Victory at Smithfield

Panel Introduction

Although it is now less common for the national guard to battle workers than it was at the turn of the 20^th Century, management still goes to great lengths to ensure that workers never bargain collectively. Their methods are less militant, but still effective. One example is creating anti-union astroturf campaigns. This is when a company will artificially amplify anti-union voices in the workplace through advertisements or websites to give others the appearance that unionization is unpopular. Management will also call mandatory meetings with employees where they can intimidate and proselytize to a captive audience. Companies will also temporarily improve wages or working conditions in an attempt to convince workers that they don’t need a union to achieve a better workplace. Of course, without a union, these improvements can be revoked just as easily as they were implemented.

Corporations will also use less conventional means to make things difficult for union organizers. During the campaign to organize the Amazon warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama, management convinced the local government to modify the timing of the stoplight outside the warehouse. Organizers had been distributing literature to workers stopped at the light, so Amazon pressured the local government to ensure that they would have less time to do that.

Although they are less visible now, union-busting agencies like the Pinkertons still exist, and are frequently called upon when a corporation feels threatened by a union movement. For these and other reasons, like outdated federal labor laws, it is still very difficult for workers to organize. However, it is not impossible, as the workers of Smithfield Foods demonstrate.