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202-523: In 2016, under the name National High School Students' Union - Syndical and Democratic, the group was fully integrated into the High School Students' Union. They called for a statutory congress to amend the UNL's statutes. After the refusal by the leadership, members of the national team and some federations organized this congress themselves. By majority vote, a new national team was elected, and

404-540: A 2 + 1 ⁄ 2 -ton granite monument when completed in 2024. A pardon request had been delivered to Washington Governor Inslee requesting posthumous pardons for the eight IWW members who were convicted. IWW quickly recovered from the setbacks of 1919 and 1920, with membership peaking in 1923 (58,300 estimated by dues paid per capita, though membership was likely somewhat higher as the union tolerated delinquent members). But recurring internal debates, especially between those who sought either to centralize or decentralize

606-480: A Catholic priest and IWW leader, "dropping pieces of paper into a hole in a box never did achieve emancipation for the working class, and to my thinking it will never achieve it." Syndicalist trade unions declared their political neutrality and autonomy from political parties. Syndicalists reasoned that political parties grouped people according to their political views, uniting members of different classes, while unions were to be purely working-class organizations, uniting

808-476: A bastion of radicalism since 1905, against what they saw as the rule of a small number of bureaucrats. Anarchists hailed the rebellion as the start of the third revolution. The government reacted by having anarchists throughout the country arrested, including a number of syndicalist leaders. The Russian syndicalist movement was thereby defeated. Syndicalists in the West who had opposed World War I reacted gushingly to

1010-671: A black fellow worker against a racist insult, an IWW organizer in Louisiana insisted that "he is a man, a union man, an IWW—a MAN! ... and he has proven it by his action." During World War I, one of the IWW's anti-war slogans was "Don't Be a Soldier! Be a Man!" In some cases, syndicalist attitudes towards women changed. In 1901, the CGT's agricultural union in southern France was hostile to women; by 1909, this had changed. The CNT, initially hostile to independent women's organizations, worked closely with

1212-462: A broader audience. Sorel presented himself as the premier theorist of syndicalism and was frequently thought of as such but was not a part of the movement, and his influence on syndicalism was insignificant, except in Italy and Poland. The extent to which syndicalist positions reflected merely the views of leaders and to what extent those positions were shared by syndicalist organizations' rank-and-file

1414-618: A celebrity, and he was in demand as a speaker for the WFM. His increasingly radical speeches became more at odds with the WFM, and in April 1908, the WFM announced that the union had ended Haywood's role as a union representative. Haywood left the WFM and devoted all his time to organizing for the IWW. Historian Vernon H. Jensen has asserted that the IWW had a "rule or ruin" policy, under which it attempted to wreck local unions which it could not control. From 1908 to 1921, Jensen and others have written,

1616-466: A general strike, which continued after FORA IX reached a settlement. Vigilantes, supported by business and the military, attacked unions and militants. In all, between 100 and 700 people died in what became known as the Tragic Week . Nevertheless, strikes continued to increase and both FORA V and IX grew. The United States underwent an increase in labor militancy during the post-war period. 1919 saw

1818-527: A growing numbers of casualties at the front eroded the enthusiasm and patriotism the outbreak of war had aroused. Prices were on the rise, food was scarce, and it became increasingly clear that the war would not be short. In Germany, food shortages led to demonstrations and riots in a number of cities in the summer of 1916. At the same time, anti-war demonstrations started. Strikes picked up from around 1916 or 1917 on across Europe and soldiers began to mutiny . Workers distrusted their socialist leaders who had joined

2020-651: A journal mainly for miners in Charleroi , Belgium, urged its readers to follow "the example of our confederated friends of France". The IWW's newspapers published articles on French syndicalism, particularly the tactic of sabotage and the CGT's La Vie Ouvrière carried articles about Britain's labor movement by the British syndicalist Tom Mann . Migration played a key role in spreading syndicalist ideas. The Argentine Regional Workers' Federation ( Federación Obrera Regional Argentina , FORA), openly anarchist by 1905,

2222-445: A labor dispute. In 1908, Vincent St. John tried to organize a stealth takeover of the WFM. He wrote to WFM organizer Albert Ryan, encouraging him to find reliable IWW sympathizers at each WFM local, and have them appointed delegates to the annual convention by pretending to share whatever opinions of that local needed to become a delegate. Once at the convention, they could vote in a pro-IWW slate. St. Vincent promised: "once we can control

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2424-544: A lockout, vowing to remain shut until they had broken the power of the IWW. The lockout prompted a split within the Goldfield workforce, between conservative and radical union members. Leaders of the Western Federation of Miners such as Bill Haywood and Vincent St. John were instrumental in forming the IWW, and the WFM affiliated with the new union organization shortly after the IWW was formed. The WFM became

2626-400: A low profile and GEB member Frank Little championing continued agitation, Ralph Chaplin brokered a compromise agreement. A statement was issued that denounced the war, but IWW members were advised to channel their opposition through the legal mechanisms of conscription. They were advised to register for the draft, marking their claims for exemption "IWW, opposed to war." During World War I,

2828-539: A more restrictive definition of syndicalism based on five criteria: This definition excludes the IWW and the Canadian One Big Union (OBU), which sought to unite all workers in one general organization. Peterson proposes the broader category revolutionary industrial unionism to encompass syndicalism, groups like the IWW and the OBU, and others. Revolutionary industrial unionism, part of syndicalism in

3030-476: A number of labor disputes. Finally, van der Linden and Thorpe point to spatial and geographical factors that shaped the rise of syndicalism. Workers who would otherwise not have had an inclination to syndicalism joined because syndicalism was dominant in their locales. For example, workers in the Canadian and American West were generally more radical and drawn to the IWW and One Big Union than their counterparts in

3232-593: A number of organizations or currents within the labor movement that did not identify as syndicalist . They apply the label to one big unionists or industrial unionists in North America and Australia, Larkinists (named after the Irish ITGWU leader James Larkin ) in Ireland, and groups that identify as revolutionary industrialists, revolutionary unionists, anarcho-syndicalists , or councilists. This includes

3434-601: A political influence on the Swedish labor movement's left, that in 1910 formed the Syndicalist union SAC which soon contained a minority seeking to mimick the tactics and strategies of the IWW. The few own the many because they possess the means of livelihood of all ... The country is governed for the richest, for the corporations, the bankers, the land speculators, and for the exploiters of labor. The majority of mankind are working people. So long as their fair demands –

3636-429: A rather limited practical struggle against World War I, they also looked to challenge the war on an ideological or cultural level. They pointed to the horrors of war and spurned efforts to legitimate it as something noble. German syndicalists drew attention to the death, injury, destruction, and misery that the war wrought. German, Swedish, Dutch, and Spanish syndicalists denounced nationalism with Tierra y Libertad ,

3838-434: A result of hundreds of arrests, ultimately forcing public officials to rescind such laws. Sabotage ranged from slow or inefficient work to destruction of machinery and physical violence. French railway and postal workers cut telegraph and signal lines during strikes in 1909 and 1910. The final step towards revolution according to syndicalists would be a general strike. According to Griffuelhes, it would be "the curtain drop on

4040-654: A revolutionary wave, inspired in part by Russia, swept Europe in the following years. In Germany, strikes and protests against food shortage, mainly by women, escalated and by 1917 had eroded public confidence in the government. The abdication of Wilhelm II in November 1918 after the Kiel mutiny by sailors sparked an insurrectionary movement throughout the country that led to the German Revolution of 1918–19 . The syndicalist FVdG, which had just 6,000 members before

4242-524: A series of riots as miners dissatisfied with the Western Federation of Miners local at Butte formed a new union, and demanded that all miners join the new union, or be subject to beatings or worse. Although the new rival union had no affiliation with the IWW, it was widely seen as IWW-inspired. The leadership of the new union contained many who were members of the IWW or agreed with the IWW's methods and objectives. The new union failed to supplant

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4444-658: A series of successful strikes in 1913 in Mexico City and central Mexico. After the Constitutionalist Army occupied the capital in 1914, syndicalists allied with the government it established to defeat rural forces such as the Zapatistas and therefore received government support. Once those forces had been suppressed, this alliance broke apart and the Casa campaigned for workers' control of factories and

4646-510: A syndicalist journal in Barcelona, calling it a "grotesque mentality". The Dutch newspaper De Arbeid criticized nationalism, because "it finds its embodiment in the state and is the denial of class antagonism between the haves and the have-nots". German and Spanish syndicalists went further still by putting into question the concept of nationhood itself and dismissing it as a mere social construct. The Germans observed that most inhabitants of

4848-468: A tired old scene of several centuries, and the curtain raising on another". Syndicalists remained vague about the society they envisioned to replace capitalism, stating that it was impossible to foresee in detail. Labor unions were seen as being the embryo of a new society in addition to being the means of struggle within the old. Syndicalists generally agreed that in a free society production would be managed by workers. The state apparatus would be replaced by

5050-628: A variety of trades and industries. At their peak in August 1917, IWW membership was estimated at more than 150,000, with active wings in the United States , the United Kingdom , Canada , Australia and New Zealand . However, the extremely high rate of IWW membership turnover during this era (estimated at 133% between 1905 and 1915) makes it difficult for historians to state membership totals with any certainty, as workers tended to join

