By Bryan O’Keefe

Two years ago, the major news in labor relations was the split between the AFL-CIO and seven dissident unions, which eventually joined together and formed the “Change to Win” federation. Many labor observers felt that the split was driven by the personalities involved – in particular SEIU President Andy Stern and AFL-CIO President John Sweeney – as much as it was by actual differences in substance. Nevertheless, Change to Win did not tread lightly when it came to formulating their mission statements and goals at their first convention in St. Louis. Speakers talked about massive organizing campaigns, revitalizing the labor movement, and saying good riddance to the old AFL-CIO. (I was lucky enough to be in attendance at that event and still remember that the theme song for the day was “I Can See Clearly Now” which was certainly meant to be a metaphor about the AFL-CIO leadership).

Two years later, all of this raises questions – what has Change to Win actually accomplished? Where does the split stand today? David Moberg has an excellent summary on the state of Change to Win in the liberal magazine “In These Times” this week. The piece is worthy of a full-read.

The biggest problem facing Change to Win is figuring out how to actually translate words into action. Change to Win leaders in 2005 talked a lot about massive new organizing campaigns and Stern even put organizing guru Tom Woodruff in charge of the Change to Win strategic organizing center. But so far, there have not been tangible results. Even if one looks at their website today, all of the major campaigns they have listed – Uniform Justice, Justice at Smithfield, Driving Up Standards, etc. – pre-date Change to Win and were started by individual unions.

Moberg’s article does say that Change to Win is preparing an organizing campaign against CVS and other drugstores. This would actually be a “new campaign” and is worth watching – however, right now, they just simply do not have much to show in terms of results.

What’s more, the organization itself has experienced internal strife. As Moberg points out, there have been spats between UFCW and SEIU over how to best attack Wal-Mart, fights between the service unions and more industrial unions (like the Teamsters) over immigration reform, etc. None of these have exactly threatened the existence of Change to Win, but little fights like these can take their toll, especially when the organization is not having a lot of success in achieving it’s primary goal. Change to Win leaders were known for their criticism of the AFL-CIO and all of its bureaucratic infighting, but their own organization is now suffering from the same shortfalls. Plus too, they complained long and hard about the AFL-CIO’s spending on politics, but Change to Win unions themselves have continued to dump money into the Democratic Party at a frantic pace.

Moberg and the labor leaders he interviews still seem rather bullish about the long-term prospects of Change to Win. And they might in fact be right. It’s also possible that Change to Win leaders are just buying time until Sweeney retires and then the two groups will kiss and make-up relatively soon. The personal rhetorical barbs that Sweeney and Stern exchanged two years ago would preclude a compromise now unless one of them ate crow and there is little chance of that happening. Moberg also leaves open the possibility of reuniting, but not anytime in the near future and the creation of another labor model if the reunification ever happens.

For now, however, it’s clear that Change to Win still has major hurdles to overcome if it truly wants to achieve the type of broad labor agenda it laid out two years ago.

Bryan O'Keefe is a labor policy analyst in Washington, D.C. He is a frequent contributor to EFCA Updates and WorkplaceHorizons.com.