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29 Lab. Stud. J. i (2004-2005)

handle is hein.journals/labstuj29 and id is 1 raw text is: Introduction Steven Ashby andJill Kriesky Last April, Building a Strong Grass Roots Union Movement: Member Mobilization, Political Action and Organizing was the focus of presentations, papers, and community-based events at the 2003 United Association for Labor Education (UALE) Conference in Miami, Florida. Over the course of three days, labor educators and activists discussed and debated strategies that can revitalize the union movement, starting from the local- member level. This issue of the Labor Studies Journal features four outstanding case studies from the conference. Each addresses the roles of strategic campaigns in achieving the difficult but critical goals of new-member organizing, collective bargaining, or broader social-policy agendas. All of these articles highlight the contributions of local union members to the campaigns, but especially emphasize coalition building with allies inside and outside the labor movement. In the first article of this series, Robert Hickey analyzes multi-fac- eted strategies launched by the Paper, Allied-Chemical and Energy Work- ers International Union (PACE) in their five-year campaign to block Crown Central Petroleum's union-busting and industry bargaining pat- tern-busting strategies. Hickey adds to the growing case-study literature by documenting the role of corporate research, international solidarity, membership mobilization in communities, activities beyond plant-gate picketing, and coalition-building. Two of Hickey's significant conclusions are echoed in other papers in this volume. First, the success PACE workers achieved in this cam- paign did not result from any one tactic; instead, pressure on multiple leverage points produced a greater impact than any one action could have. Second, Hickey concludes that the labor movement may achieve much more in comprehensive campaigns if they extend themselves beyond fight- ing defensively for union contracts to undertaking a full range of political, LABOR STUDIES JOURNAL, Vol. 29, No, 1 (Spring 2004): i-iii. Published for the United Association for Labor Education by the West Virginia University Press, P.O. Box 6295, West Virginia University, Morgantown, WV 26506. © 2004, West Virginia University Press.