5252-594: A viable strategy because the general strike became a practical possibility. Although it had been advocated before, there were not sufficient numbers of wage workers to bring society to a standstill and they had not achieved a sufficient degree of organization and solidarity until the 1890s, according van der Linden and Thorpe. Several general or political strikes then took place before World War I: in 1893 and in 1902 in Belgium, in 1902 and in 1909 in Sweden, in 1903 in

5454-506: Is a general union, subdivided between the various industries which employ its members. The philosophy and tactics of the IWW are described as "revolutionary industrial unionism", with ties to socialist , syndicalist , and anarchist labor movements. In the 1910s and early 1920s, the IWW achieved many of its short-term goals, particularly in the American West , and cut across traditional guild and union lines to organize workers in

5656-490: Is a matter of dispute. Commenting on French syndicalism, the historian Peter Stearns concludes that most workers did not identify with syndicalism's long-range goals, and that syndicalist hegemony accounts for the relatively slow growth of the French labor movement as a whole. He says that workers who joined the syndicalist movement were on the whole indifferent to doctrinal questions, their membership in syndicalist organizations

5858-583: Is but one bargain that the Industrial Workers of the World will make with the employing class – complete surrender of the means of production." The Argentine Regional Workers' Federation ( Federación Obrera Regional Argentina , FORA) and the OBU accepted such deals, and others began accepting them eventually. Similarly, syndicalist unions did not work to build large strike funds, for fear that they would create bureaucracy separate from

6060-416: Is justified to group together such a wide range of organizations because their similar modes of action or practice outweigh their ideological differences. Others, such as Larry Peterson and Erik Olssen , disagree with this broad definition. According to Olssen, this understanding has a "tendency to blur the distinctions between industrial unionism, syndicalism, and revolutionary socialism ". Peterson gives

6262-564: Is known for the Wobbly Shop model of workplace democracy , through which workers elect their own managers and other forms of grassroots democracy ( self-management ) are implemented. The IWW does not require its members to work in a represented workplace, nor does it exclude membership in another labor union. The first meeting to plan the IWW was held in Chicago in 1904. The seven attendees were Clarence Smith and Thomas J. Hagerty of

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6464-624: The 1917–1919 Brazil strike movement and cycle of labor struggles. It included a general strike in 1917, a failed uprising in 1918 inspired by the Russian Revolution, and a number of smaller strikes. The movement was put down by increased organization by employers to resist workers' demands and by government repression, including the closure of unions, arrests, deportations of foreign militants, and violence, with some 200 workers killed in São Paulo alone. In Argentina, FORA had split into

6666-858: The American Labor Union , George Estes and W. L. Hall of the United Brotherhood of Railway Employees , Isaac Cowan of the U.S. branch of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers , William E. Trautmann of the United Brewery Workmen and Julian E. Bagley WW1 veteran and author. Eugene Debs , formerly of the American Railway Union , and Charles O. Sherman of the United Metal Workers were involved but did not attend

6868-770: The Dublin Lockout . After Larkin left Ireland in 1914, James Connolly took over leadership of the union. Because of the organization's weakness, Connolly allied it along with its paramilitary force, the Irish Citizen Army , with the Irish Republican Brotherhood . Together, they instigated the Easter Rising , seeking to weaken the British Empire and hoping that the insurrection would spread throughout Europe. The uprising

7070-846: The Free Workers' Union of Germany (FAUD), and the Argentine Regional Workers' Federation (FORA). Although they did not regard themselves as syndicalists, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) (nicknamed "Wobblies") in the United States, the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union (ITGWU), and the Canadian One Big Union (OBU) are considered by most historians to belong to this current. The International Workers' Association – Asociación Internacional de los Trabajadores (IWA–AIT), which

7272-805: The French Section of the Workers' International in the struggle against the Three-Year Law of 1913 , which extended conscription. During the Spanish Civil War , the CNT, whose policy barred anyone who had been a candidate for political office or had participated in political endeavors from representing it, was intimately connected with the Iberian Anarchist Federation ( Federación Anarquista Ibérica , FAI). In

7474-428: The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) in the United States, which claimed its industrial unionism was "a higher type of revolutionary labor organization than that proposed by the syndicalists". Van der Linden and Thorpe use syndicalism to refer to "all revolutionary, direct-actionist organizations". Darlington proposes that syndicalism be defined as "revolutionary trade unionism". He and van der Linden argue that it

7676-577: The LOPMI law. Syndicalism Syndicalism is a revolutionary current within the labour movement that, through industrial unionism , seeks to unionize workers according to industry and advance their demands through strikes and other forms of direct action , with the eventual goal of gaining control over the means of production and the economy at large through social ownership . Syndicalist unions first emerged in Spain and North America in

7878-635: The Russian Provisional Government . Immediately, anarchist groups emerged. Russian syndicalists organized around the journal Golos Truda ( The Voice of Labor ), which had a circulation of around 25,000, and the Union of Anarcho-Syndicalist Propaganda. Anarchists found themselves agreeing with the Bolsheviks led by Lenin, who returned to Russia in April, as both sought to bring down the provisional government. Lenin abandoned

8080-526: The Seattle general strike , large miners' strikes, the Boston police strike , and the nationwide steel strike of 1919 . The IWW had been nearly destroyed in the previous two years by local criminal syndicalism laws, the federal government, and vigilante violence. It attempted to take credit for some of the strikes, although in reality it was too weak to play a significant role. The First Red Scare intensified

8282-720: The Tulsa Outrage , a group of black-robed Knights of Liberty tarred and feathered seventeen members of the IWW in Oklahoma. The attack was cited as revenge for the Green Corn Rebellion , a preemptive attack caused by fear of an impending attack on the oil fields and as punishment for not supporting the war effort. The IWW members had been turned over to the Knights of Liberty by local authorities after they were beaten, arrested at their headquarters and convicted of

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8484-405: The anarcho-communist FORA V and the syndicalist FORA IX. While FORA V called for a futile general strike in 1915, FORA IX was more careful. It called off general strikes it had planned in 1917 and 1918. In January 1919, five workers were by the authorities during a strike led by a union with tenuous links to FORA V. At the funeral, police killed another 39 workers. Both FORA organizations called for

8686-471: The anti-authoritarian wing of the early International Workingmen's Association (IWA), the first international socialist organization formed in 1864. Its most successful early leader, Russian anarchist Mikhail Bakunin , came to believe that worker organizations should consider using force to advance their cause, when necessary. He and his followers advocated the general strike, rejected electoral politics, and anticipated workers' organizations replacing rule by

8888-598: The class struggle in the minds of many workers, as these parties were thought to be overly concerned with building the parties themselves and with electoral politics than with the class struggle, and had therefore lost their original revolutionary edge. The socialists preached the inevitability of socialism but were in practice bureaucratic and reformist. Similarly, the trade unions frequently allied with those parties, equally growing in numbers, were denounced for their expanding bureaucracies, their centralization, and for failing to represent workers' interests. Between 1902 and 1913,

9090-519: The nationalization of foreign capital. It contributed to a rise in labor unrest that began in mid-1915. It led general strikes in May and in July–August 1916 in greater Mexico City. The latter was quelled by the army, marking the defeat of the Casa , which was also suppressed. In Portugal, the 5 October 1910 revolution that led to the deposition of the king was followed by a strike wave throughout

9292-414: The theory of historical trajectory , which represented the idea that capitalism is a necessary stage on Russia's path to communism, dismissed the establishment of a parliament in favor of that power being taken by soviets , and called for the abolition of the police, the army, the bureaucracy, and finally the state – all sentiments syndicalists shared. Although the syndicalists also welcomed

9494-708: The 1870s, before rising to prominence in France and later emerging on other continents. Syndicalist movements were most predominant amongst the socialist movement during the interwar period that preceded the outbreak of World War II . Major syndicalist organizations included the General Confederation of Labor (CGT) in France, the Confederacion Nacional del Trabajo (CNT) in Spain, the Italian Syndicalist Union (USI),

9696-452: The 1915 Zimmerwald conference . They faced considerable difficulties putting up meaningful resistance against the war. The government called up militants to the Army, including Monatte, who considered refusing the order and being summarily executed; he decided this would be futile. Syndicalist organizations in other countries nearly unanimously opposed the war. In neutral Spain, José Negre of

9898-479: The 1960s were organizing efforts among students in San Francisco and Berkeley, which were hotbeds of student radicalism at the time. This targeting of students resulted in a Bay Area branch of the union with over a hundred members in 1964, almost as many as the union's total membership in 1961. Wobblies old and new united for one more " free speech fight ": Berkeley's Free Speech Movement . Riding on this high,

10100-548: The 66-member Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee , which included four anarchists, among them the syndicalist Shatov. On 25 October, this committee led the October Revolution ; after taking control of the Winter Palace and key points in the capital with little resistance, it proclaimed a Soviet government. Anarchists were jubilant at the toppling of the provisional government. They were concerned about

10302-606: The AFL not only had failed to effectively organize the U.S. working class , but it was causing separation rather than unity within groups of workers by organizing according to narrow craft principles. The Wobblies believed that all workers should organize as a class, a philosophy that is still reflected in the Preamble to the current IWW Constitution: The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of

