LNS President Joe Uehlein recently spoke on a panel on Labor and the Environment at the Pacific Northwest Labor History Conference in Portland, Oregon. Joe talked about the critical importance of taking down silos that divide us, noting that now more than ever we need to come together to take on current challenges. He called for an end to transactional movement relationships and a move toward a transformational labor-enviro movement. Joe was asked to highlight a couple of events in labor-enviro history that have lessons relevant today.
Joe described how the Labor Network for Sustainability organized climate and enviro orgs to support the UAW strike in 2023: “It was a massive undertaking and we got over 50 climate and environmental organizations to call the auto corporation CEOs, flooding their offices with over a thousand phone calls, writing letters, showing up on the picket lines across the country, and more. We crashed the Stellantis (Chrysler) phone system. The lesson here is that enviros want to support labor, and if you believe something can be done, even though people are telling you it can’t, and you stick to your vision and organize effectively, you can win.”