AH Challenge: Syndicalist Wobbly America

[Libertad]

This is for the fellow comrades within AH.com. "Reactionaries" are welcome to share their ideas too.

I am planning to have a plausible timeline of a possible Industrial Workers of the World take over in the Great Depression era America along the lines of the DeLeonist strategy of establishing a dictatorship of the proletariat through the dual means of parliamentarism (a revolutionary vanguard political party winning a democratic election, in this case the Socialist Labor Party by the 1932 elections) and classic syndicalism (a general strike to be lead by the One Big Union, in this case the Industrial Workers of the World, more as a reaction to a possible fascist putsch lead by possibly General Douglas McArthur, just like in the Reds timeline, forcing the Great Depression era President that is the loser in the elections to declare federal martial law).

So by that, we'll have a Second American Revolution and the take over of these empowered Wobblies and the post-facto constitutional changes needed to retire the United States of America from existence and for the establishment of the Industrial Union of the World, TTL's syndicalist USSR like entity.

One part of the challenge, which I guess is something we badly needed, is for Marxism-Leninism to not gain prominence... most likely by a failed Red October Revolution and keeping a social democratic Russian Republic alive under Kerensky.

LHB talked to me about his ideas on this on a series of PMs, but what do you guys think?

One advice too: If you are one of those people who believes in the stability of US political institutions and having these "exceptionalist" feelings, we already have enough American leftist challenge threads where such views were already said. No more of those please. Feel free to say that this thread sucks and then leave or just ignore this.

Thank you for your attention guys.

 

[TxCoatl1970]

Syndicalism AKA left-wing communism had a lot of problems organizing in the States, mostly b/c folks really weren't interested in overthrow of the system as getting a fair wage.
They had a horrible image problem as bomb-throwers and agitators more interested in stirring up trouble than actually fixing anything.

Socialists believing in gradualism and reform through the system got beat to the punch by Progressives early in the century then got broomed by the Palmer Raids after WWI into irrelevancy until the Depression, and even then, FDR's New Deal stole their thunder that the powers that be didn't care about the common man.
Finding some way to butterfly those POD's gives lefties- especially anarchists a chance to be an independent political force.

Anarchism IMO is an easier sell in America than Bolshevik collectivism. Self-starting movements and communitarian stuff appeal to everyone, right or left.
The problem is you have to have appealing capable leaders and pitchmen who break it down for people in a form they'll buy.
Emma Goldman was a pip, and tried to win every fight for equality of the sexes, pacifism, etc etc immediately and wore herself out.
Big Bill Heywood was a controversy magnet and an easy target for law enforcement to bust as a rabble-rouser.

YMMDV but those are my comments.

 

[LHB]

Compared to Communism Wobbly Syndicalism, I think, had a serious shot at one point of getting to the point of revolution in the US. Unlike the Communist Party the IWW was an American development with a non-sectarian yet anti-capitalist in outlook meaning you can get a broad leftist tent going, it had a lot of appeal in its day, and by 1915 was giving the AFL a run for its money.

If you can get a situation where the AFL falls or is absorbed by the IWW, a new round of repression at the right time, and no Palmer Raids then I think you could get to a situation where a Wobbly-led syndicalist revolution is possible assuming anything like the Great Depression hits.

One possibility for a PoD is for Charles Hughes to beat Woodrow Wilson in 1916 which is a lot easier than one would think. Wilson only squeaked through thanks to California's electoral votes and Hughes could have had those if he made it to a meeting with Republican Governor Hiram Johnson to win his support; OTL by not making the meeting Johnson assumed Hughes was snubbing him so he didn't do a thing to help him win. Hughes ran on a platform of rolling back the labor laws and new business regulations pushed though under Wilson and Taft, laws which were pretty popular among rank and file workers. Such a push could lead to a series of strikes in response, begetting further reaction, and so on building into a bigger OBU.

If on top of that if the US stays out of the Great War then you'd have what you need to build the IWW into the force it needs to be to stage a revolution. A Great War without the US strikes me more likely as ending in a bloody peace of exhaustion which would lead to some serious economic havoc everywhere. With Britain and France having no reparations money to pay their war loans, Germany a battered bloody mess, and all the war work that was flowing into American factories suddenly drying up that would give you all the elements of a really ugly economic downturn all over the world. I'm not sure if it would reach Depression levels but it won't be pretty.

 

[GiantMonkeyMan]

Unlike the Communist Party the IWW was an American development with a non-sectarian yet anti-capitalist in outlook meaning you can get a broad leftist tent going,

This is a weird perspective of the early Communist Party which contained anarchists, socialists, communists and trade unionists in it early stages. The ordinary members were the ones who decided, democratically, that they should join Comintern, not pressure from Russia. They towed the line to Moscow in it early stages to unite with other communist parties but both the IWW and the Communist Party had huge numbers of people who didn't speak English as a first language and weren't born in America. In fact, large numbers of wobblies joined the Communist Party.

it had a lot of appeal in its day, and by 1915 was giving the AFL a run for its money.

I think this is untrue. The AFL pretty much kept a solid (larger) number of members whilst the IWW grew and shrank depending on the mood of the workers in regards to struggles. The AFL weren't really under much threat from the wobblies.