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10504-699: The AFL's acceptance of capitalism and its refusal to include unskilled workers in craft unions. The convention had taken place on June 27, 1905, and was referred to as the "Industrial Congress" or the "Industrial Union Convention". It was later known as the First Annual Convention of the IWW. The IWW's founders included William D. ("Big Bill") Haywood , James Connolly , Daniel De Leon , Eugene V. Debs , Thomas Hagerty , Lucy Parsons , Mary Harris "Mother" Jones , Frank Bohn , William Trautmann , Vincent Saint John , Ralph Chaplin , and many others. The IWW aimed to promote worker solidarity in

10706-479: The Australian syndicalist movement were influenced by them, as well as older socialist notions. According to Darlington, anarchism, Marxism, and revolutionary trade unionism equally contributed to syndicalism, in addition to various influences in specific countries, including Blanquism , anti-clericalism , republicanism , and agrarian radicalism . Bill Haywood , an American syndicalist and leading figure in

10908-545: The CNT declared: "Let Germany win, let France win, it is all the same to the workers." The CNT insisted that syndicalists could support neither side in an imperialist conflict. A wave of pro-British sentiment swept Ireland during the war, although the ITGWU and the rest of the Irish labor movement opposed it, and half of the ITGWU's membership enlisted in the British military. The ITGWU had also been significantly weakened in 1913 in

11110-399: The Chicago labor movement of the 1880s. They were involved in the nationwide struggle for an eight-hour day . On 3 May 1886, the police killed three striking workers at a demonstration in Chicago. Seven policemen and four workers were killed the following day when someone, possibly a police member, threw a bomb into the crowd. Four anarchists were eventually executed for allegedly conspiring to

11312-618: The Communist Party and its subsidiary organizations." After the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1946 by Congress, which called for the removal of Communist union leadership, the IWW experienced a loss of membership as differences of opinion occurred over how to respond to the challenge. In 1949, US Attorney General Tom C. Clark placed the IWW on the Attorney General's List of Subversive Organizations in

11514-633: The East, so we believed, the sun of freedom rose." The Spanish CNT declared: "Bolshevism is the name, but the idea is that of all revolutions: economic freedom. ... Bolshevism is the new life for which we struggle, it is freedom, harmony, justice, it is the life that we want and will enforce in the world." Borghi recalled: "We exulted in its victories. We trembled at its risks. ... We made a symbol and an altar of its name, its dead, its living and its heroes." He called on Italians to "do as they did in Russia". Indeed,

11716-400: The East. Similarly, southern workers were more drawn to syndicalism in Italy. According to Altena, the emergence of syndicalism must be analyzed at the level of local communities. Only differences in local social and economic structures explain why some towns had a strong syndicalist presence, while others did not. Syndicalism was not informed by theory or a systematically elaborated ideology

11918-730: The FCPE (Parents' Federation). According to Antonin Nouvian, MNL’s General Secretary, the goal was to "maintain pressure until the government reconsiders its position". In 2023, the MNL joined the social movement against President Emmanuel Macron ’s pension reform. The MNL called for high school blockades and urged students to join citywide protests during the national strike days. On March 23, nearly 400 high schools across France were blocked. The MNL also used these protest days to reiterate its opposition to Parcoursup , mandatory national service ( SNU ), and

12120-424: The FVdG, although industrial unionists, whose influence was dwindling, were also involved. Rudolf Rocker , an anarchist recently returned to Germany after spending several years in London, wrote the FAUD's program. Class struggle peaked in Italy in the years 1919–1920, which became known as the biennio rosso or red biennium. Throughout this wave of labor radicalism, syndicalists, along with anarchists, formed

12322-437: The French General Confederation of Labor ( Confédération générale du travail , CGT) came to use the term to describe its brand of unionism. Revolutionary syndicalism , or more commonly syndicalism with the revolutionary implied, was then adapted to a number of languages by unionists following the French model. Many scholars, including Ralph Darlington , Marcel van der Linden , and Wayne Thorpe, apply syndicalism to

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12524-417: The French president's call for national unity by agreeing to a no-strike pledge and to resolve labor disputes through arbitration and by actively participating in the French war effort. Most of its members of military age were conscripted without resistance and its ranks shrank from 350,000 in 1913 to 49,000 dues-paying members in 1915. CGT leaders defended this course by arguing that France's war against Germany

12726-419: The French radicals worked within existing unions to infuse them with their revolutionary spirit. Some found existing unions entirely unsuitable and built federations of their own, a strategy known as dual unionism . American syndicalists formed the IWW, although William Z. Foster later abandoned the IWW after a trip to France and set up the Syndicalist League of North America (SLNA), which sought to radicalize

12928-437: The German Free Trade Unions ' membership grew by 350% but its bureaucracy by more than 1900%. Another common explanation for the rise of syndicalism is that it was a result of the economic backwardness of the countries in which it emerged, particularly France. Newer studies have questioned this account. According to van der Linden and Thorpe, changes in labor processes contributed to the radicalization of workers and thereby to

13130-406: The German Empire identified not as Germans but in regional terms as Prussians or Bavarians and the like. Multilingual countries like Germany and Spain also could not claim a common language as a defining characteristic of the nation nor did members of the same nation share the same values or experiences, syndicalists in Spain and Germany argued. Syndicalists also argued against the notion that the war

13332-425: The Great Labour Unrest, including the 1911 Liverpool general transport strike where he chaired the strike committee. In Ireland, Larkin and the ITGWU led 20,000 during the 1913 Dublin lockout . After the ITGWU attempted to unionize the Dublin United Tramway Company and tram workers went on strike, the city's employers threatened to fire any workers who did not sign a pledge to not support the ITGWU, thereby turning

13534-438: The IWW attempted to win power in WFM locals which had once formed the federation's backbone. When it could not do so, IWW agitators undermined WFM locals, which caused the national union to shed nearly half its membership. The Western Federation of Miners left the IWW in 1907, but the IWW wanted the WFM back. The WFM had made up about a third of the IWW membership, and the western miners were tough union men, and good allies in

13736-437: The IWW in large numbers for relatively short periods ( e.g. , during labor strikes and periods of generalized economic distress). Membership declined dramatically in the late 1910s and 1920s. There were conflicts with other labor groups, particularly the American Federation of Labor (AFL), which regarded the IWW as too radical, while the IWW regarded the AFL as too conservative and opposed their decision to divide workers on

13938-401: The IWW maintained its anti-war stance, while its bitter rival, the AFL, supported the war; however, it did not launch an anti-war campaign, as it feared the government would crush it if it did, and wanted to focus on its economic struggles. The IWW's practical opposition to the war was limited, 95% of eligible IWW members registered for the draft, and most of those drafted served. Syndicalists in

14140-438: The IWW never fully recovered. During the 1950s, the IWW faced near-extinction due to persecution under the Second Red Scare , although the union would later experience a resurgence in the context of the New Left in the 1960s and 1970s. The IWW promotes the concept of " One Big Union ", and contends that all workers should be united as a social class to supplant capitalism and wage labor with industrial democracy . It

14342-402: The IWW's "mining section". Many in the rank and file of the WFM were uncomfortable with the open radicalism of the IWW and wanted the WFM to maintain its independence. Schisms between the WFM and IWW had emerged at the annual IWW convention in 1906, when a majority of WFM delegates walked out. When WFM executives Bill Haywood, George Pettibone , and Charles Moyer were accused of complicity in

14544-499: The IWW's general secretary-treasurer Bill Haywood became determined that the organization should adopt a low profile in order to avoid perceived threats to its existence. The printing of anti-war stickers was discontinued, stockpiles of existing anti-war documents were put into storage, and anti-war propagandizing ceased as official union policy. After much debate on the General Executive Board, with Haywood advocating

14746-510: The IWW, defined the union's purpose at the First Convention of the Industrial Workers of the World as "the emancipation of the working class from the slave bondage of capitalism". Syndicalists held that society was divided into two great classes, the working class and the bourgeoisie. Their interests being irreconcilable, they must be in a constant state of class struggle . Tom Mann , a British syndicalist, declared that "the object of

14948-778: The International Confederation of Labour (ICL–CIT), which was formed in 2018. The word syndicalism has French origins. In French, a syndicat is a trade union, usually a local union. A syndicate is a self organizing group working towards a shared interest. The corresponding words in Spanish and Portuguese, sindicato , and Italian, sindacato , are similar. By extension, the French syndicalisme refers to trade unionism in general. The concept of syndicalisme révolutionnaire or revolutionary syndicalism emerged in French socialist journals in 1903, and

15150-590: The MMWIU. Despite its brief affiliation with the Congress of Industrial Organizations, it was raided by the AFL and CIO and defunct by the late 1950s, less than ten years after separating from the IWW. The loss of the MMWIU, at the time the IWW's largest industrial union, was almost a deathblow to the IWW. The union's membership fell to its lowest level in the 1950s during the Second Red Scare , and by 1955,

15352-566: The MNL obtained 17% of the vote in the same elections, ranking third among high school student unions. In 2017, the UNL-SD opposed a reform of the Baccalauréat , particularly criticizing inequalities it believed were introduced by continuous assessment and the loss of anonymity during exams. The union also opposed the creation of Parcoursup , criticizing the platform's selective algorithm, its lack of ranking for applicants' preferences, and

