The
Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), also known as the "Wobblies", is an international labor union that was founded in 1905. The philosophy and tactics of the IWW are described as "
revolutionary industrial
unionism", with ties to socialist,
syndicalist, and anarchist labor movements. The IWW promotes the concept of "One Big Union", and contends that all workers should be united as a social class to supplant capitalism and wage labor with industrial
democracy. It is known for the Wobbly Shop model of workplace
democracy, in which workers elect their own managers and other forms of grassroots
democracy and self-management are implemented. The IWW
… Read more does not require its members to work in a represented workplace, neither does it exclude membership in another labor union.
Syndicalism is a current in the labor movement to establish local, worker-based organizations and advance the demands and rights of workers through strikes. Major
syndicalist organizations include the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), the General Confederation of Labor in
France, the National Confederation of Labour in Spain, the Italian
Syndicalist Union, the Free Workers' Union of
Germany, and the Argentine Regional Workers' Federation. A number of
syndicalist organizations were and still are to this day linked in the International Workers' Association.
Syndicalists advocate
direct action, including working to rule, passive
resistance,
sabotage, and strikes, particularly
… Read more the general
strike, as tactics in the class struggle, as opposed to indirect action such as
electoral politics. The final step towards
revolution, according to
syndicalists, would be a general
strike. Labor unions were seen as being the embryo of a new
society in addition to being the means of struggle within the old.
Syndicalists generally agreed that in a free
society production would be managed by workers. The state apparatus would be replaced by the rule of workers' organizations. In such a
society individuals would be liberated, both in the economic sphere but also in their private and social lives.
Joe Hill was a Swedish-
American labor activist, songwriter, and member of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). He rose in the IWW
organization and traveled widely, organizing workers under the IWW banner, writing political songs and satirical poems, and making speeches. His most famous songs include "There Is Power in a Union", "The Preacher and the Slave" (in which he coined the phrase "pie in the sky"), "The Tramp", "The
Rebel Girl", and "Casey Jones the Union Scab", which express the harsh and combative life of itinerant workers and call for workers to
organize their efforts to improve working conditions.