|
« AAUP Homepage
|
Organizing in the Lab
Postdocs see collective bargaining as an insurance policy against the arbitrary nature of bureaucracy.
By Benjamin Weaver
During the spring and summer of 2006, I was involved in the postdoctoral organizing drive in the University of California system led by Postdoctoral Researchers Organize, a campaign affiliated with the United Auto Workers (henceforth PRO/UAW). I was primarily organizing at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, administered by UC on behalf of the Department of Energy. Although the campaign was not initially successful (a renewed campaign in 2008 has recently petitioned for certification), it demonstrated some of the challenges of organizing postdocs and the compelling reasons for unionization.
This was not the first time I participated in an organizing campaign. About eight years earlier, as a graduate student in the UC system, I had been involved in the campaign that led to the recognition of UAW Local 2865, which represents teaching assistants, readers, and tutors (collectively, “academic student employees”) throughout the UC system. That recognition was the result of a very long campaign. Perhaps its most important lesson was the need to organize simultaneously on all UC campuses. The PRO/UAW campaign followed the same model, with an important difference: California law had been amended in 2004 to allow card-check recognition. That is, if an organizing campaign could collect authorization cards from an absolute majority of employees in the job titles it was seeking to represent, it would immediately be recognized as the collective bargaining agent for those employees, without the need for an election.
As in campaigns to organize graduate student employees, the way in which postdocs are classified by their institutions is important. A postdoc is no longer a student and should not expect to be treated like one. Frequently, however, the postdoc experience is little different from that of a graduate student, with perhaps slightly higher pay. Furthermore, postdocs can end up in a bureaucratic limbo, treated as neither students nor employees. When I was a postdoc (2001–04), UC classified postdocs as “visiting” employees. As “visitors,” we were not eligible for dental and vision insurance (which, for obscure reasons, were tied to retirement benefits). This policy, badly in need of correction, was an ideal motivation for a collectively bargained contract. Perhaps in recognition of this, UC extended dental and vision benefits to most postdocs in early 2005; postdocs at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory got them in late 2006, just as the PRO/UAW campaign was in full swing. Yet, although these benefits were granted, they are still not contractually guaranteed.
The PRO/UAW campaign was centered on individual visits with postdocs. One or two organizers would visit postdocs in their offices and discuss the benefits of collective bargaining. Interested postdocs would sign an authorization card. Because of my experience organizing academic student employees, I was able to provide a perspective on the collective bargaining process that many postdocs lacked. As more campaigns to organize academic student employees are undertaken, the pool of postdoctoral employees who have experience as both academics and union organizers will continue to grow.
One of the biggest challenges was simply identifying and finding postdocs. Departments did not always maintain up-to-date lists of postdoc employees. Some postdocs traveled for extended periods for their research. In some cases, employees thought they were postdocs when their payroll titles were something else. The ambiguities of bureaucratic limbo extended to the highest level; even the UC system did not have an accurate list of postdoc employees. This difficulty resulted in the original PRO/UAW campaign falling slightly short of an absolute majority, as, indeed, some postdocs turned out to be employees with a different payroll title. (I myself was technically no longer a postdoc, but in a research staff position, although there was no significant difference in the work I was doing.)
During the campaign, postdocs expressed many reasons for desiring collective bargaining. Dental and vision benefits were important (standard medical benefits were already available). Cost of living is another pressing issue in the San Francisco Bay Area and in California in general. One of the provisions of the UAW Local 2865 contract with UC that most interested postdocs was a cost-of-living adjustment tied to that of the UC faculty.
Postdocs are under pressure to produce research and papers. Ideally, this work will be rewarded not just with pay, but also with career advancement. However, because postdoctoral positions are funded by diverse and often limited-term grants, even the hardest-working postdoc may find a career interrupted or cut short by lack of funding. This fact is particularly apparent at national laboratories, where shrinking science budgets and continuing resolutions have ravaged funding. It seems natural that future postdoc contracts will contain provisions for job security. The UC administration, in particular, has set itself up for contention with employees on the issues of pay and job security with a series of executive pay scandals that have made national news. The conclusion of unions representing UC employees is that UC has more than enough money to satisfy their contract demands.
Most of the postdocs I met enjoyed their work and had good relations with the principal investigators who had appointed them, but principal investigators have essentially no power over issues such as health-care benefits. Many saw collective bargaining as an insurance policy against the arbitrary nature of the UC bureaucracy, which helps explain why, despite collegial relations with supervisors, response to the organizing campaign at UC was overwhelmingly positive. As universities continue to operate like corporations, unionization is a natural response of all university employees. The idea of postdoctoral organization will continue to spread, and organizing campaigns can be expected to persevere even if years of work are necessary to gain recognition.
Benjamin Weaver is a research scientist at New York University.
Comment on this article.
|