Above, jubilant Egyptians in Cairo set off fireworks in celebration of democracy and human rights in February.

Workers at root of revolution

The story of how the Egyptian people could, within a few short weeks, overthrow a tyrant of 30 years, reveals the central role of the labor movement in the struggle for democracy and human rights.

The toppling of Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak through nonviolent demonstrations has inspired people all over the world. In Egypt, the yearning for freedom by idealistic young people merged with the longing for social justice of a long-suppressed labor movement. With amazing speed, the struggle for freedom and social justice, expressed through peaceful direct action, proved more potent than a corrupt and repressive power structure.

This struggle has special meaning for our union. The UAW has experienced in its own history the power of peaceful resistance. It was through sit-down strikes in the 1930s and 1940s that our union won the right to organize and collectively bargain. Civil rights advances in the 1960s occurred through marches and boycotts in which Martin Luther King Jr. articulated the message of nonviolence that he absorbed from the example of Mahatma Gandhi. Cesar Chavez used peaceful protests and boycotts to organize the farm workers’ union.

These examples, and now the example of Egypt, strengthen our faith that when people stand up for democracy and human rights, justice will triumph.

This stirring example of the power of peaceful protest provides lessons for the UAW in its global fight for human rights and social justice.

Conditions in Egypt

Since the government in Egypt imposed martial law in the 1950s, the people have been living under a corrupt dictatorship that suppressed fundamental rights. There was no freedom of speech or assembly, and no right to have independent unions. Officials hand-picked leaders of a government-controlled union federation. If people spoke up against government policies or working conditions, the police could arrest and imprison them without charges or trials. Attempts to organize independent unions led to retaliation and repression. Mubarak orchestrated sham elections that put him and his associates in power year after year.

While the Egyptian economy has grown annually at a rate of about 5 percent, all of the wealth has gone to government and business elites. Mubarak’s family alone has amassed billions of dollars from government-controlled businesses. As the rich have gotten richer, the poor continue to live in desperate poverty. Forty percent of the population lives on $2 a day or less! The minimum wage of $33 a month for a six-day workweek hasn’t changed since 1984. Health and safety conditions are terrible, and child labor is a large part of the Egyptian workforce. The largest textile factory in the Middle East, employing 25,000 workers, is located in the Egyptian city of Mahalal, and the average base salary there is $102 a year. Workers must work more than one job to survive.

Egyptians demonstrate for right to organize unions

Although outlawed, labor activists have engaged in efforts to organize independent unions in recent years. These union organizing efforts planted the seeds for the 2011 uprising.

Since 2004, more than two million Egyptian workers have participated in illegal demonstrations demanding the right to have unions. In April 2007, 24,000 workers at the Mahalal textile factory staged a series of walkouts. Young human rights activists, inspired by the courage and idealism of the workers, created their own activist organization, called the 6th of April Youth Movement. This Youth Movement was instrumental in planning the 2011 protests that sparked the uprising.

Union organizing gained momentum, and in 2008 for the first time workers publicly elected their own leadership of the newspaper union. Also in 2008, 10,000 tax department workers camped out in front of Egypt’s Parliament for nearly two weeks, finally winning the right to form their own independent union.

Professor Joel Beinin of Stanford University commented that this grassroots activism by workers demanding the right to organize is what created the foundation for the democracy movement.

The Tunisia revolution

It was the successful uprising against the Tunisian government in December 2010 that lit the spark of democratic revolt in the Arab world. The labor movement in Tunisia was the driving force behind this movement.

As in Egypt, the Tunisian people were ruled by a corrupt dictator. Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, 74, ruled for 23 years by jailing opponents, censoring the media and crushing dissent.

This all ended on Dec. 17, 2010, when a young worker, Mohamed Bouazizi, set himself on fire to protest government oppression. This desperate act by a fruit vendor trying to support his family triggered a nonviolent resistance movement. Twenty-eight days later, on Jan. 14, 2011, Ben Ali resigned and left the country.

Labor unions were central to the protests, holding rallies and demonstrations in defiance of the government’s attempts to suppress freedom of assembly.