If you can get a situation where the AFL falls or is absorbed by the IWW, a new round of repression at the right time, and no Palmer Raids then I think you could get to a situation where a Wobbly-led syndicalist revolution is possible assuming anything like the Great Depression hits.

The AFL crumbling or turning leftward would be a necessity for syndicalism to be more successful in the US. I think a very interesting idea would be for perhaps the IWW to dissolve into the AFL and turn it radical and leftwards by ousting the labour aristocrat leaders before the red scares could gut the wobblies. The AFL would have been a much more solid organisation for the state to crush.

 

[Zimmerwald1915]

Syndicalism AKA left-wing communism

Syndicalism and left-wing communism are not synonyms. Left-wing communism in America was organized around Fraina in the CPA and in the Proletarian Party that united with Mattick's Councilists in the thirties.

 

[LHB]

This is a weird perspective of the early Communist Party which contained anarchists, socialists, communists and trade unionists in it early stages.

What I mean by saying they are an American development is not to say you didn't have diversity of membership but rather that as an organization, quite in contrast to the Communist Party, its ideas were very much rooted in the American labor experience and were based on the work and efforts of American (meaning immigrant and homegrown) radicals. This is in contrast to the Communist Party which, while diverse in its membership, was based on ideas and methods that were largely imported from Europe. In this sense the IWW was more directly adapted to the situation in the United States because it developed as a direct result of the American labor struggle which was not the case in the Communist Party. The Spanish CNT and the French syndicalist unions from around the same time were very similar to the IWW in that regard and saw considerable successes in their specific circumstances because they were the most organically adapted to their immediate situation.

I think this is untrue. The AFL pretty much kept a solid (larger) number of members whilst the IWW grew and shrank depending on the mood of the workers in regards to struggles. The AFL weren't really under much threat from the wobblies.

Part of that is because the AFL started adopting more radical tactics and methods based on the successes of the IWW. AFL radicalism and willingness to engage in confrontation was at its greatest when the IWW had the most influence in part because Wobbly tactics, in many cases, worked better than the AFL's approach. It says a lot that in spite of the damage done by the FBI the CIO adopted the IWW's industrial unionism model instead of the AFL's craft unionism approach.

The AFL crumbling or turning leftward would be a necessity for syndicalism to be more successful in the US. I think a very interesting idea would be for perhaps the IWW to dissolve into the AFL and turn it radical and leftwards by ousting the labour aristocrat leaders before the red scares could gut the wobblies. The AFL would have been a much more solid organisation for the state to crush.

Agreed, for the IWW to succeed it needs to be the last union federation standing. As long as there is a reformist alternative that is seen as a credible option for rank and file workers the IWW will not get the critical mass it needs to pull off a nationwide general strike.

However I don't think the IWW taking over the AFL from within would work. What I'd see as more likely is the AFL making a number of tactical blunders which deplete their resources, member-unions of the AFL voting with their feet and affiliating with the IWW, and individuals peeling off. Regardless of how it plays out as long as Samuel Gompers breathes the AFL is going to fight any attempts at revolutionary radicalism; he would need to be neutralized or co-opted in some fashion for the AFL to go radical. If he goes down somehow that also makes it more likely for the AFL to follow him in his wake so either way Gompers is an element that has to be dealt with.

 

[Libertad]

Is it possible for America to engage in a large scale intervention in Mexico while at the same time continuing what it is doing before directly joining in the Great War by selling stuff and making loans to the British and the French? I guess looking at the possibilities of no American participation in the Great War is another thing for me to look up. I don't know if this is really going to mean a Central Powers victory.

Or maybe there might be some American "volunteer brigades" that might join the Allies, though this is still different from America joining the war itself.

This is also not just about the Industrial Workers of the World. I'm also talking about the entire DeLeonist strategy; hence making the Socialist Labor Party into a more popular political party. Or maybe it could just be the Socialist Party. I don't know.

 

[Libertad]

Well, LHB and I are talking already of certain plans and I am inviting fellow comrades when I already launched the thread to give their comments and ideas, so it means that we are making this challenge a possibility. An Industrial Union of the World centered in the former United States and United Kingdom.

I'm thinking so far of a Reverse Cold War scenario of sorts; making Russia and China centers of international capitalism and America and Britain as the center of the Union.

I am looking forward to at least make this a semi-collaborative TL. LHB and I are into this. But we are inviting you all to maybe expand it even more.

I'm still not certain about the POD. It might be in the 1905-1910 period. The President of the IWW is a different guy. There is no 1908 split. Then Samuel Gompers dying in 1909/1910. And then an international POD in China, courtesy of Hendyrk's Superpower Empire inspiration. Then a different US president by 1912 (Charles Evans Hughes most likely since he almost won it over Wilson OTL). Then the butterfly effect piling up.

I'm also still not certain of making a very long Cold War without a World War II. Or maybe making a World War II. Because I really want my Japan to go syndie. At least national/Strasserist like syndicalism maybe. And given the massive consequences of a syndicalist revolution in the industrial centers of the world; I see capitalism trying to make up for this big loss under the political embrace of fascism/integralism.

We'll see.