Introduction - Don Sutherland

Nowadays, shop stewards are more commonly known as “delegates”. Shop Stewards Committees were formal and informal leadership groups inside the workplace. Shop Steward Councils were regular joint meetings of Shop Committee reps from several workplaces at once.

This article, Activity of Shop Stewards Councils, was presented to all union members for discussion on the job, using the AMWU Monthly Journal in July 1976. Its purpose was to explain a National Conference decision taken just 7 months after the defeat of the Whitlam Labor government in November 1975.

Through Carmichael’s voice, the union leadership was explaining to the members not just that it would continue to fight militantly in the hostile climate of the Fraser LNP government, and how it would do so.

Carefully reading the article reveals Laurie Carmichael’s understanding of strategy for unions and their allies.

Not long after he became Secretary of the Melbourne District of the AMWU, Carmichael used his annual leave to concentrate on a comprehensive study of strategy. He used the Mitchell Library and other resources so that he could access the best available material on the subject, including new developments in business strategy.

He is not coy about putting forward his explanation as “theoretical assistance” for shop stewards and members. He believed strongly they could cope with “theory”; that he could connect the day to day experience of shop stewards to a sensible theory of strategy that they could grab hold of and contribute to through their own efforts starting in their workshops.

It’s worth paying attention to and thinking through some key concepts in the article:

• The “starting points” for strategy,
• Using shop level experience,
• “Perspective” on the campaign,
• “Stages of development” of a strategy,
• “Moving from one stage to another”,
• Collectively developing the strategy,
• Adjusting and aligning tactics and actions based on the growth of power,
• The ebb and flow of the campaign.

Later, in his “retirement”, Carmichael gave some lectures to prospective union leaders on the importance of strategy, and the role of leadership in starting and guiding it. His notes started with: “Without Strategy You are Flying Blind”.

He described how he used these ideas in the Vietnam Moratorium Campaign, the defeat of the penal powers in 1968, and the shorter hours campaign. The deliberate intent is, in every moment of a campaign, to build strong workers’ consciousness, Carmichael led the 38-hour week and wages victory over the Fraser government that helped its defeat in 1983.