The labor movement and the Egyptian revolt

Emboldened and inspired by the events in Tunisia, thousands of Egyptians began their pro-democracy demonstrations in Tahrir Square in Cairo on Jan. 25. As the demonstrations grew, the government reacted by shutting down the Internet and rounding up activists and foreign journalists. Mubarak refused to step down, instead announcing that he would not run in September and would let his vice president manage governmental operations.

It was Egyptian labor that gave the decisive push on the 16th day of the protest, Feb. 9, driving Mubarak from office two days later. Actions taken by labor activists in dozens of cities around the country provided the critical support for the democracy movement.

Workers at textile, cement, chemicals, transportation, telecom and tourism firms shuttered their businesses and joined the peaceful protest with strikes and sit-ins. Hundreds of bank employees protested outside of their banks. Public transport workers demonstrated outside the state TV and radio building. Ambulance drivers parked 70 emergency vehicles along a road. Even police went on strike. Telephone operators refused to place calls for one minute in a show of support. Retirees organized protests as well, demanding that the billions of dollars amassed by government and business elites be returned to the people to fund public pensions.

The New York Times wrote about Hamdi Hussein, a textile union activist, who related that unions had to meet secretly for many years because of the suppression of union rights. “Now the labor movement that helped topple Mubarak will take its rightful place in protecting the revolution,” Hussein said.

Hussein said that the Egyptian labor movement has articulated two primary goals of their protests:

• To win the democratic right to establish free, independent unions.

• To eliminate the huge income gap between the wealthy elites and the struggling working class.

Lessons from Egypt’s human rights revolution

A critical lesson of the Egyptian uprising is that unions are essential to democracy and human rights. In order to preserve his dictatorial powers, Mubarak suppressed the right to form independent trade unions. It was the involvement of labor activists through strikes and sit-ins that provided the final push to remove him from power. Without labor support, the Tahrir Square demonstrations would not have achieved their goals.

Labor rights are human rights. The right to have a union is the right to freedom of speech and association for workers. Unfortunately, this right to organize unions is under attack around the globe. In some countries, labor activists face the threat of arrest or physical harm. In the United States, when workers try to organize unions, management threatens retaliation such as layoffs, benefit reductions and firings. Federal labor laws do not provide any meaningful penalties for this intimidation.

That is why the UAW has adopted Principles for Fair Union Elections that allow workers to freely decide whether to organize. The struggle in Egypt reminds us that our sisters and brothers around the globe are fighting for these same rights, and we must fight together. In a global economy, labor must join together and speak with one voice to the multinational corporations.

Unions are essential for social justice. The obscene gap between rich and poor in Egypt is the direct result of the suppression of free trade unions. Unions provide the counter-balance to corporate power. The sit-ins of the 1930s and 1940s by auto workers began the process of creating a middle class in the United States. The strategy by corporations to banish unions from the United States is threatening to destroy the middle class. The UAW’s struggle to restore the middle class is the same struggle as the Egyptian unions are engaged in. The UAW must act in solidarity with all unions around the world to create a global middle class. Without strong unions, society will be divided into have’s and have not’s. Democracy cannot survive such injustice.

Another lesson from the Egyptian revolution is the power of nonviolent direct action in support of democratic rights and social justice. Violence and war have never been the solution to injustice. We must learn from the examples of Gandhi, King, Mandela and our Egyptian brothers and sisters. The UAW must find creative ways using new tools to demonstrate our commitment to human rights at home and around the world. We must all act together as the people of Egypt have done.

Finally, an important lesson from Egypt is that the people can triumph. We face so many challenges and so many attacks on working people and unions. The right wing in the United States is obsessed with creating a union-free America. They try to scapegoat union activists and immigrants and gays and people of color, hoping to divide us. We must hold on to our faith in our common humanity and we must maintain our optimism.

As we remember the fireworks crackling in Tahrir Square, let us renew our commitment to stand up in peace and love for the fundamental democratic rights of all people. That is the proud mission of the UAW.