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

Clau O'Brien Moscoso
New Wave of Protests Begin as US Troops Enter Perú to Train Armed Forces
14 Jun 2023
A Third Takeover of Lima is the next action planned in the mobilization against the coup government in Peru.
Jean Saint-Vil
What is Urgent and Necessary in Haiti
14 Jun 2023
The author asks CARICOM member states to support the Haitian people in their struggle for sovereignty.
Gustavo Bolívar
Colombia: The Friends and Enemies of Petro
14 Jun 2023
Colombia's new president is popular with the people but beset by enemies. It is a common situation where the popular vote is not indicative of who really holds political power.
Tanupriya Singh
A Deadly Fight: Senegal’s Political Crisis Escalates After Repression of Protesters
14 Jun 2023
At least 16 people were killed after protests broke out in Senegal following the sentencing of leading opposition figure Ousmane Sonko to two years in prison. Mass public unrest has grown against…
Friends of the Congo
Anniversary Report: Six-Day War, Democratic Republic of The Congo
14 Jun 2023
Uganda and Rwanda began their incursions into the Democratic Republic of Congo 23 years ago. Full reparations to victims have not been paid and the two invader countries still act with impunity.