Clean the Air Resolution

The resolution, "It's Time to Clear the Air About AFL-CIO Policy Abroad!" was passed by the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council (SBLC) in San Jose, California. We feel that is an extraordinary resolution which can have a very important impact if it is passed by many unions and labor councils and sent off to the AFL-CIO in Washington, DC.

Below you'll find the resolution, the cover letter the SBLC sent to AFL-CIO President John Sweeney and the letter being sent to selected unions and labor councils calling upon them for action on the issue.

If you'd like to have this resolution and the letters on hard copy letterhead or if you'd like to have them sent to your union or labor council, please contact Cristina Grijalva at the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council, 2102 Almaden Road, Suite 107, San Jose, CA 95125. Telephone (408) 266-3790.

Your effort to pass this resolution in your union and labor councils will help bring appropriate action from the AFL-CIO. Please call if you have any questions.

November 8, 2000

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Attached you will find a copy of a resolution passed by the South Bay AFL-CIO addressing the issue of Labor's involvement in foreign affairs. You will also find attached a copy of the letter sent to AFL-CIO President John Sweeney introducing our resolution and reiterating our goals and our vision.

On behalf of the South Bay Labor Council I strongly urge you to adopt this resolution and communicate your support to the AFL-CIO. Together we can rectify our past and move forward together in creating trust and unity among workers around the world.

In Solidarity,

(signed)

Amy Dean
Executive Officer

November 8, 2000

Mr. John Sweeney, President
AFL-CIO
815 16th Street, N.W.
Wahington, DC 20006

Dear President Sweeney,

I have been directed by a democratic and deliberate vote of the South Bay AFL-CIO Labor Council to forward to you the attached resolution. This resolution was the result of widespread discussion and debate, resulting ultimately in unanimous adoption.

It is hard to capture the sincerity and passion with which proponents of this resolution pursued its passage. Some of the movers of the resolution were born and raised in Chile and saw their loved ones torured and killed. Others spent time with victims of the oppression and, to this day, feel a heart felt commitment to right the wrongs on their behalf. Others simply are ashamed of the role we played in Chile and elsewhere around the world. In the end, concensus was reached around the following principle: that in order to address the issues working people face in this new global economy, we must establish a renewed trust and a renewed solidarity among all workers around the world.

The South Bay Labor Council, like our sisters and brothers around the country, are proud of the new direction the AFL-CIO has taken under your leadership. We recognize that the AFL-CIO in general, and the Solidarity Center in particular, have taken significant steps toward goals such as those expressed in the attached resolution. Examples of this include the development of our Union Cities Program and our Women's Department, the integtration of our constituent organizations into real labor leadership, the power we have awakened among our members and potential members in fighting for immigrant workers' rights and amnesty, and the demonstrations we led with environmentalists, faith based community members, students and workers around the world against the World Bank and corporate globalization.

The labor movement, led by the AFL-CIO, must continue to take positive steps to build our authenticity with workers around the world through acts of true solidarity. We must take those steps based solely upon our working families agenda and thus rectify our past and erase the distance that still exists between us and some of our natural allies abroad and here at home.

We shold not be diverted by a debate over approach. Instead, let us agree on a common agenda - to distance ourselves from our past and create a new image of trust and unity. That is the goal of this resolution. That is the goal supported unanimously by our Council. And that is the goal we wish to move forward together as our country's most effecxtive force in shaping tomorrow.

In Solidarity

(signed)

Amy Dean
Executive Officer.

Cc. Executive Board Members

IT'S TIME TO CLEAR THE AIR ABOUT AFL-CIO POLICY ABROAD!

WHEREAS the impact of economic globalization on American working families and workers everywhere is causing more job dislocation , impoverishment of working families, division among workers and a huge economic gap between rich and poor in the U.S. and among nations, with power shifting more and more into corporate hands; and

WHEREAS an effective strategy to serve our members' interests and counter the corporate economic globalization agenda is to build solidarity and unity among unions and workers' organizations worldwide based upon mutual respect and our common needs, with mutually determined labor standards based on social justice and human rights as they are perceived by workers in each nation; and

WHEREAS while we recognize and applaud the many changes in the international policy and practice of the AFL-CIO in recent years and, as we are taking steps to increase credibility among workers and members in the U.S., we must also overcome fear and suspicion of workers abroad based upon errors and excesses of the Cold War years - so that the AFL-CIO may become a more trusted and vital actor on the stage of workingclass international affairs; and

WHEREAS recent articles in the Labor Studies Journal for Summer 2000 show that the AFL-CIO played a role leading to the bloody Pinochet overrthrow of the democratically elected government in Chile, that its work was linked to corporate and CIA intervention ordered by Richard Nixon and led by Henry Kissinger (clearly against the best interests of the labor movement in Latin America and the United States,) that the AFL-CIO engaged in similar activities in many countries on almost every continent and that such activities served corporate interests and were largely funded by the U.S. government; and

WHEREAS the bitter fruit of the experience in Chile and other countries was a strengthened hand for Corporate America, the destruction of militant unions and support of spurious unions, the persecution of working families and the torture, disappearance and death of many trade union activists and leaders, situations which defy rebuilding trust without taking responsibility for such events where it may be due, and accounting for and renouncing such policies; Therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED that, to advance the progressive new policies of the AFL-CIO in global affairs, we call upon our Federation to fully account for what was done in Chile and other countries where similar roles may have been played in our name, to forever renounce such policies and practices and to openly invite concerned union members and researchers to review and discuss all AFL-CIO archives on international labor affairs; and be it further

RESOLVED that the AFL-CIO describe, country by country, exactly what activities it may still be engaged in abroad with funds paid by government agencies and renounce any such ties that could compromise our authentic credibility and the trust of workers here and abroad and that would make us paid agents of government or of the forces of corporate economic globalization; and be it further

RESOLVED that the above actions be taken to clear the air in affirmation of an AFL-CIO policy of genuine global labor solidarity in pursuit of economic and social justice with attention to domestic and international labor standards that include the right to organize and strike, an adequate social safety net, living wages, the right to health care and education, elimination of mandatory overtime, protection of the rights of immigrant workers, prohibitions on strikebreaking and the pursuit of peace among nations and peoples; and be it
finally

RESOLVED that we send this resolution to the AFL-CIO and circulate it to Labor Councils and local unions in our area and elsewhere asking them to take similar action .

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