2022 Labor Committee Report
The CA-DSA Labor Committee began life a year ago, with 10-12 people meeting via zoom on a regular basis. Its first meetings solidified our goals. We saw ourselves as an organizing committee for supporting chapter labor work and helping to coordinate that work statewide via communication, campaigns, education, training and organizing. We hoped to grow our numbers and to develop working subgroups that support the development of rank and file power within the California labor movement.
We surveyed chapters to assess the status of their labor work. We found, not surprisingly, that the larger chapters have active labor committees involved in such activities as strike support, industry-based worker circles, study groups, and supporting electoral campaigns for pro-worker political candidates. The smaller chapters mostly do not have ongoing labor formations, unevenly engaging in ad hoc activities when possible. They expressed interest in support from CA-DSA and larger chapters, and the larger chapters expressed interest in sharing resources. We brought our findings to the State Council and proposed to build a bank of education and training resources.
The committee, however, struggled to gain a quorum at its meetings. We had expected to build out the Labor Committee infrastructure (connections and coordination among chapters and externally with the broader labor movement) during the Living Wage Act campaign, much as we had done with an ad hoc state DSA labor committee during the campaign for Prop 15 in 2020. When the Living Wage Act campaign failed to qualify for the November 2022 ballot, we moved to an emphasis on resource sharing. As part of that program we co-sponsored a well-attended zoom panel presentation on organizing the logistics industry in late summer. We also engaged in local support work for Starbucks organizing.
When the UC academic worker strike appeared on the horizon, Labor Committee members—some of whom were UAW members—pitched in with strike preparations and once it began, strike support activities. But we found that Labor Committee responsibilities for our volunteers, layered on top of local DSA chapter work and local union work, were not sustainable as we had conceptualized them. The Committee is now in a rethinking and rebuilding phase. We envision a three-fold purpose: education and training, salting, and union solidarity work. We are recruiting new co-chairs and once they are in place, we will put out a call for committee members.