15554-653: The Mexican border. Nearly 5000 miners worked in Bisbee's mines. On June 27, 1917, Bisbee's miners went on strike. The strike was effective and non-violent. Demands included the doubling of pay for surface workers, most of them recent immigrants from Mexico, as well as changes in working conditions to make the mines safer. The six-hour day was raised agitationally but held in abeyance. In the early hours of July 12, hundreds of armed vigilantes rounded up nearly two thousand strikers, of whom 1186 were deported in cattle cars and dumped in

15756-526: The Netherlands and Sweden, both neutral countries, criticized the truce socialists entered with their governments in order to shore up national defense. The Dutch NAS disowned Cornelissen, one of its founders, for his support for the war. Syndicalists from Spain, Portugal, Great Britain, France, Brazil, Argentina, Italy, and Cuba met at an anti-war congress in El Ferrol , Spain, in April 1915. Although

15958-633: The Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Spain, Italy, and France, while Belgian syndicalists were in the process of forming one. There were also groups advocating syndicalism in Russia, Japan, the United States, Portugal, Norway, Denmark, Hungary, and Great Britain. Outside of North America, the IWW also had organizations in Australia, New Zealand, where it was part of the Federation of Labour (FOL), Great Britain even though its membership had imploded by 1913, and South Africa. In Ireland, syndicalism took

16160-527: The Netherlands, Poland, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. Discussions were contentious and did not lead to the founding of a syndicalist international. Delegates did agree on a declaration of principles describing syndicalism's core tenets. They also decided to launch an International Syndicalist Information Bureau and to hold another congress in Amsterdam. This congress did not take place due to

16362-494: The Netherlands, and in 1904 in Italy, in addition to significant work stoppages during the Russian Revolution of 1905 . Darlington cites the significance of the conscious intervention by syndicalist militants. The industrial unrest of the period created conditions which made workers receptive to syndicalist leaders' agitation. They spread their ideas through pamphlets and newspapers and had considerable influence in

16564-411: The OBU advocated values of "radical manhood". Francis Shor argues that the "IWW promotion of sabotage represents a kind of masculine posturing which directly challenged the individualizing techniques of power mobilized by industrial capitalism". Thus, "the IWW's masculine identity incorporated features of working-class solidarity and protest ... through 'virile' syndicalism." For example, while defending

16766-526: The Russian Revolution. Although they were still coming to grips with the evolving Bolshevik ideology and despite traditional anarchist suspicions of Marxism, they saw in Russia a revolution that had taken place against parliamentary politics and under the influence of workers' councils. At this point, they also had only limited knowledge of the reality in Russia. Augustin Souchy , a German anarcho-syndicalist, hailed it "the great passion that swept us all along. In

16968-661: The Southwest, and became a large and powerful longshoremen's union in Philadelphia. Resisting IWW domination in the gold mining boom town of Goldfield, Nevada was the AFL-affiliated Carpenters Union. In March 1907, the IWW demanded that the mines deny employment to AFL Carpenters, which led mine owners to challenge the IWW. The mine owners banded together and pledged not to employ any IWW members. The mine and business owners of Goldfield staged

17170-613: The Spanish CNT had visited France. Alceste de Ambris and Armando Borghi  [ it ] , both leaders in Italy's USI, were in Paris for a few months from 1910 to 1911. French influence also spread through publications. Pouget's pamphlets could be read in Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, English, German, and Swedish translations. Journals and newspapers in a number of countries advocated syndicalism. For example, L'Action directe ,

17372-409: The U.S. government moved strongly against the IWW. On September 5, 1917, U.S. Department of Justice agents made simultaneous raids on dozens of IWW meeting halls across the country. Minutes books, correspondence, mailing lists, and publications were seized, with the U.S. Department of Justice removing five tons of material from the IWW's General Office in Chicago alone. Based in large measure on

17574-585: The UMWA members to peacefully pass through the IWW picket lines. In November 1916, the 10th convention of the IWW authorized an organizing drive in the Arizona copper mines. Copper was a vital war commodity, so mines were working day and night. During the first months of 1917, thousands joined the Metal Mine Workers' Union #800. The focus of the organizing drive was Bisbee, Arizona , a small town near

17776-555: The UMWA too reactionary, because the United Mine Workers negotiated contracts with the mine owners for fixed time periods; the IWW considered that contracts hindered their revolutionary goals. In what a contemporary writer pointed out was a complete reversal of their usual policy, UMWA officials called for police to protect United Mine Workers members who wished to cross the picket lines. The Pennsylvania State Police arrived in force, prevented picket line violence, and allowed

17978-838: The United States, the IWW was involved in at least 150 strikes including the Goldfield, Nevada, labor troubles of 1906–1907 by miners' strikes, the Pressed Steel Car strike of 1909 , the 1912 Lawrence textile strike , the Brotherhood of Timber Workers ' strikes in Louisiana and Arkansas in 1912–1913, and the 1913 Paterson silk strike . The most prominent was the struggle in Lawrence. Wobblie leaders brought together 23,000 mostly immigrant workers, many of whom did not speak English. They arranged for workers' children to be sent to live with sympathetic families outside of Lawrence for

18180-518: The WFM, and the ongoing fight between the two resulted in the copper mines of Butte, longtime union strongholds for the WFM, becoming open shops, and the mine owners recognized no union from 1914 until 1934. The IWW clashed with the United Mine Workers union in April 1916, when the IWW picketed the anthracite mines around Scranton, Pennsylvania, intending, by persuasion or force, to keep UMWA members from going to work. The IWW considered

18382-438: The achievement of immediate improvements, such as the reduction of working hours, the increase of wages, etc. But this task is only one aspect of the work of syndicalism; it prepares for complete emancipation, which can be realised only by expropriating the capitalist class." For unions to fulfill this role, it was necessary to prevent bureaucrats – "whose sole purpose in life seems to be apologising for and defending

18584-659: The anarcho-syndicalist theorist Rudolf Rocker , there were syndicalist tendencies in Britain's labor movement as early as the 1830s. Syndicalism's direct roots were in Pierre Joseph Proudhon 's mutualism , a form of socialism that focused on cooperation among the community of man. He coined capitalist to describe the political class granting itself monopolies on the use of capital, and wanted workers to oppose this state control through peaceful means, only using force defensively. Proudhon's ideas were popular in

18786-671: The attacks on the IWW; by the end of 1919, the IWW was practically powerless. 1919 also saw the Canadian labour revolt , leading to the formation of One Big Union, which was only partly industrial unionist. The Bolsheviks suppressed syndicalism in Russia but courted syndicalists abroad as part of their international strategy. In March 1919, the 1st Congress of the Comintern was held in Moscow. The Bolsheviks acknowledged syndicalism's opposition to socialist reformism and saw them as part of

18988-540: The basis of their trades. Membership also declined due to government crackdowns on radical , anarchist , and socialist groups during the First Red Scare after World War I . In Canada, the IWW was outlawed by the federal government by an Order in Council on September 24, 1918. Likely the most decisive factor in the decline in IWW membership and influence was a 1924 schism in the organization, from which

19190-488: The beginning of the 1949 Smith Act trials , FBI director J. Edgar Hoover was disappointed when prosecutors indicted fewer CPUSA members than he had hoped, and—recalling the arrests and convictions of over one hundred IWW leaders in 1917—complained to the Justice Department, stating, "the IWW as a subversive menace was crushed and has never revived. Similar action at this time would have been as effective against

19392-510: The broader sense, originated with the IWW in the United States and then caught on in other countries. In a number of countries, certain syndicalist practices and ideas predate the coining of the term in France or the founding of the IWW. In Bert Altena's view, a number of movements in Europe can be called syndicalist, even before 1900. According to the English social historian E. P. Thompson and

19594-438: The capitalist system of exploitation", according to Larkin – from inhibiting workers' militant zeal. Battling bureaucracy and reformism within the labor movement was a major theme for syndicalists. One expression of this was many syndicalists' rejection of collective bargaining agreements , which were thought to force labor peace upon workers and break their solidarity. The Wobblie Vincent St. John declared: "There

19796-644: The case in Italy and much of the Anglophone world, including Ireland where anarchists had no significant influence on syndicalism. The extent to which syndicalist doctrine was a product of anarchism is debated. The anarchist Iain McKay argues that syndicalism is but a new name for ideas and tactics developed by Bakunin and the anarchist wing of the First International, while it is wholly inconsistent with positions Marx and Engels took. According to him,

19998-522: The category of "organizations seeking to change the government by unconstitutional means" under Executive Order 9835 , which offered no means of appeal, and which excluded all IWW members from Federal employment and federally subsidized housing programs (this order was revoked by Executive Order 10450 in 1953). At this time, the Cleveland local of the Metal and Machinery Workers Industrial Union (MMWIU)

20200-535: The congress was poorly planned and prohibited by the Spanish authorities, delegates managed to discuss resistance to the war and extending international cooperation between syndicalist groups. Argentine, Brazilian, Spanish, and Portuguese delegates later met in October in Rio de Janeiro to continue discussions and resolved to deepen cooperation between South American syndicalists. While syndicalists were only able to put up

