[Marxism] French Caterpillar workers battle for all workers

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

NY Times, April 17, 2009
Échirolles Journal
French Strikers Hang On to Threads of a Worldview
By STEVEN ERLANGER

ÉCHIROLLES, France — The workers here at Caterpillar have been on strike 
for more than a month, and they see themselves in a battle for all the 
workers of France.

They have “boss-napped” management officials, blocked intercity trains, 
stopped and interrogated the local police prefect, set up picket lines 
and organized assemblies to seek more solidarity with workers at other 
companies whose jobs are also at risk. Asked if France will experience a 
hot summer of protest, Pierre Piccarreta, a factory representative with 
the main union here, the General Confederation of Labor, or C.G.T., 
said, “It’s already a hot spring.”

A sign on a factory fence reads “Les Cater en lutte” — the Caterpillars 
at battle — and many workers spent a rainy Wednesday night on the site 
in tents, in what has become the most prominent labor conflict in France.

The workers are fighting for their own jobs, of course, and the jobs of 
their children here in the Isère region, around Grenoble, where the icy 
peaks of the Alps rise impassively above the clouds. But in a way these 
workers are also fighting for a traditional kind of French 
management-worker relationship that is quickly fraying in this global 
economic crisis.

“Today, politicians don’t put people at the center of life,” said Michel 
Palomera, 64, who retired in 2005 after 40 years at Caterpillar but came 
here out of solidarity with the strikers. “Today, the only value is money.”

Even 20 years ago, he said, “the bosses came from the bottom of the 
scale, with another attitude, and a good knowledge of the company and 
its values.” Today, he said, with globalization and the intensity of the 
crisis, “it’s all changed.”

Caterpillar, an American company that makes sophisticated agricultural 
and construction equipment, reported a profit last year of $3.5 billion. 
But in January, presuming a continued drop in orders, the company 
announced immediate cuts of 5,000 jobs worldwide and the gradual 
elimination of 22,000.

Here, where Caterpillar started operations in the early 1960s and now 
employs about 3,000 people in two plants, the immediate issue has been 
733 jobs that management said must go.

But Mr. Piccarreta, 53, said that in addition to full-time jobs, 
management wanted to get rid of an additional 300 or so contract workers.

“That means that one-third of the work force may disappear in six 
months,” Mr. Piccarreta said. “We insist that they have the financial 
capacity to do otherwise.” He complains that management refuses to sit 
down with the union and discuss alternatives, including a shared 
reduction of working hours and a reorganization of what has been a 
seven-days-a-week workplace.

While the conflict is about a global company with a distant management, 
there is affection for Caterpillar and the tenor is not anti-American.

Last week, management offered to fire only 600 people in return for 
major changes in working times and a rollback in benefits like the 
35-hour week, free transportation and cafeteria privileges. The union 
refused. “They want to profit by the global crisis to take back social 
advantages won at Caterpillar,” said José Muñoz, 64, who worked here for 
37 years.

The French president, Nicolas Sarkozy, who aides said was anxious about 
a possible season of escalating protests in France, tried to intervene 
early. He would not let the workers down, he said, and vowed to save the 
plant.

But the workers here consider this just another empty Sarkozy promise. 
Mr. Muñoz cited a Sarkozy vow last year to save 575 steelmaking jobs at 
the Arcelor Mittal foundry at Gandrange — jobs that have since disappeared.

Unemployment in France is now about 8.3 percent and is expected to reach 
nearly 10 percent this year. In this region, unemployment has hit 12 
percent.

The unions, traditionally strong in France, are struggling to find an 
effective response to the crisis and the threat to jobs. Many analysts 
say that the power of the unions has long passed its peak and that while 
they are able to disrupt everyday life — and let off steam — through 
one-day general strikes, they are no longer powerful enough to force 
substantive changes.

Asked if the workers regret holding four of their bosses overnight in 
their offices, which created a furor, Mr. Piccarreta said: “We didn’t 
mean to end up there. But it was exasperation, anger, and the bosses 
were making us go in circles.” The management representatives either do 
not show up to meetings or arrive late, he said. “We weren’t able to 
negotiate.”

Mr. Muñoz said, “The tradition of social dialogue is disappearing.” He 
said he considered it a question of manners and attitude, but also of 
strategy in a globalized company. “The bosses here are young,” he said. 
“They don’t know how to listen and manage people. They don’t have the 
power to decide.”

The press office at Caterpillar here said only that the situation was 
“sensitive” and that the company would have no comment.

Dominique Quercia, 36, has been a welder for 15 years, and has a 
9-year-old daughter. “I’m fighting for the people here, because it makes 
me heartsick to see people leave the company,” he said. “They have kids 
to feed.” New jobs are scarce, he said. “These people,” he added, “are 
going to be in deep trouble,” despite French social protections.

Michel Laboisseret, the C.G.T.’s main delegate to both Caterpillar 
plants, said the hope was that politicians, both national and local, 
would bring pressure to bear on the company to reopen negotiations in 
earnest with the unions.

“We’re realistic,” Mr. Laboisseret said. “We know we won’t be able to 
avoid layoffs. The point is to save the maximum number of jobs.”

Management has agreed to a fund of 50 million euros (about $66 million) 
to pay and help retrain those laid off. The unions want the number of 
jobs to be lost reduced to 600, but they also want the same special fund 
and a promise that Caterpillar will keep the plants open for at least 
five years.

Mr. Piccarreta has four children. “I’m 53 and I still have years to 
work,” he said. “I’m fighting against this economic system that makes 
men, women and entire families suffer. Everyone realizes this now. This 
system is starting to explode; it should no longer exist. It makes the 
entire world suffer, it enriches the rich and impoverishes the poor.”

Mr. Palomera was more practical. “We don’t want to break this company,” 
he said. “We just want to work.”

Maïa de la Baume contributed reporting.

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