Can Unions Rebuild Our Democracy?

Our institutions have failed to protect democracy. Can unions take up the fight?

For so many of us, these are mostly dark times interrupted by brief windows of hope — and the road ahead is daunting. No matter how this year’s presidential election plays out, the contest’s ultimate winner will surely be pessimism, one of the few things Americans across the political spectrum seem to be in alignment on: pessimism for the future, pessimism for possibilities of transformation, pessimism for the idea that justice will win the day.

We exist in a political system built on institutions seemingly unable to fulfill even the basic function of producing policies that huge majorities of Americans support, like lower prescription drug prices, less debt, increasing the minimum wage, a cease-fire in Gaza. It’s no wonder that public polling shows, according to the Pew Research Center, that “Americans’ views of politics and elected officials are unrelentingly negative, with little hope of improvement on the horizon.”

union workers in parade hold letters that spell UNION

There’s little evidence that our political system is anything but broken, and confidence in these failing institutions — from Congress to the news media to organized religion to the Supreme Court to the White House — continues to decline.

The necessary conversations in our movement spaces are mostly quite simple: What’s left? What’s worth salvaging? What can we carry with us? For those of us who see the power and potential of organized workers, the questions are sharper: What has our crumbling democracy meant for working people? Where are the centers of power within our labor movements? And, most importantly, can unions and workers ultimately change the horizons we’re walking toward?