20402-503: The country. After the police occupied the offices of an agricultural union, syndicalists called for a general strike. During the strike, Lisbon was controlled by workers and there were armed uprisings in several other cities. In 1912, the strike wave ebbed off. Italian syndicalists successfully organized agricultural workers in the Po Valley by uniting different parts of agricultural working class. They were most successful in areas where

20604-546: The course of events in Russia. In France, the CGT's radical minority that had opposed the war enthusiastically supported Bolshevism. They formed the Revolutionary Syndicalist Committees and attempted to push the CGT as a whole to support the Comintern. The General Executive Board of the IWW decided join the Comintern, although this decision was never confirmed by a convention. German and Swedish syndicalists were more critical of Bolshevism from

20806-584: The crime of vagrancy. Five other men who testified in defense of the Wobblies were also fined by the court and subjected to the same torture and humiliations at the hands of the Knights of Liberty. In 1919, an Armistice Day parade by the American Legion in Centralia, Washington , turned into a fight between legionnaires and IWW members in which four legionnaires were shot. Which side initiated

21008-667: The decision in 1967 to allow college and university students to join the Education Workers Industrial Union (IU 620) as full members spurred campaigns in 1968 at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee , and the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. The IWW sent representatives to Students for a Democratic Society conventions in 1967, 1968, and 1969, and as

21210-704: The deep South and the Pacific Northwest of the United States and Canada, between 1917 and 1924. The IWW lumber strike of 1917 led to the eight-hour day and vastly improved working conditions in the Pacific Northwest. Though mid-century historians credited the US Government and "forward thinking lumber magnates" for agreeing to such reforms, an IWW strike forced these concessions. Where the IWW did win strikes, such as in Lawrence, they often found it hard to hold onto their gains. The IWW of 1912 disdained collective bargaining agreements and preached instead

21412-585: The desert of New Mexico. In the following days, hundreds more were ordered to leave. The strike was broken at gunpoint. Between 1915 and 1917, the IWW's Agricultural Workers Organization (AWO) organized more than a hundred thousand migratory farm workers throughout the Midwest and western United States. Building on the success of the AWO, the IWW's Lumber Workers Industrial Union (LWIU) used similar tactics to organize lumberjacks and other timber workers, both in

21614-603: The dispute into a city-wide conflict in late September. Workers' resistance crumbled in January 1914. There was no international syndicalist organization prior to World War I. In 1907, CGT activists presented the Charter of Amiens and syndicalism to an international audience a higher form of anarchism at the International Anarchist Congress of Amsterdam in 1907. Discussions at the Congress led to

21816-498: The documents seized September 5, one hundred and sixty-six IWW leaders were indicted by a Federal Grand Jury in Chicago for conspiring to hinder the draft, encourage desertion, and intimidate others in connection with labor disputes, under the new Espionage Act. One hundred and one went on trial en masse before Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis in 1918. Their lawyer was George Vanderveer of Seattle. In 1917, during an incident known as

22018-411: The drastic reduction in the number of choices available to students. In response to these reforms, the UNL-SD initiated its first protest on January 15, 2018, the day Parcoursup was launched. In early 2019, following Greta Thunberg 's visit to France to denounce political inaction on climate change, the MNL, along with other high school and student organizations like the UNL and UNEF , participated in

22220-579: The duration of the strike so their parents could focus on the struggle. Unlike most IWW-led strikes, the struggle was successful. In Mexico, syndicalism first emerged in 1906 during the violent Cananea strike by miners and the even more violent Río Blanco strike by textile workers. In 1912, during the Mexican Revolution of 1910–1920, anarchists formed the syndicalist union House of the World Worker ( Casa del Obrero Mundial ). It led

22422-690: The dynamics of the capitalist system, and aimed to overthrow that system. According to van der Linden and Thorpe, workers' radicalization manifested itself in their rejection of the dominant strategies in the labor movement, which was led by reformist trade unions and socialist parties. Vladimir Lenin posited that "revolutionary syndicalism in many countries was a direct and inevitable result of opportunism, reformism and parliamentary cretinism." A feeling that ideological disputes were draining workers' power led Dutch, French, and American syndicalist organizations to declare themselves independent of any political groups. In countries like Italy, Spain, and Ireland, which

22624-693: The economy, and syndicalization of industry. The Russian Civil War against the White Army split anarchists. The syndicalists were criticized harshly because most supported the Bolshevik regime in the war even as they excoriated Bolshevik policy. They reasoned that a White victory would be worse and that the Whites had to be defeated before a third revolution could topple the Bolsheviks. Despite this, syndicalists were harassed and repeatedly arrested by

22826-401: The entire class, and could therefore not be divided on political grounds. The French syndicalist Pouget explained: "The CGT embraces – outside of all the schools of politics – all workers cognisant of the struggle to be waged for the elimination of wage-slavery and the employer class." In practice, this neutrality was more ambiguous. For example, the CGT worked with

23028-508: The established American Federation of Labor (AFL). In Ireland, the ITGWU broke away from a more moderate, and British-based, union. In Italy and Spain , syndicalists initially worked within the established union confederations before breaking away and forming USI and the CNT respectively. In Norway, there were both the Norwegian Trade Union Opposition ( Norske Fagopposition , NFO), syndicalists working within

23230-446: The events. The Haymarket Affair , as these events became known, led anarchists and labor organizers, including syndicalists, in both the United States and Europe to re-evaluate the revolutionary meaning of the general strike. According to Émile Pouget , a French anarchist and CGT leader, from "the United States, the idea of the general strike – fertilized by the blood of anarchists hanged in Chicago ... –

23432-452: The fact that many Marxists embraced syndicalism merely indicates that they abandoned Marx's views and converted to Bakunin's. Altena too views syndicalism as part of the broader anarchist movement but concedes there was a tension between this and the fact that it was also a labor movement. He also sees Marxist ideas reflected in the movement, as leading syndicalists, such as Ferdinand Domela Nieuwenhuis and Christiaan Cornelissen , and much of

23634-662: The factories and order to the economy in December by putting the economy under state control. At the First All Russian Congress of Trade Unions in January, the syndicalists, who had paid little attention to the unions, only had 6 delegates, while the Bolsheviks had 273. No longer depending on their help in toppling the provisional government, the Bolsheviks were now in a position to ignore the syndicalists' opposition and outvoted them at this congress. They opted to disempower local committees by subordinating them to

23836-582: The factory committees as the true form of syndicalist organization, not unions. Because they were better organized, the Bolsheviks were able to gain more traction in the committees, with six times as many delegates in a typical factory. Despite the goals they had in common, syndicalists became anxious about the Bolsheviks' growing influence, especially after they won majorities in the Petrograd and Moscow soviets in September. The Petrograd Soviet established

24038-459: The form of the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union (ITGWU), which espoused a mix of industrial unionism and socialist Irish republicanism , and was labeled Larkinism. There was a significant uptick in workers' radicalism in most developed capitalist states from 1911 to 1922, although it relented during World War I. Strikes increased in frequency, numbers of workers involved, and duration. According to van der Linden and Thorpe, syndicalism

24240-678: The formation of the international syndicalist journal Bulletin international du mouvement syndicaliste . The CGT was affiliated with the International Secretariat of National Trade Union Centers (ISNTUC), which brought together reformist socialist unions. Both the Dutch NAS and the British ISEL attempted to remedy the lack of a syndicalist counterpart to ISNTUC in 1913, simultaneously publishing calls for an international syndicalist congress in 1913. The CGT rejected

24442-641: The former could not be overthrown by changes to the latter. Nevertheless, a number of leading syndicalist figures worked in political parties and some ran for elected office. Larkin was active in the Labour Party , while Haywood was part of the Socialist Party of America . Both of them saw the economic sphere as the primary arena for revolutionary struggle, and involvement in politics could at best be an echo of industrial struggle. They were skeptical of parliamentary politics. According to Thomas Hagerty ,

24644-499: The goal of uniting all French workers. In 1905, the Industrial Workers of the World were formed in the United States by the Western Federation of Miners , the American Labor Union , and a broad coalition of socialists, anarchists, and labor unionists. Its base was mostly in the Western United States, where labor conflicts were most violent and workers therefore radicalized. Although the Wobblies insisted their union

24846-509: The immigrant IWW membership. "Conceivably, the number of Finns belonging to the I.W.W. was somewhere between five and ten thousand." The Finnish-language newspaper of the IWW, Industrialisti , published in Duluth, Minnesota , a center of the mining industry, was the union's only daily paper. At its peak, it ran 10,000 copies per issue. Another Finnish-language Wobbly publication was the monthly Tie Vapauteen ("Road to Freedom"). Also of note

25048-438: The interest of the working class upheld only by an organization formed in such a way that all its members in any one industry, or in all industries if necessary, cease work whenever a strike or lockout is on in any department thereof, thus making an injury to one an injury to all. Instead of the conservative motto, "A fair day's wage for a fair day's work," we must inscribe on our banner the revolutionary watchword, "Abolition of

25250-579: The invitation. Its leaders feared that leaving ISNTUC, which it intended to revolutionize from within, would split the CGT and harm working-class unity. The IWW also did not participate, as it considered itself an international in its own right. The First International Syndicalist Congress was held in London from 27 September to 2 October. It was attended by 38 delegates from 65 organizations in Argentina, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Cuba, France, Germany, Italy,

