Enter Fain, the first UAW president to be directly elected by the membership, after two of his predecessors and their underlings did prison time for spending union funds on golf clubs, luxury lodgings and steak dinners with champagne and cigars.
Months after his swearing-in this March, Fain bucked convention by not holding handshake ceremonies usually attended by the three companies’ CEOs and union leadership to kick off contract negotiations.
finally, a union president who knows how to negotiate
We don’t negotiate with capitalists
yes, but part of managing a conflict is allowing escalation to develop slowly. ultimately, class consciousness has to develop to the point where the class realizes they don’t need the capitalists and are better off expropriating them. but to get there you’re going to have to negotiate in the mid-term or you’re going to get replaced by the people you represent because it looks like you’re not actually fighting for their interests. demands that the workers want but which the bourgeoisie can never grant are critical jn this process.