Organising | STRONGER UNIONS

Grassroots versus Advertising

Grassroots logo Generally the forces that disagree with us have a wealth of monetary resources at their feet. They can pour money into TV ads, into billboards and in reaching the powerful to support their aims and messages. What do we have to compare to change the way people think on our issues?

This question resurfaced while I was watching this article on the Rachel Maddow show. In describing the Republican attack on the rights to abused women who have come to the US via marriage (and whose visas depended on this relationship), she outlines the relationship between the owners of sites that advertise mail order brides (who this law helps) and the groups who are lobbying to repeal the law. Half way through the piece, I began to consider again about the impact that money has on building support for campaigns coupled with a focus on slogans, messages and polling.

Posted on May 17th, 2012 by Becky Wright filed under: Union organising

Becky Wright

Grassroots – building for the long term

Grassroots logo The local elections are over, France and Greece have seen people vote for an alternative and as pundits scramble to analyse and say what it all means, I want to take a step back and consider the role that organising and campaigning plays in building for change.

Campaigning can be tricky. You have a position and you want someone else to agree with you. You try all manner of tactics to press your positions. Send out press releases and hope that there’s space in your local newspaper. The trudge can be relentless and sometimes no end in sight. Sometimes we win, sometimes we don’t. But what happens when the dust has settled and the campaigning is over? What does it really mean to win or lose?

Posted on May 8th, 2012 by Becky Wright filed under: Union news

Becky Wright

Building our Grassroots

It might not be controversial to hear that as an organiser I’m passionate about building grassroots activism. Enabling and empowering people to have a say it what affects them and how they would like to shape the world is a really important part of what we do here at the Organising Academy.

This is why I’m really pleased to be a part of a new venture called Grassroots.

On 26 May in London, trade unions and progressive organisations, who are committed to tackling the big challenges we face right now, will meet to share and hear the most exciting and practical ideas on campaigning, organising and mobilisation.

Posted on March 19th, 2012 by Becky Wright filed under: Union organising

Becky Wright

Communications & Organising

megaphone

I’ve been wanting to blog about the role that communications play in campaigns and organising for quite a while now so it was with great interest I read Mehdi Hasan’s article for the New Statesman where he explores the role of framing in politics.

By and large, the most difficult thing in the campaigns I have been involved in, is communicating what the campaign is trying to achieve to a wider audience. Often I hear complaints that the media is against us and no one want to listen. I can’t give you a silver bullet but I can point to some ways in which you might be more successful in communicating.

Posted on January 19th, 2012 by Becky Wright filed under: Union organising

Becky Wright

VIDEO: What are the challenges for unions?

You may have picked up Carl’s original posting a month or so ago on trade union membership. But, in case you haven’t, here’s our first Organising Academy webinar on those figures and what they mean for unions. Be great to hear your thoughts.

Posted on September 28th, 2011 by Becky Wright filed under: Union futures

Sam Gurney

International labour standards: creating space to organise?

Domestic workers celebrate the passing of Convention 189 on Domestic Workers at the ILO's 100th Session in Geneva in June this year. Photo: © International Labour Organization

Last week, I had to give a presentation to the Solicitors International Human Rights Group (SIHRG), on the topic ‘International Labour Standards: How effective is the current system?’ The main temptation was to simply say ‘not very’ and leave it at that, but the calibre of the audience demanded a rather more structured response.

When it comes to actually establishing international labour standards, the system might not be the Rolls Royce of global governance structures, but it’s definitely in the high end range compared to many of the other areas where we’re crying out for globally agreed standards, such as finance sector regulation or controls on tax evasion and avoidance.

Posted on September 16th, 2011 by Sam Gurney filed under: Rights at work

Carl Roper

Reaching out to the never members

The state of membership in the private sector, as revealed in the latest Trade Union membership statistics released earlier this year demands a new and innovative approach to how unions reach out to the majority of workers who aren’t in a union.

There’s an adage that says unionised sectors of the economy can’t remain islands of decent pay and conditions in a sea of declining standards. If we wanted proof that this is true then we need only look at the way in which the paucity of decent occupational pension schemes in the overwhelmingly non-unionised private sector has been used to undermine public service pension provision.

The scale of this challenge is significant. Density in the private sector is now just 14% – barely 1 in 7 private sector workers now belong to a union. Unions are present in less than a third of private sector workplaces and less than one fifth of private sector employees are covered by collective agreements. Since 2000 density in the private sector has fallen by 3.7% and membership by 840,000. And since the late 90s the number of workers who have never been members of a union has steady increased. Now, over half of all employees have never been in a union and in the private sector, three fifths of employees have never held a union card.

Posted on September 9th, 2011 by Carl Roper filed under: Union organising