25452-411: The labor movement and broader push of social justice was that, when founded, it was the only American union to welcome all workers, including women, immigrants, African Americans and Asians, into the same organization. Many of its early members were immigrants, and some, such as Carlo Tresca , Joe Hill and Elizabeth Gurley Flynn , rose to prominence in the leadership. Finns formed a sizable portion of

25654-505: The libertarian feminist organization Mujeres Libres during the Spanish Civil War. According to the historian Sharif Gemie, the male orientation of parts of the syndicalist labor movement reflected the ideas of the anarchist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon , who defended patriarchy because women, of their own accord, are "chained to nature". Syndicalists were involved in a number of strikes, labor disputes, and other struggles. In

25856-599: The lines of the IWW with some support from the American organization but also with links to the left wing of the Communist Party of Germany . In December 1919, the Free Workers' Union of Germany (Syndicalists) ( Freie Arbeiter-Union Deutschlands (Syndikalisten) , FAUD) was formed, claiming to represent over 110,000 workers, more than eighteen times the FVdG's pre-war membership. Most of the new organization came from

26058-861: The mainstream Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions ( Landsorganisasjonen i Norge in Norwegian, LO), and the Norwegian Syndicalist Federation ( Norsk Syndikalistik Federation in Norwegian, NSF), an independent syndicalist organization set up by the Swedish SAC. There was a similar conflict between the Industrial Syndicalist Education League and the Industrial Workers of Great Britain . By 1914, there were syndicalist national labor confederations in Peru, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico,

26260-567: The meeting. The IWW was officially founded in Chicago, Illinois in June 1905. A convention was held of 200 socialists , anarchists , Marxists (primarily members of the Socialist Party of America and Socialist Labor Party of America ), and radical trade unionists from all over the United States (mainly the Western Federation of Miners ) who strongly opposed the policies of the American Federation of Labor (AFL). The IWW opposed

26462-501: The most consistently revolutionary faction on the left as socialists sought to rein in workers and prevent unrest. The Italian syndicalist movement had split during the war, as the syndicalist supporters of Italian intervention left USI. The interventionists, led by Alceste de Ambris and Edmondo Rossoni, formed the Italian Union of Labor  [ it ] ( Unione Italiana del Lavoro , UIL) in 1918. The UIL's national syndicalism emphasized workers' love of labor, self-sacrifice, and

26664-433: The murder of former Idaho governor Frank Steunenberg , the IWW used the case to raise funds and support and paid for the legal defense. Even the not guilty verdicts worked against the IWW, because the IWW was deprived of martyrs, and at the same time, a large portion of the public remained convinced of the guilt of the accused. Bill Haywood for a time remained a member of both organizations. His murder trial had made Haywood

26866-414: The nation rather than anti-capitalist class struggle. Both USI and the UIL grew significantly during the biennio rosso . The first factory occupation of the biennio was carried out by the UIL at a steel plant in Dalmine in February 1919, before the military put an end to it. In July, a strike movement spread through Italy, culminating in a general strike on 20 July. While USI supported it and

27068-672: The need for constant struggle against the boss on the shop floor. It proved difficult to maintain that sort of revolutionary enthusiasm against employers. In Lawrence, the IWW lost nearly all of its membership in the years after the strike, as the employers wore down their employees' resistance and eliminated many of the strongest union supporters. In 1938, the IWW voted to allow contracts with employers. The IWW's efforts were met with "unparalleled" resistance from Federal, state and local governments in America; from company management and labor spies , and from groups of citizens functioning as vigilantes. In 1914, Wobbly Joe Hill (born Joel Hägglund)

27270-448: The officers of the WFM for the IWW, the big bulk of the membership will go with them." But the takeover did not succeed. According to several historians, the 1913 El Paso smelters' strike marked one of the first instances of direct competition between the IWW and the WFM, as the two unions competed to organize workers on strike against the American Smelting and Refining Company 's local smelter . In 1914, Butte, Montana, erupted into

27472-404: The opposite. Socialists agreed to put aside class conflict and vote for war credits . German socialists argued that war was necessary to defend against what they termed Russia's "barbaric Tsarism ", while their French counterparts pointed to the need to defend against Prussian militarism and the German "instinct of domination and of discipline". This collaboration between the socialist movement and

27674-459: The organization had around 25,000 members. In its first decades, the IWW created more than 900 unions located in more than 350 cities and towns in 38 states and territories of the United States and five Canadian provinces. Throughout the country, there were 90 newspapers and periodicals affiliated with the IWW, published in 19 different languages. Cartoons were a major part of IWW publications. Produced by unpaid rank and file members they satirised

27876-436: The organization, ultimately brought about the IWW's 1924 schism. The twenties witnessed the defection of hundreds of Wobbly leaders (including Harrison George , Elizabeth Gurley Flynn , John Reed , George Hardy , Charles Ashleigh , Earl Browder and, in his Soviet exile, Bill Haywood ) and, following a path recounted by Fred Beal , thousands of Wobbly rank-and-filers to the Communists and Communist organizations. At

28078-468: The outbreak of World War I. Syndicalists had long opposed interventionism. Haywood held that "it is better to be a traitor to your country than to your class". French syndicalists viewed the French Army as the primary defender of the capitalist order. In 1901, the CGT published a manual for soldiers encouraging desertion. In 1911, British syndicalists distributed an "Open Letter to British Soldiers" imploring them not to shoot on striking workers but to join

28280-409: The ownership and control of their livelihoods – are set at naught, we can have neither men's rights nor women's rights. The majority of mankind is ground down by industrial oppression in order that the small remnant may live in ease. — Helen Keller , IWW member, 1911 The IWW first attracted attention in Goldfield , Nevada , in 1906 and during the Pressed Steel Car Strike of 1909 . By 1912,

28482-407: The point of production where they work" rather than at the ballot box. Of the 230 delegates present at the founding of Canada's One Big Union, a mere 3 were women. When a female radical criticized the masculinist atmosphere at the meeting, she was rebuffed by men who insisted that labor only concern itself with class rather than gender issues. The historian Todd McCallum concludes that syndicalists in

28684-479: The police force—one a regular officer and another a deputized citizen from the National Guard Reserve—were killed, probably by "friendly fire". At least five Everett civilians were wounded. Many IWW members opposed United States participation in World War I . The organization passed a resolution against the war at its convention in November 1916. This echoed the view, expressed at the IWW's founding convention, that war represents struggles among capitalists in which

28886-422: The police, particularly the Cheka , from 1919 on. Their demands had some sway with workers and dissidents within the Bolshevik party and the Bolshevik leadership viewed them as the most dangerous part of the libertarian movement. After the Russian Civil War ended, workers and sailors, including both anarchists and Bolsheviks, rose up in what came to be known as the Kronstadt rebellion of 1921, with Kronstadt being

29088-469: The proclamation of a new government, fearing a dictatorship of the proletariat , even more so after the Bolsheviks created the central Soviet of People's Commissars composed only of members of their party. They called for decentralization of power but agreed with Lenin's labor program, which endorsed workers' control in all enterprises of a certain minimum size. The introduction of workers' control led to economic chaos. Lenin turned to restoring discipline in

29290-572: The rank-and-file and instill in workers the expectation that the union rather than they would wage the class struggle. Syndicalists advocated direct action , including working to rule , passive resistance, sabotage, and strikes, particularly the general strike, as tactics in the class struggle, as opposed to indirect action such as electoral politics. The IWW engaged in around 30 mostly successful civil disobedience campaigns they deemed free speech fights . Wobblies would defy laws restricting public speeches, in order to clog up prisons and court systems as

29492-549: The reformist union Federterra had been thwarted by employers. Syndicalists led large strikes by farm workers in Parma and Ferrara in 1907–1908; these strikes failed as a result of employers' strikebreaking tactics and infighting among workers. In 1911–1913, syndicalists played an important role in a large strike wave in Italy's industrial centers. The syndicalist union confederation USI was formed in 1912 by veterans of both strike movements. British Wobblies were involved in two major strikes in Scotland, one at Argyll Motor Works and

29694-410: The revolutionary struggle to overthrow the employing class; its motto was " an injury to one is an injury to all ". They saw this as an improvement upon the Knights of Labor 's creed, "an injury to one is the concern of all" which the Knights had spoken out in the 1880s. In particular, the IWW was organized because of the belief among many unionists, socialists, anarchists, Marxists, and radicals that

29896-503: The revolutionary wing of the labor movement. No syndicalists attended the founding convention, mainly because the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War , which included a blockade of Russia by the Allied powers of World War I , made travel to Moscow near impossible. After long discussions, the CNT opted to join the Comintern , although it classified its adherence as provisional as a concession to detractors of Bolshevism. USI also decided to join; some like Borghi had reservations about

30098-418: The rich become richer, and the working poor all too often die at the hands of other workers. An IWW newspaper, the Industrial Worker , wrote just before the U.S. declaration of war: "Capitalists of America, we will fight against you, not for you! There is not a power in the world that can make the working class fight if they refuse." Yet when a declaration of war was passed by the U.S. Congress in April 1917,

