By Camille Godbout-Chouinard, USA Communications Committee
At the end of March, the UMass Amherst Labor Center ran The Strike Conference. Attended by many of the incoming USA board, the conference was an amazing opportunity to hear from unionized workers from many different sectors. Attending sessions and learning alongside dockworkers, nurses, hospitality workers, and assembly line workers and seeing how our goals, difficulties, and strengths align as workers was heartening and inspiring. The conference was funded in part by the Community, Democracy, and Dialogue initiative.
Friday night’s keynote speaker was an energizing call-to-action from the international president of the Association of Flight Attendants, Sarah Nelson. The plenary brought dockworkers from Sweden and port workers from Chile to speak on their experiences organizing for a strike. On Saturday, there were about 2 dozen sessions to choose from; nurses organizing against their union-busting hospital, public transit strikes in NYC, hunger strikes in prisons, and how-to’s for building research teams and engaging the public. Saturday ended with a plenary featuring workers from 4 different sectors whose locals had gone on strike.
Our humble USA contingent left the conference feeling energized and motivated. We are fortunate to share a campus with the UMass Amherst Labor Center, a progressive and radical hub for worker power. USA Communications Committee will do our best to keep you updated on the many events they put on throughout the year. You can read more about the Labor Center here, and view more details on The Strike Conference here.
