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Security Cameras and HQ Squads: Wal-Mart's Union-Busting Tactics
NEW YORK - The world's biggest retailer, Wal-Mart, today stands accused of routinely flouting its workers' human rights through a sophisticated strategy of harassing union organisers, discriminating against long-term staff and indoctrinating employees with misleading propaganda.In a forensic indictment based on two years' research, the Washington-based pressure group Human Rights Watch lifts the lid on Wal-Mart's aggressive tactic of stamping on the slightest sign that workers are organising representation.
Evidence in Discounting Rights includes examples of workers forced into unpaid overtime and an alleged strategy of squeezing out long-serving staff who are more costly than low-wage, temporary, younger workers.
It reveals that Wal-Mart, which owns Britain's Asda, has elaborate tactics to stop staff from coming together to fight for better conditions. The company is accused of focusing security cameras on areas where staff congregate and shifting around loyal workers in "unit packing" tactics to ensure votes for union recognition are defeated.
American store bosses get a "manager's toolbox" - a manual which openly describes itself as a guide on "how to remain free in the event union organisers choose your facility as their next target".
They are told to phone a special "union hotline" if they suspect staff. Teams of union busters are then sent from Wal-Mart's Arkansas headquarters who regale workers with vitriolic presentations on the perils of unionisation.
Carol Price, author of the report, said: "Wal-Mart's aggressive and sophisticated anti-union strategy is based out of its headquarters. This is not a store-by-store problem - the violations are a direct result of the company's philosophy."
With $351bn (£176bn) in annual revenue and 1.8m staff worldwide, Wal-Mart was named America's largest company in the latest Fortune 500 rankings but its controversial business practices have caused increasing political unease. Unions organised a nationwide protest bus tour last year and prominent politicians have been getting on board.
The Norwegian government has ordered its state pension fund not to invest in Wal-Mart shares because of workers' rights violations. Hillary Clinton last week pointedly refused to endorse the company when asked during a presidential debate whether she considered it to be good or bad for America.
"It's a mixed blessing," Mrs Clinton said. Although Wal-Mart provides many jobs in rundown areas of her former home state of Arkansas, she said its behaviour raises "serious questions about the responsibility of corporations" in providing healthcare, safe working conditions and an environment of equality.
Combining documentary evidence with interviews of dozens of past and present Wal-Mart employees, Human Rights Watch has built a picture of a company which goes to great lengths to minimise the freedom of its staff.
Healthcare programmes are often limited to "catastrophic coverage" for accidents and emergencies, rather than preventative medicines. The company faces the biggest class action lawsuit in US history in which 1.5m women claim the company discriminated against female staff in pay, promotions and assignments.
In a breach of US law, Wal-Mart has allegedly banned union organisers from distributing flyers outside its stores and has confiscated literature found on the premises. Since Wal-Mart began in 1962, there has only been one successful formation of a union - among meat cutters in Texas seven years ago. The department was subsequently shut down - an act ruled illegal by US labour authorities.
Faced with increasingly vocal opposition, Wal-Mart's chief executive, Lee Scott, has been trying to improve the company's image. It has introduced more upmarket items and is testing environmentally friendly initiatives at two experimental green stores. Mr Scott has pledged to improve healthcare coverage and, in a significant breakthrough, he held a meeting in February with one of the company's most outspoken critics - Andy Stern, the head of the Service Employees International Union. The company has even distributed voting information to all its 1.3m US staff encouraging them to register for a voice at the next presidential election.
Wal-Mart had not responded to repeated requests for comment by the time the Guardian went to press last night.
Film campaign
Need to bash a union? A video production company discreetly tucked away in a 113-year-old former general store in America's rural deep south can help.
Paul French & Partners specialises in making bespoke, glossy films dramatising the so-called impact of union recognition - strikes, redundancies and uncompetitive, failing businesses.
Wal-Mart uses Paul French to produce films ostensibly to explain "the facts" to workers about union membership. But the Georgia-based firm's website makes no bones about its true purpose - to prevent union recruitment drives.
A sample film made for a valves company, DeZurik, is ironically entitled "It couldn't happen here" and bombards the viewer with examples of disruptive strikes by unions.
Another, for Delta Mechanics, depicts organisers as silky-tongued manipulators who pressurise staff around the clock until they join.
A third film for Allied Holdings dramatises the pain of redundancies caused when union-negotiated pay rises make a company uncompetitive.
