After the stunning victory at Amazon by a little-known independent union that didn't exist 18 months ago, organized labor has begun to ask itself an increasingly pressing question: Does the labor movement need to get more disorganized?
In its campaign at a Staten Island warehouse, the Amazon Labor Union relied almost entirely on current and former workers. It turned to GoFundMe appeals for financing, instead of using the union's funds. The word was spread in a break room and at low-key barbecues outside the warehouse.
The approach succeeded where larger, wealthier and more established unions have failed before.
The president of the American Postal Workers Union said that it was sending a wake-up call to the rest of the labor movement.
The success at Amazon comes on the heels of worker-driven initiatives in other industries. One of the largest labor actions in recent decades was set in motion by the use of social media by rank-and-file public-school teachers in states like West Virginia and Arizona.
White-collar tech workers organize protests at companies over issues like sexual harassment and prejudice. Workers at colleges have formed unions that are not affiliated with labor groups.
Over the past six months, Starbucks workers have voted to unionize 10 corporate-owned stores and have filed for elections in roughly 150 more, but the campaign has largely expanded through worker-to-worker interactions over email, text and Zoom, even as it is being overseen by Workers United.
Starbucks employees who are not unionized usually receive advice from their unionized counterparts, meet with co-workers in their stores, distribute union cards, decide whether or not to file for an election, and respond to media inquiries.
I can give my opinions, but living it means more than that, said Richard Bensinger, an organizers for Workers United.
In her book, No Shortcuts: Organizing for Power in the New Gilded Age, Jane McAlevey wrote that she was skeptical of two approaches to unions. Advocacy is when union officials try to hammer out deals with corporate executives or political power brokers to allow workers to unionize, but with little input from workers.
Ms. McAlevey questioned the approach that the union takes on an employer, which is primarily through the efforts of a professional staff, consultants and a group of activists rather than a large group of rank-and-file workers.
The Fight for $15 campaign, in which the service employees of the union have spent tens of millions of dollars to raise wages and help fast-food workers unionize, and the OUR Walmart campaign, in which Walmart employees had similar goals, were used to mobilize workers, according to some union officials
Peter Olney, a former organizing director of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, said that they were engaged in a campaign to try to bring to bear a lot of external pressure, with show strikes and community support, to jack up Walmart to deal with them. Walmart won't respond to strikes. You need to have real strikes.
Even if they fell short of unionizing workers, the campaigns helped mobilize support for higher wages. Defenders say the goal is to have an impact on a company- or industry-wide scale. A pending California bill that would regulate fast-food wages and working conditions is a sign of progress.
The advantages of going it alone and the limitations of established unions have been perceived by workers. The workers at the Amazon Fresh grocery store in Seattle reached out to a few unions, but decided that the unions' focus on winning recognition through the National Labor Relations Board would delay resolution of the issue.
When the workers floated the idea of staging protests, union officials responded cautiously.
The workers decided to form a union on their own, without the formality of the N.L.R.B., a model known as a solidarity union, whose roots precede the modern labor movement.
It is possible for workers to seek N.L.R.B. certification if they do not want to be associated with an established union.
The strategy at Amazon was akin to sending a conventional army into battle against guerrillas, and the talking points had fallen flat once co-workers realized that the union consisted of fellow employees rather than outsiders.
Angelika said that when a worker comes up to her, they look at her, then ask if she works here.
A variety of groups have tried to make it easier for workers to organize. The Solidarity Fund gave stipends to workers involved in organizing campaigns and gave grants to seven Amazon workers on Staten Island.
Unit is a for-profit company that provides software that allows workers to track the support of co-workers and file authorization signatures electronically with the N.L.R.B. Piedmont Health Services is a health care provider in North Carolina with roughly 40 eligible employees.
Even with cutting-edge tools, independent organizing efforts can be hard to sustain, even after securing a win through a strike or an election.
Kate Bronfenbrenner is the director of labor education research at Cornell University. It takes three years for a normal first contract campaign. This is going to take a long time if Amazon contests this in court.
The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which narrowly missed winning a do-over election at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama last week, can provide institutional support to see the effort through.
The need for a hybrid approach in which they retain control of their organizations but seek guidance and resources from more established unions is something that is already occurring to varying degrees.
The Amazon workers on Staten Island received pro bono legal help from employees of established unions as well as office space, and the Communications Workers of America lent them a messaging platform capable of sending out texts to co-workers en masse.
Workers United pays for legal work at Starbucks, such as litigating the company's challenges to election petitions. One of the baristas involved in the original campaign is also a worker for Workers United.
The question is whether traditional unions will be able to resist the temptation to seize control from the workers who fueled them, while ramping up their contributions to these efforts.
The postal workers union was prepared to contribute resources to the Amazon campaign with no strings attached, but Mr. Dimondstein advised his fellow union leaders to stand down and play a long game.
He said that we need to make sure that this doesn't break down into jurisdictional fights.
When asked if he thought established unions would be able to resist that temptation, he confessed his uncertainty.
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