Rahm Emanuel & Bruce Rauner On Jihad to Eliminate Unions in Chicago, says Former Union Organizer Jane McAlevey | Black Agenda Report

Rahm Emanuel & Bruce Rauner On Jihad to Eliminate Unions in Chicago, says Former Union Organizer Jane McAlevey

01 Apr 2015

🖨️ Print Article

by Doug Henwood at KPFA's Behind The News

US living standards for ordinary people have deteriorated the last 40 years because Democrats and Republicans have systematically de-unionizeds the country, says former union organizer Jane McAlevey. Illinois governor Bruce Rauner and Chicago's Mayor Rahm Emanuel are on a jihad to kill the last unions in Chicago, the better to impose more privatizations, cuts in child care, wages, education and more austerity.

McAlevey, author of "We Need Syriza Here In Illinois" published last month in The Nation, declares the distinction between people working in the so-called “public sector” and “private sector” is nonsense. There are not two economies, there is one, and there are not two ways that workers get treated, depending on whether they work for government or corporations, there is one. She reminds us that real unions create traditions and institutions of internal democracy, which is not the same as "horizontalism" that they run strikes regularly, and that they are frequently led, as the Chicago Teachers Union was in 2012 by black women.

McAlevey was a remarkably successful union organizer for SEIU in Nevada, a so-called right to work state.

Left economist Doug Henwood, among much else the host of KPFA's Behind the News, interviews Jane McAlevey on the connection between Bruce Rauner, Scott Walker and Rahm Emanuel, how the 2012 Chicago Teachers Union strike kept Mayor Rahm Emanuel from closing 100 Chicago public schools instead of just 50, and the ultimate collective power of organizing the workplace.

Catch Doug Henwood's program every week here.

McAlevey is the author of Raising Expectations, Raising Hell.

listen

http://shout.lbo-talk.org/lbo/RadioArchive/2015/15_02_19.mp3

More Stories

Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Malcolm Harris’s Book, “Palo Alto”
19 Apr 2023
This week’s featured author is Malcolm Harris. Harris is a freelance writer and the author of Kids These Days: The Making of Millennials and Shit is Fucked Up and Bullshit: History Since the End of…
Jon Jeter
Modern Day Reconstruction and Tennessee's Expulsion of Black Lawmakers
19 Apr 2023
The temporary expulsion of two Black Tennessee legislators was a reminder of why even a tiny semblance of Black political independence is feared and hated. The expressions of support from …
Jacqueline Luqman
Apologies Not Accepted - Or I Love It When The Universe Proves Me Right
19 Apr 2023
Jacqueline Luqman was vilified for pointing out a simple fact. Black people will not make common cause with racists and bigots. Racists do not get a pass because they call themselves anti-war.
Clau O'Brien Moscoso
Piura No Longer a Fujimori Stronghold
19 Apr 2023
Peru is facing popular struggle in the wake of a coup which ousted President Castillo. It must also confront a legacy of political corruption.
James Patrick Jordan
Haiti, Hunger, and US Prison Imperialism
19 Apr 2023
Imposing coups, forcing fake elections, denying asylum claims, and kidnapping a president aren't enough subjugation for the US to carry out against Haiti. US built prisons are a death trap for…