- by James T
- The Guardian
- Issue #2164
On 6 September, comrades from across Sydney gathered in the CPA’s Peter Symon building to attend a workshop on Basic Skills for the Trade Union Activist. Hosted by experienced Party members from the CPA’s NSW Trade Union Fraction, the workshop brought together comrades from a range of different backgrounds and work experiences to learn and relearn the basics of trade union activism.
Through a combination of lectures, discussion groups and practical activities, participants were able to share their experiences, ask difficult questions, and come together to formulate plans of action for specific workplaces.
Beginning with a lesson in the history of trade unionism in Australia, the workshop was grounded in the current situation and how this relates to the practice of communists in the workplace. Participants were inspired by tales of trade union strength in the past, from hard-fought industrial disputes to the intersection of trade unionism and community which formed the backbone of working-class culture in Australia. This was a theme that would permeate the entirety of the workshop.
Situated in the weakened position that Trade Unions now find themselves in, the workshop focused on cultivating basic activist skills among comrades that are beginning their journey in trade unionism. Young comrades learnt fundamental actions to take before organising a workplace, including a checklist of information to gather and the art of mapping.
Experienced participants shared important strategies in deep mapping and what to be on the lookout for in order to understand their workplace community including hobbies, sports team affiliations, and details about family and community; all this information is essential in creating a dynamic and an ever-expanding workplace map. Young comrades learnt how to constructively engage fellow workers, and build ties of trust and solidarity that extend throughout each role in the workplace.
Importantly, the task of building and strengthening a workplace culture was emphasised. Inspired by workplace cultures cultivated by militant Trade Unions, participants were instructed on how to bolster self-reliance, solidarity and comradeship within the workplace. From small acts like group dinners to rolling funds that can be used to compensate those who have been victimised by capital, workplace communities link the working class to each other in times of great alienation across society. Within these communities, an embryonic form of future organisations can be glimpsed.
A workplace community is a sphere of society controlled by the working class and acts in accordance with its interests. When connected to points of distribution and social reproduction, these communities can bring together an increasingly larger section of the working class and can unite it in the face of pressing political, economic and social issues. As a site of true proletarian power, the workplace community is no longer a site of individual suffering but of collective struggle. In this environment, the working class can recapture what it has lost after decades of capitalist onslaught and construct a scaffold for future working-class institutions.
Furthermore, attendees were given valuable instructions on how to combat hostile management and other appendages of capital in the workplace. By instilling confidence and by the careful examination of key documents, the workplace activist can resist the diverse traps laid out for them as a result of their agitation. By utilising trade union structures, and Health and Safety Reps, and by winning the confidence of the rank-and-file, the activist can become a formidable opponent of capital.
By the continual deployment and refinement of workshops like this, the Party can develop a new generation of talented trade union activists. United in opposition to capital, an increasingly organised and conscious working class can reclaim its fighting organisations from traitors and cowards. Only by the continual development of activists can the working class bolster its ranks in the struggle that accompanies a capitalist system in crisis.
The Party and its young rank and file membership has taken a step forward in our ability to construct working class power. With theoretical clarity and practical skills, comrades will be developed into activists and endowed with the fighting spirit that once burnt across our southern sky.