30300-588: The rise of syndicalism. This rise took place during the Second Industrial Revolution . Two groups of workers were most attracted to syndicalism: casual or seasonal laborers who frequently changed jobs, and workers whose occupations were becoming obsolete as a result of technological advances. The first group included landless agricultural workers, construction workers, and dockers, all of whom were disproportionately represented in several countries' syndicalist movements. Because they frequently changed jobs, such workers did not have close relationships with their employers and

30502-630: The risk of losing one's job as a result of a strike was reduced. Moreover, because of the time constraints of their jobs they were forced to act immediately in order to achieve anything and could not plan for the long term by building up strike funds or powerful labor organizations or by engaging in mediation. Their working conditions gave them an inclination to engage in direct confrontation with employers and apply direct action. The second group included miners, railway employees, and certain factory workers. Their occupations were deskilled by technological and organizational changes. These changes made workers from

30704-469: The rule of workers' organizations. In such a society, individuals would be liberated in the economic sphere but also in their private and social lives. Syndicalist policies on gender issues were mixed. The CNT did not admit women as members until 1918. The CGT dismissed feminism as a bourgeois movement. Syndicalists were mostly indifferent to the question of women's suffrage . Elizabeth Gurley Flynn , an IWW organizer, insisted that women "find their power at

30906-532: The same way socialism was by Marxism . Émile Pouget , a CGT leader, maintained: "What sets syndicalism apart from the various schools of socialism – and makes it superior – is its doctrinal sobriety. Inside the unions, there is little philosophising. They do better than that: they act!" Similarly, Andreu Nin of the Spanish CNT proclaimed in 1919: "I am a fanatic of action, of revolution. I believe in actions more than in remote ideologies and abstract questions." Although workers' education

31108-437: The second at a Singer Corporation 's sewing machine factory in Clydebank . In 1906, several industrial unionists began to spread their ideas and organize workers at Singer's. The organized the 1911 strike at Singer after a woman was fired for not working hard enough. The strike was cleverly defeated by management and most activists lost their jobs. The ISEL leader Tom Mann was also at the center of several labor disputes during

31310-554: The second group similar in some respects to the first group. They did not entirely result from the introduction of new technology but were also caused by changes in management methods. This included increased supervision of workers, piecework , internal promotions, all designed make workers docile and loyal and to transfer knowledge and control over the process of production from workers to employers. Frustration with this loss of power led to formal and informal resistance by workers. Altena disagrees with this explanation. According to him, it

31512-413: The socialists' neutrality and therefore support the war. Finally, they gave similar arguments as the French, warning of the dangers posed by the "suffocating imperialism of Germany", and felt obliged to follow the CGT's lead. USI's pro-war wing had the support of less than a third of the organization's members and it was forced out in September 1914. Its anarchist wing, led by Borghi, was firmly opposed to

31714-399: The soviets, they were most enthusiastic about the factory committees and workers' councils that had emerged in all industrial centers in the course of strikes and demonstrations in the February Revolution . The committees fought for higher wages and shorter hours but above all for workers' control over production, which both the syndicalists and Bolsheviks supported. The syndicalists viewed

31916-512: The split was formalized, resulting in the separation between the UNL and the UNL-SD. The creation of the UNL-SD as an independent entity was officially recognized in 2017 under the 1901 law for associations. In early 2019, the organization changed its name to the Mouvement National Lycéen (MNL). Running under the "Le progrès lycéen" lists, the MNL secured around 22% of the vote in the 2018 Conseil Supérieur de l’Éducation high school elections, placing second among student organizations. In 2021,

32118-409: The spring of 1917. The start of the war had induced an economic boom in the United States, tightening the labor market and thereby strengthening workers' bargaining position. The IWW profited from this, more than doubling its membership between 1916 and 1917. At the same time, the Wobblies fervently denounced the war and mulled calling an anti-war general strike. Once the United States became a combatant,

32320-422: The start. Rocker declared already in August 1918 that the Bolshevik regime was "but a new system of tyranny". Industrial Workers of the World The Industrial Workers of the World ( IWW ), whose members are nicknamed " Wobblies ", is an international labor union founded in Chicago in 1905. The nickname's origin is uncertain. Its ideology combines general unionism with industrial unionism , as it

32522-475: The state was known as the union sacrée in France, the Burgfrieden in Germany, and godsvrede  [ nl ] in the Netherlands. Moreover, a number of anarchists led by Peter Kropotkin , including the influential syndicalist Christiaan Cornelissen, issued the Manifesto of the Sixteen , supporting the Allied cause in the war. Despite this, most syndicalists remained true to their internationalist and anti-militarist principles by opposing

32724-408: The state, central syndicalist themes. According to Lucien van der Walt , the Spanish Regional Federation of the IWA , which was formed in 1870, was in fact syndicalist. Kenyon Zimmer sees a "proto-syndicalism" in the influence the anarchist -led International Working People's Association (IWPA) and Central Labor Union , which originated in the American section of the First International, had in

32926-498: The student climate strike initiated and coordinated by Youth for Climate France . In May 2019, the MNL supported teachers' unions in organizing a strike against the Baccalauréat reform, claiming in a statement: "Students are not being taken hostage by striking teachers but by a ministry that refuses to budge". On May 3, 2021, the MNL helped organize the "#BacNoir" protest, which mobilized between 100 and 200 schools. The MNL called for continued mobilization on May 5, with support from

33128-425: The syndicalist conception, unions played a dual role. They were organs of struggle within capitalism for better working conditions, and they were also to play a key role in the revolution to overthrow capitalism. Victor Griffuelhes expressed this at the CGT's 1906 congress in the following manner: "In its day-to-day demands, syndicalism seeks the co-ordination of workers' efforts, the increase of workers' well-being by

33330-403: The syndicalists' ability to theorize their struggles and their experience with direct action methods. Starting in the second half of 1919, workers disappointed by the socialist party's and unions' support for the war and previously non-unionized unskilled workers who were radicalized during the war flocked to the FVdG. The revolution also saw the introduction to Germany of industrial unionism along

33532-471: The trade unions unable to cope with the ever growing power of the employing class. The trade unions foster a state of affairs which allows one set of workers to be pitted against another set of workers in the same industry, thereby helping defeat one another in wage wars. Moreover, the trade unions aid the employing class to mislead the workers into the belief that the working class have interests in common with their employers. These conditions can be changed and

33734-460: The trade unions, which in turn became organs of the state. The Bolsheviks argued that workers' control did not mean that workers controlled factories at the local level and that this control had to be centralized and put under a broader economic plan. The syndicalists criticized the Bolshevik regime bitterly, characterizing it as state capitalist . They denounced state control over the factories and agitated for decentralization of power in politics and

33936-406: The union's fiftieth anniversary, it was near extinction, though it still appeared on government lists of Communist-led groups. The 1960s civil rights movement , anti-war protests, and various university student movements brought new life to the IWW, albeit with many fewer new members than the great organizing drives of the early part of the 20th century. The first signs of new life for the IWW in

34138-424: The union's opponents and helped spread its messages in various forms, including 'stickerettes'. The most well-known IWW cartoon character, Mr Block, was created by Ernest Riebe and was made the subject of a Joe Hill song. Members of the IWW were active throughout the country and were involved in the Seattle General Strike of 1919, were arrested or killed in the Everett Massacre , organized among Mexican workers in

34340-447: The union's philosophy of direct action. Altena argues that, even though evidence of ordinary workers' convictions is scant, it indicates that they were aware of doctrinal differences between various currents in the labor movement and able to defend their own views. He observes that they likely understood syndicalist newspapers and debated political issues. Syndicalism is used by some interchangeably with anarcho-syndicalism . This term

34542-435: The unions is to wage the Class War". According to syndicalist doctrine, this war was aimed not just at gaining concessions such as higher wages or a shorter working day but at the revolutionary overthrow of capitalism. Syndicalists agreed with Karl Marx 's characterization of the state as the "executive committee of the ruling class". They held that a society's economic order determined its political order and concluded that

34744-468: The very workers dying in the war were denied access to that culture by capitalist conditions. Finally, syndicalists railed against religious justifications for war. Before the war, they had rejected religion as divisive at best; support for the war by both Catholic and Protestant clergy revealed their hypocrisy and disgraced the principles they and Christianity claimed to uphold. As the war progressed, disaffection with worsening living conditions at home and

34946-479: The violence of the Centralia massacre is disputed, though there had been previous attacks on the IWW hall and businessmen's association had made threats against union members. A number of IWWs were arrested, one of whom, Wesley Everest , was lynched by a mob that night. A bronze plaque honoring the IWW members imprisoned and lynched following the Centralia Tragedy was dedicated in the city's George Washington Park on November 11, 2023. This plaque will be installed on

35148-420: The wage system." It is the historic mission of the working class to do away with capitalism. The army of production must be organized, not only for everyday struggle with capitalists, but also to carry on production when capitalism shall have been overthrown. By organizing industrially we are forming the structure of the new society within the shell of the old . One of the IWW's most important contributions to

35350-413: The war and their respective nation's participation in it. The majority of the French CGT and a sizable minority in the Italian USI did not. The CGT had long had a moderate, reformist wing, which gained the upper hand. As a result, according to historians like Darlington or van der Linden and Thorpe, the CGT was no longer a revolutionary syndicalist organization after the start of World War I. It followed