When contacted by phone, the firm's founder, Paul French, was reluctant to talk about such films: "A small number of our pieces are on that subject. I would rather talk to you about [films on] sexual harassment and violence in the workplace."
When asked whether he had any qualms about union-bashing films, Mr French simply said: "No".
Paul French boasts a blue-chip client list including General Electric, Fruit of the Loom, Lockheed Martin and Wrangler, although the type of work it carries out is not disclosed.
Persuasive videos are a relatively common tactic for employers in America - the Scottish bus company FirstGroup recently angered the mighty Teamsters union by using videos to "inform" its US staff about the impact of signing up.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007
25 Comments so far
Show AllI refuse to shop at Wal Mart.
Never have, never will!
JJPeters has the right idea.
Vote with your money like the fascists do. Starve that beast first, then move on to Target, K-Mart, and all the other big boxes.
I have found with some planing and a willingness to forgo impulse shopping I can avoid Wal-Mart completely. If your retail choices do not allow you to do so, only buy what you absolutely cannot find anywhere else at places like that.
Will you pay more for the same stuff? Yep you will, but the question you need to ask yourself is: Is maintaining our national soveriegnty and labor rights worth it? It sure is!
To all:
How is it that this progressive site does not mention the May Day, the International Day of the Working Men Solidarity.
Workers of the world, those who sell their hands, skills and brains, unite!
I guess I have to disagree with you on that. I used to shop sometimes at Walmart several years back and then my consciousness was raised, or actually slapped violently is more like it, lol. I grew up in a very republican town, went to business school and worked as a corporate accountant for 20 years, so I suppose it's not too surprising why it made sense at the time to shop there (disgusting and abhorrent now, but that was then, this is now). Then I watched the documentary "The Corporation" and then "Walmart - the High Cost of Low Prices". If "The Corporation" is the general theory then Walmart is the case study. I simply was not aware prior to that - I was too sucked into my cultural myopia.
After seeing these films, everything changed! It's strange really - everything looks different after an experience like that. We haven't stepped into a Walmart since and we've gotten much better educated about all the damage that multinationals are ravaging on the world. We buy local, organic, and fair trade, made with recyclable or precycled materials whenever we can. It didn't happen overnight, there was a learning curve there for sure, but we've come a long way. The internet has been a fantastic resource once we changed our focus. And after realizing the devastation that was taking place, YOU CANNOT GO BACK. Even though it costs more, we feel good about making choices that support poeple and the environment, not multinational stockholders and their overpaid management. Now we get our produce in the summer from an organic CSA farm, and this year I have the priveledge of working there. We have minimized nearly every aspect of our lives at this point and we are saving to buy land in Oregon and start an organic CSA farm of our own. And there is no amount of money that can replace the satisfaction and sense of well-being that we feel with our new way of life.
I'm sure some people will never change their mind, but personally, I think that many, many would if they understood clearly what is at stake. If someone you know is a devoted Walmart shopper, recommend they watch these two documentaries - it might just do the trick. It could even be life changing. Also, let's face it, it's simply getting harder and harder these days to deny the damage that is being wrought by companies like Walmart, no matter how much advertising and PR they vomit. Don't give up on folks - set the best example you can and help them understand why you do what you do.
gmkaake
Congratulations on your transformation. Sounds like you followed about the same path I did. Only difference is that I worked in not-for-profit and cooperatives for most of my career. And I'm a bit older I think. I bought that farm in Oregon that you are planning on. Only problem is that small farmers have a VERY difficult time making a go of it in the current economic and governmental environment. With the "mainstreaming" of organic and local, small farms are at even more risk. And I don't even want to talk about the Farm Bill, Monsanto, GMO's, building on excellent soils for greed, etc!
I also refuse to shop at Wal-Mart. I studied Fashion Merchandising and this corporation just about put my career out of commission.
As an individual or household, 'voting with your money', and refusing to support 'bad' products or companies may be the ethical/moral thing to do, but it is practically futile.
Organized consumer boycotts have merit, but even these seem to accept the basic premise of 'market democracy': That consumption is a form of voting.
The idea that currency is a form of voting actually contributes to the power of corporations, NOT consumers. It validates the most powerful companies with the stamp of consumer approval as well as justify every form of social (and political) inequality. e.g., If people wanted what X provided, they'd 'vote' for X by buying X's labor, service or goods. Any attempt to interfere in the market is not just a 'distortion' it is now also anti-democratic.
Of course, there are ways to tweak the market democracy model but none of them can overcome the fact that the very few will always have more power and more legitimacy.
