"Unions are from Mars..." by Pancho Arguelles - cont.

 

“I don’t think that is right,” she adds, “but I think that is labor’s culture, so when we play with labor, we play by those rules. I think that it should be one of the main goals for us to organize, educate and be able to mobilize the community.”

 

A younger organizer, who is newer to the immigrant rights movement, reflected on how things can get better: “I think that in the last 18 months we have learned how unions work, and I think we are smarter now on how to relate to labor. We need to build our power and we need to prove that we have power. Here’s a thought: labor is strong in bigger cities like Chicago and in places like California. But they are not strong and haven’t built a massive membership in parts of the Midwest and the South. So if we, as community groups, build immigrant bases in those emerging areas, we can prove to them that it is to their advantage to relate to us. I think that is the way we need to think - not that we participated in this postcard campaign and then they screwed us. We knew in the beginning we would get screwed in the end. I mean, even I knew that. We just need to be smarter at the beginning and be able to negotiate the relationship better... and you can only do that with power... and with a base.”

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