35552-414: The war and was almost completely suppressed by the state during the war, regrouped at a conference in Berlin in December 1918. It was active in the revolutionary events of the following years, particularly in the Ruhr area . It supported spontaneous strikes and championed direct action and sabotage. The FVdG started to be held in high regard for its radicalism by workers, particularly miners, who appreciated

35754-418: The war effort but also refrained from working against it. From the start of the war, even before Italy did so, a minority within USI, led by the most famous Italian syndicalist, Alceste De Ambris , called on the Italian state to take the Allies' side. As part of left-interventionism , the pro-war syndicalists saw Italian participation in the war as the completion of nationhood. They also felt compelled to oppose

35956-434: The war effort. Thanks in part to their fidelity to internationalism, syndicalist organizations profited from this development and expanded as the war drew to an end. Disaffection with the war condensed in the post-World War I revolutions that began with the Russian Revolution of 1917. In February 1917, strikes, riots, and troop mutinies broke out in Petrograd , forcing the Nicholas II to abdicate on 2 March in favor of

36158-438: The war, deeming it incompatible with workers' internationalism and predicting that it would only serve elites and governments. Its opposition was met with government repression, and Borghi and others were interned by the end of the war. Instead, the anti-war faction in the CGT was a small minority. It was led by the likes of Pierre Monatte and Alphonse Merrheim . They would link up with anti-war socialists from around Europe at

36360-549: The war. In 1917, radicals began to dominate the labor movement as a result of the war, the Sidónio Pais dictatorship established that year, and the influence of the Russian Revolution. The 1918 Portugal general strike was called for November but failed, and in 1919 the syndicalist General Confederation of Labour ( Confederação Geral do Trabalho , CGT) was formed as the country's first national union confederation. In Brazil, in both Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, syndicalists, along with anarchists and socialists, were leaders in

36562-576: The working class's struggle against capital. Syndicalists argued that patriotism was a means of integrating workers into capitalist society by distracting them from their true class interest. In 1908, the CGT's congress invoked the slogan of the First International, proclaiming that the "workers have no fatherland". When World War I broke out in July 1914, socialist parties and trade unions – both in neutral and belligerent countries – supported their respective nations' war efforts or national defense, despite previous pledges to do

36764-403: The working people and the few, who make up the employing class, have all the good things of life. Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class, take possession of the means of production, abolish the wage system, and live in harmony with the Earth. We find that the centering of the management of industries into fewer and fewer hands makes

36966-407: Was a clash of different cultures or that it could be justified as a defense of civilization. They stated that various cultures were not mutually hostile, and the state should not be seen as the embodiment of culture, since culture was the product of the entire population, while the state acted in the interests of just a few. Moreover, they argued that if culture was to be understood as high culture ,

37168-432: Was a distinctly American form of labor organization and not an import of European syndicalism, the IWW was syndicalist in the broader sense of the word. According to Melvyn Dubofsky and most other IWW historians, the IWW's industrial unionism was the specifically American form of syndicalism. Nevertheless, the IWW also had a presence in Canada and Mexico nearly from its inception, as the United States economy and labor force

37370-412: Was a war between democracy and republicanism on the one side and barbaric militarism on the other. Italy did not initially participate in World War I, which was deeply unpopular in the country, when it broke out. The Italian Socialist Party and the reformist Italian General Confederation of Labour opposed intervention in the Great War . Once Italy became a participant, the socialists refused to support

37572-402: Was accused of murder in Utah and, on what many regarded as limited and insufficient evidence, was executed in 1915. On November 5, 1916, at Everett, Washington , a group of deputized businessmen led by Sheriff Donald McRae attacked Wobblies on the steamer Verona , killing at least five union members (six more were never accounted for and probably were lost in Puget Sound ). Two members of

37774-409: Was convinced by the workers' enthusiasm that revolution could be possible, the UIL and the socialists were opposed. The socialists succeeded in curtailing the general strike and it imploded with a day. The government, unsettled by the radicalism on display, reacted with repression against the far left and concessions to workers and peasants. In Portugal, working class unrest picked up from the start of

37976-402: Was first used in 1907 by socialists criticizing the political neutrality of the CGT, although it was rarely used until the early 1920s when communists used it disparagingly. Only from 1922 was it used by self-avowed anarcho-syndicalists. Although syndicalism has traditionally been seen as a current within anarchism, it was dominated in some countries by Marxists rather than anarchists. This was

38178-410: Was formed as a rival to the bourses but was at first much weaker. From the start, it advocated the general strike and aimed to unite all workers. Pouget, who was active in the CGT, supported the use of sabotage and direct action. In 1902, the bourses merged into the CGT. In 1906, the federation adopted the Charter of Amiens , which reaffirmed the CGT's independence from party politics and fixed

38380-443: Was formed by Italian and Spanish immigrants in 1901. Many IWW leaders were European immigrants, including Edmondo Rossoni who moved between the United States and Italy and was active in both the IWW and USI. International work processes also contributed to the diffusion of syndicalism. For example, sailors helped establish IWW presences in port cities around the world. Syndicalists formed different kinds of organizations. Some like

38582-406: Was formed in 1922, is an international syndicalist federation of various labour unions from different countries. At its peak, it represented millions of workers and competed directly for the hearts and minds of the working class with social democratic unions and parties. A number of syndicalist organizations were and still are to this day linked in the IWA–AIT; some of its member organizations left for

38784-399: Was further encouraged by employers' hostility to workers' actions. The economist Ernesto Screpanti hypothesized that strike waves like the one from 1911 to 1922 generally occur during the upper turning-points of the periodic global long cycles of boom and bust known as Kondratieff waves . He argued that such waves of proletarian insurgency were global in reach, saw workers breaking free of

38986-464: Was important at least to committed activists, syndicalists distrusted bourgeois intellectuals, wanting to maintain workers' control over the movement. Syndicalist thinking was elaborated in pamphlets, leaflets, speeches, and articles and in the movement's own newspapers. These writings consisted mainly in calls to action and discussions of tactics in class struggle. The philosopher Georges Sorel 's Reflections on Violence introduced syndicalist ideas to

39188-399: Was imported to France". In the 1890s, French anarchists, conceding that individual action such as assassinations had failed, turned their focus to the labor movement. They were able to gain influence, particularly in the bourses du travail , which served as labor exchanges , meeting places for unions, and trades councils and organized in a national federation in 1893. In 1895, the CGT

39390-410: Was intertwined with those countries. French syndicalism and American industrial unionism influenced the rise of syndicalism elsewhere. Syndicalist movements and organizations in a number of countries were established by activists who had spent time in France. Ervin Szabó visited Paris in 1904 and then established a Syndicalist Propaganda Group in his native Hungary in 1910. Several of the founders of

39592-423: Was only one way this radicalization expressed itself. In the United Kingdom, the period from 1910 to 1914 became known as the Great Labour Unrest . While many historians see syndicalism as a consequence of this unrest, Elie Halévy and the politician Lord Robert Cecil argue it was its cause. Employers in France likewise blamed an upsurge in workers' militancy in the same period on syndicalist leaders. Syndicalism

39794-417: Was partly accidental, and leaders were unable to convert workers to syndicalist ideas. Frederick Ridley, a political scientist, is more equivocal. According to him, leaders were very influential in the drafting of syndicalist ideas. Syndicalism was more than a mere tool of a few leaders, and was a genuine product of the French labor movement. Darlington adds that most members in the Irish ITGWU were won over by

39996-403: Was quickly quelled by the British army and Connolly was executed. In Germany, the small Free Association of German Trade Unions (FVdG) opposed the socialists' Burgfrieden and Germany's involvement in the war, challenging the claim that the country was waging a defensive war. Its journals were suppressed and a number of its members were arrested. The United States did not enter the war until

40198-422: Was still under British rule, parliamentary politics were not seen as a serious means for workers to express their grievances. Most workers were disenfranchised, yet even in France or Britain, where most male workers had the right to vote, many workers did not trust party politics. The enormous numerical growth of well-organized socialist parties, such as in Germany and Italy, did not correlate with any real advance in

40400-439: Was the Finnish IWW educational institute, the Work People's College in Duluth, and the Finnish Labour Temple in Port Arthur, Ontario , Canada, which served as the IWW Canadian administration for several years. Further, many Swedish immigrants, particularly those blacklisted after the 1909 Swedish General Strike , joined the IWW and set up similar cultural institutions around the Scandinavian Socialist Clubs. This in turn exerted

40602-450: Was the strongest IWW branch in the United States. Leading figures such as Frank Cedervall , who had helped build the branch up for over ten years, were concerned about the possibility of raiding from AFL-CIO unions if the IWW had its legal status as a union revoked. In 1950, Cedervall led the 1500-member MMWIU national organization to split from the IWW, as the Lumber Workers Industrial Union had almost 30 years earlier. This act did not save

40804-523: Was workers with significant autonomy in their jobs and pride in their skills who were most attracted to syndicalism. Moreover, he argues that explanations based on workers' occupations cannot explain why only a minority of workers in those jobs became syndicalists or why in some professions workers in different locations had vastly different patterns of organization. The small size of many syndicalist unions also makes observations about which workers joined statistically irrelevant. Syndicalism came to be seen as

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