Cash registers are NOT ballot boxes.
I concur with "Poet"…
Everyday we choose where to spend our money. We make choices based on advertising, value and fads. We do not make choices concerning corporate responsibility. If you shop at Wal-Mart you support the underhanded practices of a business while not supporting the welfare of people in your community.
Here is a secret the corporations do not want you to know: Consumers control the behavior and the vitality of every corporation and business.
Corporations know that if consumers unite they can ultimately determine the fate of American and international trade. Here is another thing they know, advertising is a tool used to keep consumers buying goods based on sex, status and our self conscious self loathing. Advertising is a psychological science used to appeal to you emotional states of mind. As a result we buy things to make ourselves feel better, whether we need them or not (the evidence is in self storage companies).
Corporations know that American consumers will never unite to control corporate behavior because they have a short attention span. American's have a short attention span because corporations control the media, they control your information, they control your options and they control your choices, ultimately they control you.
Consumers have what the corporations need to survive. You as a consumer shape the character of our nation on a daily if not weekly basis. Corporations like Wal-Mart exist because American consumers allow them to.
Time to wake up America, if you want to take back control of your nation you need to patronize corporations that are responsible. Each and every corporation has a personality. Based on what you now know about Wal-Mart would you want a business with that type of personality as a friend or neighbor?
American Democracy and Capitalism are controlled by the dollar, your dollar. Ultimately, we are in control.
I worked briefly at WalMart Headquarters, only to find that while employees all go to mandatory indoctrination rallies under the big American flags, people speaking all German to each other come from the control supervision rooms to monitor and adjust the employees' computer terminals. Later I found out that Walmart was a major contributor to CA governator Ahnold Schwazilekker, and Walmart parking lots were a frequent site of his campaign speeches. Go figure. Over 50% of their Walmart goods have long been imported, mostly from east and south Asian sweatshops. After Walmart was sold out years ago, the big American flags are a FRONT. German profiteers + Asian sweatshop labor + American pocketbooks = WalMart. People in Arkansas are too poor to be able to say anything and still survive.
Then there are the pro-nazi books on the shelves that 'Walmart' could not be responsible for in its deep southern stores. The story probably goes far deeper than union-busting alone. Neu-welt-ordnung und Wal-Mart.
The world needs to know about the corruption and tyranny of coorporations. "But I have a resposibility to my shareholders", says the C.E.O.
What could be the solution?
MEDIA REFORM
Yes, MEDIA REFORM is more important than the war on terror. MEDIA REFORM is more important than global warming. And yes MEDIA REFORM is more important than workers rights at Wal-Mart.
It's so simple it's celebratory.
adamwestfakey@yahoo.ca
What good is media if you can't read?
It's time to actually DO something! Call, write, and email your Senators and Harry Reid to support the passage of the Employee Free Choice Act (S1041). Do it TODAY! Do it again tomorrow! Get your friends envolved. The more voices the better.
Get moving!!! Make your voice heard. And make it LOUD!! Raise the volumn!
We were shown anyt-union and anti-inspectore videos when I worked at the Red Cross. While Wal Mart leads the way, many, many of our employers are monitoring what we read, who we socialize with, our histories on a variety of levels, and of course, our precious bodily fluids. They try to run our lives when all we want to to sell our labor for enough to live on. On this May Day, it is important to realize that democracy begins in the workplace. If we are afraid to speak out politically even on our off-time for fear of losing our jobs, than corporo-fascism has won.
The union movement in the US was destroyed decades ago & the strongest unions in the US today are more guilds than unions. Real unions anywhere in the Americas have a hard time surviving, all too often, that should be taken literally.
Laborers are ultimately the creators of all supply.
Consumers are ultimately the creators of demand.
Laborers and consumers have been unable to properly exert an
influence in the market to their benefit because they do not act
collectively.
Merchants are able to exert an influence in the market because
they can negotiate in a collective manner the value of commodities
created by their labor.
Merchants are also able to exert an influence in the market because
they are consuming in a collective manner from their supplier.
In general, the distortion that wealth causes in capitalist
systems is due to the ability of that wealth to represent the
collective actions of multiple players, undemocratically.
As corporations grow larger, then so must unions.
In fact a proper union could replace the government's market regulations,
and could enforce them without violence, but by cooperation and non-cooperation.
After organizers for the Steel Workers Union threatened my family and me back in the 1960's I vowed to never join a union and never did.
