of capitalist institutions the worker can go to with his demands. This is a very well-developed layer of buffers between the workers and the capitalists. It is a feature that makes the system of rule in advanced capitalist countries more flexible, enabling the system to sponge up mass discontent, as long as there is no clear leadership.
Handling grievances should be just one small part of communist organizing in the trade unions. The grievance procedure is just a delay mechanism. For example, in one hospital a housekeeping worker and leading fighter was fired on a trumped-up charge. All the Latin workers were ready right there to walk off the job for him. But the union official said from his office, “To hell with their problems, we’re busy. We can go to arbitration.” One and a half years later, the case was lost in arbitration, long after the mass sentiment had cooled down.
We say, don’t go through the grievance procedure! Solve the grievance right there on the line. Then the bourgeoisie won’t push problems on us as much, and there will be less grievances. When they know we have lost political scope, and we try to grieve every little problem (in the interest of being conscientious), they will just provoke more little disturbances, knowing we will react to every one, and this way they use the trade unionists.
Trade unionism means being a social worker. The boss exploits and the union takes care of the social consequences. Trade unionism is like a steam valve to make the conditions more bearable so the boss can continue to exploit workers more.
Every time a worker comes to us with a problem or a grievance, we have to first and foremost present the communist view. We also have to tell the workers that they have to fight for themselves. Marx said, “the proletariat must emancipate themselves.” If they don’t fight, get ready to stop the line to solve the grievance, or be willing to defend us when we get baited, then there’s nothing we can do for them. We are not out to reform capitalism.
For example, in an auto plant a worker got something in his eye and the foreman wouldn’t let him leave the line. He wanted his committeeman (who is a communist) to write up the foreman. But the committeeman explained. “What good would a grievance do? By the time I do that the damage to your eye would be done. Safety conditions are going to become an even bigger nightmare in the 80’s, and one grievance after another won’t get to the root of the problem–only overthrowing capitalism will. You have to walk off the line and I’ll back you up and fight for the other workers to back you up. If you don’t walk off I can’t do anything for you. The company wants me to go on filing grievances forever to keep me busy so they can just keep on exploiting the workers. ”
There may be some grievances you should take up. One, if the bulk of the workers believe management’s going to do something about the grievance even after you’ve presented the Party’s line, you may go through it to show how they’re not and why it should be fought out right there. Two, some grievances you push through because it plays on, sharpens up contradictions among the management (between different supervisors, etc.). So this can strengthen the workers’ hand overall. The masses must emancipate themselves, and most little things and grievances the workers should take care of themselves, although many workers may at first see you, their steward, like a lawyer/client or social worker/client relationship. Some grievances should never be taken up–one, if it can be directly resolved right there; two, often grievances are from one worker against another, and even if you win the individual grievance it generally disunites the body of workers overall (unless it’s right-on people’s justice against a scab or company spy): three, union organizers and business agents are often bombarded with grievances from workers all over. Generally that means there is no fighting steward system, and that has to come first. Otherwise you are compounding the illusion that one person can solve all the little problems. First of all, all capitalism’s little problems cannot be solved; secondly, you have nothing without organization. There has to be, besides clear communist leadership, a steward system of workers who are daring to lead. Without that one person can do very little. You should aid the workers in building this steward system, but it has to be there as part of building the fighting capacity of the workers.
There is a difference between grievance procedure and the steward system. Some “super-stewards” do a lot of grievances themselves–the epitome of the social worker trade unionist. But communist organizing in the trade unions means first and foremost 1) Presenting a clear political direction including the political perspective on grievances; 2) the situation of dealing with everyday fights must be organizationally resolved with a steward system under clear leadership. The line behind this is the task of communists to train a core of working class leaders who are bold, clear and able to lead.