John Womack Jr. is the Robert Woods Bliss Professor of Latin
American History and Economics, emeritus, at Harvard University. He
served as chairman of the Department of History, 1982-85, and
acting chairman, 1991-92. Born and raised in Norman, Oklahoma, he
first joined a union, the International Laborers and Hod Carriers,
while in high school, earning a union wage in summer construction
work. He held his card until he graduated from college and went to
work at The Louisville Times--then into graduate studies and later
into academic work.
Peter Olney is a retired Director of Organizing for the
International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU). He was
Associate Director of the University of California's Institute for
Labor and Employment (ILE). Olney holds a Master's in Business
Administration from UCLA. He resides in San Francisco, California.
Olney teaches building trades union organizers as a member of the
faculty of the Building Trades Academy at Michigan State
University. Olney is an editor of The Stansbury Forum
(stansburyforum.com).
Glenn Perusek conducts strategic research for organizing and
contract campaigns and is a member of the faculty of the Building
Trades Academy at Michigan State University. He directed the Center
for Strategic Research at the national AFL-CIO; worked in strategic
research and campaigns at the IBEW and the International
Brotherhood of Teamsters. His work includes Tragedy and Necessity:
From Sarajevo to the Berlin Wall; Shifting Terrain; Depth of Field;
and Trade Union Politics: American Unions and Economic Change.
Glenn earned a BA summa cum laude from Kent State University, where
he was Mona Fletcher Award winner. He holds a PhD from the
University of Chicago, where he was Merriam Fellow and winner of
the Baker Prize, a research competition in the social sciences.
Glenn was a journeyman member of the Chicago Typographical Union.
"In Our Revolution we shout, ''When we Organize, We Win," but
organize who and win what? Labor Power and Strategy is a great
collection of Womack and 10 organizers debating strategic workplace
organizing vs associational or more general organizing at
workplaces or in communities. Womack, in a long initial interview
and in the conclusion, argues that without organizing workplace
chokepoints, we are left with the spontaneous movements that come
and go. Several of the 10 organizers essentially argue that the
spontaneous can become conscious and long lasting. Grab the book
and take up the debate."
--Larry Cohen, board chair Our Revolution, past president,
Communications Workers of America
"In this fascinating and insightful dialogue, the distinguished
historian John Womack and a set of veteran labor activists probe
the most fundamental of questions: How do we organize the 21
century working-class and give it the power to transform world
capitalism? Are workers with vital skills and strategic leverage
the key to a labor resurgence, or should organizers wager upon a
mobilization of working people whose relationship to the economy's
commanding heights is more diffuse? Or can we arrive at some
dialectical symbiosis? Whatever the answer, this is the kind of
constructively radical conversation essential to the rebirth of
working-class power in our time."
--Nelson Lichtenstein, historian and author of Capitalism
Contested: The New Deal and Its Legacies
"Put this unique collection of strategic insights into the hands of
the new generation of militants excited about revitalizing the US
labor movement and 'working-class power' might once again become
something other than an abstract slogan in this country. Couldn't
be more timely."
--Max Elbaum, editor at Convergence Magazine and author of
Revolution in the Air: Sixties Radicals Turn to Lenin, Mao and
Che"Labor Power and Strategy is essential reading for activists
and organizers seeking to understand how in a constantly changing
world
of work workers can marshal power.
--Elaine Bernard, former executive director Labor and Worklife
Program at Harvard Law School"The
comprehensive campaigns model is essential to labor's efforts
to
rebuild power. This book, focusing on workers' positional power
in
production and distribution, explores a key element of such an
overall
approach."
--Kate Bronfenbrenner, director of Labor Education Research
and a senior lecturer at Cornell University's School of Industrial
and
Labor Relations"Womack's focus upon the essential ingredients
of
effective and strategic organizing resonates today, as elements in
labor
now attempt to bestir themselves in the midst of unrelenting
decline.
His view that workers must seek forward movement through their
own
initiatives, independent of law, political process and formal
machinery
represents an important clarion call, rooted in the practical
historical
experience of more than a century. Womack's instructive views
and
observation warrant careful attention."
--William B. Gould IV, author of For Labor to Build Upon: Wars,
Depression and Pandemic
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