However, seeing the way the government and corporations have raped and pillaged the workers in recent year, I'm turning the page and starting to see a real need for BOTH organized labor and consumption.
For example, this administration has declared a cold war on Argentina and others, not so much because they don't like their politics as they don't PROFIT from Argentina's oil like they do Arab and Canadian oil!
Smart consumers would REFUSE to purchase Arab oil, products made in China, or services that farm out their tech support or billing to India or Pakistan.
Every purchase we make from our potential enemies is funding our own downfall. Our politicians don't care as long as they get their cut!
The uninsured pay 10 times what insurance companies do to hospitals because the insurance companies negotiate collectively. This is fair, and not at the detriment of the market because cooperation and non-cooperation will never cause more influence than the market will support. Collective action is the way!
Buy Local!
Correct response!!!! Buy local whenever possible. It is especially important to support your local farmers and ranchers. When the fuel runs out or is too expensive, if you don't support local now these businesses and farms won't be there when your community needs them. Further, fight any new "big box" stores in your area. These mega businesses drive out local business with their preditory practices.
Big business is destroying this country. Tell your political leaders to quit listening to big business. Big business lobbyist push our politicians to enact laws that hurt or prevent small businesses to compete. If you want to open a convenience store in this country big business has it rigged to where you are required to buy from one or two major distributors and competition is not allowed. That is why a mom and pop store can't compete with the big chain convenience stores. It's the same in groceries, hardware, auto parts, and all the other specialty stores.
You name the product and you will find that the laws have been written in such a way that either makes it illegal or impractical for some one to buy directly from the factory.
I know people who are truck farmers who sell better products than the big chain grocery stores but their not allowed by law to sell to mom and pop stores. The only place their allow to sell is at farmers market type locations that don't allow for competition. Every body has to sell the tomatoes at the same price.
You can tell everyone whats going on at Walmart,in the way they treat their workers,the way they buy their goods and their advice to industry to move over seas,and theres no stoping them from shopping at Wallmart,as long as the problem doesn't affect them they will never stop shoping there.
gmkaake
Thanks for the kind words. I'm in Corvallis (Rebel Farms). And Measure 37 is just about to come crashing down on Benton County. There is a public hearing next week to reclass 222 acres of prime exclusive farm use land that is within 2 miles of town. It's all for the greed of one man that may limit our community's ability to provide local food and fodder in the future. I don't even know what to do. It's all bad! But I will go down SCREAMING!!
Free Citizen
Have you ever noticed where Wal-Mart puts up stores? Right next to poor neighborhoods! And in locations that have a lot of unskilled labor. And when they drive out all the other local businesses, they have a bunch more unemployed poor people to put into the labor machine. People work at Wal-Mart because they do not have any other choice (I guess they could starve, but that's not really a choice either). Wal-Mart is the WORLD'S largest employer. Period!
I have been appreciating your posts rebel. I can understand why it has been difficult. Our culture is just now waking up to all of this. Hang in there! I deeply respect the wisdom that you share - from my perspective you seem to have made a great deal of progress and much to teach...spiritually I mean. And isn't that what it is all about anyway, the reason we are here? We all need to wake up from this crazy dream and get with the program! We plan to work until we have our land paid off, so hopefully that will make a difference. The more everyone sees that we must support local folks and farmers especially, hopefully things will improve. Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you for blazing the trail! I think one day soon, when the shxt hits the proverbial fan, so to speak, everyone will be gladly appreciating the forethought, wisdom and effort you have provided!
For everyone trying to relate to why it's so important to buy local here is a recent article that helps put some perspective on it:
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2007/05/seeing_red.html
Rebel, are you by chance in the Eugene area?
The Chamber of Commerce is the BIGGEST most powerful pro-capital lobby in DC. Check out their website. Wal-Mart needs the OK from economically depressed, poor, town/city councils to build in the community. We have enough history with WM -ruined small businesses, low paying part time jobs, traffic/infrastructure problems, higher taxes.... We have power through our local Chambers of Commerce to stop Wal-Mart in their tracks. Become active in your Chamber of Commerce, make sure your dues supports legislation that benefits your customers....start locally where we make a difference.
Be especially critical of franchises, Wal-Mart may be the biggest but not the worst violator of individual rights.
REMEMBER--Wal-Mart jobs are SERVICE JOBS! We are providing services to each other!? When did services become "Commerce"? Find out what the Chamber of Commerce does, what legislation it supports in Congress, which political campaigns it contributes to.
The Chamber of Commerce is a big business supporting bigger businesses.