Like bread and butter, socialists and unions are always found together.
Socialists see that the world of political and economic power is upside down, and our job is to turn it right side up. Why should the criminals who ruthlessly grab the land and resources reap the rewards, when it’s workers who turn those raw materials into things of use and value? The union anthem “Solidarity Forever” says,
“They have taken untold millions that they never toiled to earn,
But without our brain and muscle, not a single wheel can turn.”
In the US, in the 1920s and 30s, those who led the union movement — the ones beaten up and gunned down by company thugs — were Communists. But in the late 1940s and early 50s, with the paranoia and repression of the Red Scare, the Congress of Industrial Unions expelled unions with “red” leadership, and union membership and militancy went down.
Mexico was less scared of Reds from across the ocean, given their experience with the imperialists next door. However, workers were stymied by the PRI government, which appointed union bureaucrats to oversee fake unions that had no worker involvement. It was socialists who challenged this absurdity and rallied workers to fight back, to flood the public squares, block the public roadways and shut down workplaces.
Antonio Vital was one such unrelenting socialist leader. When he died, the workers center Casa del Obrero Socialista Antonio Vital was founded in his honor and to continue his work, as Hortensia Escobar tells us.
Today, in both Mexico and the US, new shoots of worker militancy are sprouting. And in both places, socialists often lead. Socialists and unions. The two still go together like bread and butter. Yes, “we can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old, for the union makes us strong!”
Hortensia Escobar Hernández is a Mexican economist and UNAM graduate. She’s a strong advocate for public and popular education, especially for indigenous communities. Being a Marxist positions her for the fight for labor rights, articulating strategies to make Mexican unionism truly representative. As events coordinator for the Antonio Vital Socialist Workers’ House, or COSAV, Hortensia organizes meetings and events that promote solidarity, self-management and the defense of working-class rights.
Who was Antonio Vital, and what was his role in workers movements?
In the 1970s, the government’s neoliberal attack on the public sector inspired an upsurge of worker revolts in Mexico.
In that era, Antonio Vital became a health sector union leader. He had a medical degree and worked as a public health statistician at the General Hospital of Mexico. Because it was a public hospital under the Ministry of Health, Vital was automatically a member of a union. In Mexico, doctors are in unions too.
The union went on strike in 1978, and he was among the leaders. The government brutally repressed and broke the strike, imprisoning and torturing Vital and six other leaders, including two women. But Vital continued his defense of workers, including those beyond the health sector, and initiated militant rallies on many occasions.
In the early 2000s, during Vicente Fox’s conservative PAN government, Vital denounced its neoliberal policies that were destroying the public programs so many people depended on. To strengthen public workers, he created the Alliance of Health Workers and Public Employees. In particular, he became known throughout Latin America for his fight to improve Social Security benefits for Mexico’s public employees.
What were the specific issues for public sector workers?
The Social Security administrations in Mexico — and there are three —cover not just pensions as in the US, but also medical benefits. Federal workers receive benefits from the National Institute of Social Security, or ISSTE, and private sector workers from the Mexican Social Security Institute, or IMSS. A completely different agency provides benefits to the state-owned oil company PEMEX.
First, Vital and others demanded that wages and benefits across the three social security systems be made consistent, with federal workers getting the same benefits as the other sectors.
Second, they demanded democracy in their unions. As with most unions created by the PRI, these public-sector unions were often corrupt and allied with the repressive government.
Third, “social security” also includes housing and provides loans for workers to purchase homes. But the interest rates were high, with heavy fines for falling behind. Fines were collected by extending the loans over longer periods of time or deducting from paychecks. Many workers took home only 20% of their income! Even today, many people are stuck with those debts that are impossible to pay off.
Did the new labor law of 2019 give more space to organize democratic unions?
The new Morena government passed the labor law with good intentions, but it’s almost impossible to implement. Since the repression of the 1970s, labor has become bureaucratic and precarious. Having to worry about their own family’s survival, workers have lost class consciousness.
Workers have to understand that they, not employers, create the wealth and deserve to enjoy its benefits. They must unlearn the neoliberal lies instilled in them over many years — that capitalists at the top deserve exorbitant wages and that they will use their wealth to provide jobs and income to the rest of society.
Other obstacles also make change difficult. The unions are constructed vertically, with national leaders at the top, rank and file at the bottom — and no intermediate structures for workers to learn how to operate democratically and effectively.
An example of the difficulties is my experience in 2019 at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, or UNAM, in Mexico City, where I taught. The new law required that all existing contracts had to be approved by a vote of the union members. But a “white” union, a bosses’ association run by a small mafia, controlled the teachers’ contract.
They spread false information before the vote, the election had no independent observers, and that same mafia organized the election. No wonder we lost! The lousy contract was ratified.
I believe the Morena government didn’t listen to workers as workers. We’ve seen other advances for low-income people, but it didn’t recognize workers organizations or fully defend workers’ right to organize.
Is that the reason that Casa del Obrero Socialista Antonio Vital, or COSAV, was founded? What do you do?
In 2022, three years after Vital’s death, we founded COSAV in his honor. Workers centers like COSAV give vital assistance to unions, since most workers have little experience with organizing. I’m not only promoting COSAV, but also centers organized by CILAS, such as the Casa Obrera del Bajío, the Micelio Rojo center and a few others — far too few!
COSAV is located in the heart of Mexico City. We provide legal advice and connect workers to government services. We provide political education through workshops and film screenings with discussion afterward.
We also do research to develop materials for union campaigns. For example, when the Metropolitan Autonomous University or UAM union went on strike, we analyzed UAM’s finances and designed a flyer to distribute.
Worker centers are also the places where worker struggles are documented and that history is preserved so that future generations understand what it took to win workers’ rights. COSAV has a workers’ museum in its future plans.
Do you see change with the Claudia Sheinbaum government?
At first, no. On February 7, Claudia proposed a reform to the ISSTE that would charge more for health insurance to workers earning a monthly income of 35,000 pesos. They also proposed that federal entities would have to pay higher premiums per worker. The teachers took to the streets! While there, they demanded the repeal of the 2007 law that privatized pensions.
Claudia responded quickly and positively. On March 18, she withdrew her February 7 proposal and froze the retirement age at 56 for women and 58 for men. She did not repeal the 2007 law, saying that would require significant budgetary resources that were not available.
Regarding those impossible to repay mortgage loans with huge penalties, she promised to forgive some debtors and reduce payments so that workers wouldn’t be impoverished. She promised to discuss, school by school, wages, promotions and the right to organize. At long last, some of the issues Antonio Vital raised back in 1978 are being resolved!
As class consciousness grows, I’m confident that socialists can again be at the forefront of a renewed labor movement. When workers realize that, as a class, they have the strength to end capitalist exploitation, they can transform society.