Organising Model - Resurgence in America

Resurgence in America

In the mid 1980s, the SEIU union found itself in a state of crisis. Dwindling membership threatened to finish it off entirely. A period of intense internal discussion gave rise to the view that a radical program was needed to rebuild the union, and make it relevant to current and potential members. The Justice for Janitors campaign was launched as the organizational spearhead of this realization; beginning in Denver, Colorado in 1985. Working along the lines described above, the SEIU experienced a huge growth in membership, and a significant number of high-profile public victories for workers. (Though some proportion of the SEIU's membership growth has resulted from mergers, such as with 1199). In 1988, an AFL-CIO organised teleconference of trade unionists recognised the potential of the nascent organising model, gave it its name, and resolved to spread it throughout the trade-union movement: this was an element in the model's popularisation. The success of Justice for Janitors did not go unnoticed and other unions in America have increasingly used its tactics. In 1995, former SEIU President John Sweeney was elected president of the AFL-CIO on the New Voice slate, on a platform of spreading the organising model across the members of the federation. The extent of the success of this is disputed, with some suggesting that more rhetoric has changed than anything, but it did have at least some effect. The SEIU is currently the largest private-sector union in America, trailing only the public-sector NEA in active membership, and has received numerous plaudits for its victories. It should be noted that the tactics and strategies of the SEIU and Justice for Janitors go beyond the organising model which is, as has been described, an approach to local level organising and campaigning. It applies to a drive for recruitment of members and leaders on the level of a firm or city. Other aspects of the SEIU's strategies are national or international. For instance, the drive to gain industry-wide coverage across a large geographical base - i.e. to organise janitors not only within one building, but across a whole city, state and eventually all across the USA - or the advocacy of union mergers.