However, these conditions were contributing, not decisive factors. Decisive was that union leadership pursued a defensive strategy based on a politics rooted in the activity of the UAW and AFL-CIO hierarchy and the Democratic Party. Concern for winning support of press and city council politicians was thought to be key to putting pressure on NYU that would translate into holding up their building permits and re-zoning plans. The belief that NYU management would act to protect its liberal New York reputation was to seriously ignore the trend in the city toward Wall Street Robber Baron politics that is evident everywhere. Even the corporatist role of unions in New York political culture is declining.

What is a Union?

About 600 hundred teaching assistants, joined by several hundred supporters, showed up for the first day of picket lines. Pickets were strong for the first three weeks of the strike, but fundamental problems with the union and the strike would severely undermine its effectiveness. When the inevitable deadline to return to work or be fired came from management, severe dissension within the ranks of the union already existed. When the deadline passed the majority of striking TAs were back to work. Although the strike continued, its public presence disappeared and was a job action in name only.

Union members were left to ask why the strike failed. They had a realistic sense that management were determined to destroy the union. There was also a widespread sense that the leadership of the strike was poor and eventually there were attempts by sections of the membership to correct its course, which brought them in a head-on collision with union leadership. These efforts had a lot against them. A combination of having a poor understanding of labor history and the political role of the university, and the need to organize an independent basis for rank-and-file power, seriously undermined the attempt to bring together a membership rebellion at the height of a strike. A combination of the fatal weakness of business unionism and the lack of preparation by union members created a situation where the strike collapsed from within.

The UAW and AFL-CIO bosses, along with the leftwing of the Democratic Party, saw an opportunity for what they thought could be an easy political win. The UAW, following its strategy in more recent years in organizing teaching assistants and museum workers, saw a way to boost its membership dues and win an apparently easy political victory at a time when it is being run out of its main industry by the state and auto companies. New York City Council people came to rallies and president Sexton’s “town hall meetings” and gave fine speeches. National figures like Jesse Jackson, as he often does, along with progressive intellectuals made appearances and signed petitions. All spoke to the importance of the union and against the “corporate” university advocated by NYU management. Local 2110’s public relations campaign was in full swing among the progressive sectors of the state, union bureaucracy and academia.

However, union members outside of the leadership and staff were largely absent from organizing. This had to do with the fact that after the union was recognized in 2002 there was a demobilizing of the membership. There was no continuity of struggle maintained and on the job and on campus action was discouraged through loyalty to the legal machinery of the contract. Meanwhile, there was no public organizing in the spring of 2005 in anticipation of management’s refusal to negotiate. Even in the two months leading up to the strike, union leadership discouraged political agitation and advocacy for the union. GSOC committee meetings were not advertised for membership and a mass meeting was never called until late in the strike whose significance will be detailed later.

Being a union member did not promote a political understanding of the function of the university, labor history, or job action strategy. To organize to do so would be to come up against the union leadership. The merely symbolic strategy of the strike was based on false political principles and analysis. Union leadership hoped to carry out symbolic actions while appealing to student’s sense of fairness by putting forward economic demands alone. In one large lecture, a union representative came to speak to the undergraduate students and explained that the union was important because a living wage and some benefits helped TAs be better customer service representatives for them.

Meanwhile, the union hoped its main strategic maneuver would be to organize a coalition of city and state politicians to put pressure on NYU building permits and zoning in a time when management is aggressively building and buying property. Leadership encouraged a broken up strike based on narrow trade lines instead of reaching out across all sectors of the university aiming to shut down as much of the place as possible. Instead, a mere statement of support from the AFSCME local and the adjunct union was solicited. Faculty for Democracy, a preexisting group of a couple of hundred faculty who are battling against the continuing centralization of academic decision-making power in the hands of the President and Deans, were asked for rhetorical support and to lobby the administration. An undergraduate support group was formed by the union and made its first public appearances only just before the strike commenced.

No preparation was made the year before and early in the Fall semester to build toward a student strike. Faculty were not asked to cancel classes and effectively carry out a walk out. The AFSCME local negotiated a new contract in late October. There was no attempt to prepare the strike at this time and encourage a support strike. There was no perspective a the mass strike to shut down the whole university around a platform of grievances that addressed the concerns and problems of all these sectors. Most undecided and even sympathetic undergraduates were not clear about the issues before the strike and unconsciously absorbed the management’s political perspective.

TAs felt increasing pressure as this largely symbolic strike was waited out by management. As many rhetorically supportive faculty began to break ranks when grades became due and their own workloads were effected by the strike, this pressure came from more than just management. Many faculty had already moved to attack TAs in many departments by assigning work to TAs who crossed picket lines. They threatened to cut off access to fellowships. Some supportive faculty turned and threatened to scab TA labor if they didn’t return to work. Demoralization and the lack of independent organization prevented TAs from fighting back. For this reason direct action solidarity could not be effectively carried out against these derelicts.

The lack of autonomous organization became very apparent during the first and only mass meeting and at two subsequent GSOC leadership committee meetings. Union leaders called a mass meeting for the first time when the deadline to return to work was announced by the administration. Earlier desires to call a mass meeting before the strike were discouraged. Leaders wanted to use the meeting to browbeat members into the belief that the strike would be won and grumblings about strategy were unfounded. The couple hundred or more members who showed up to the meeting began to use it as a forum to attack the leadership and put forward alternative programs. Leadership informed the assembly that the hall was rented for only 1 hour and when that time was up they proceeded to shut down discussion, demand an immediate vote on whether to continue with the strike, and then kick everyone out. Supposedly, after many TAs left the meeting in disgust without voting, the vote was to continue the strike.

Two subsequent GSOC committee meetings turned into other attempts by members to save the strike and chart a new strategy, but it was clear after those meetings that the rebellion that was brewing had neither the organization nor a common program with which to address the weaknesses of the strike. The necessary organizing work had not been done to anticipate these problems, challenge the leadership, and chart an independent course. Towards the end, however, it was understood that the UAW held the financial keys and a bloody civil war within the local at such a time would have doomed the strike anyway.

Learning from the history of workplace group and rank-and-file solidarity organization and tactics was essential for winning the strike. Understanding the development of the role of unions under capitalism and the struggle over what a union is and who should control it is vital.

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