Computers, Privacy & the Constitution

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MichaelSosnickFirstPaper 3 - 04 May 2025 - Main.EbenMoglen
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Collective Bargaining as an Anti-Surveillance Strategy

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 An obvious caveat to this approach is the lack of union density. And surveillance technology presents a vicious cycle, preventing organizing against it. Technology is used to prevent organizing activity, through cameras that monitor employee interactions and quotas that make chat breaks impossible to physical separation of workers. Where workers cannot communicate, they cannot organize; this is organizing 101. Yes, the NLRB should expand its understanding of unfair labor practices to account for the union-busting potential of these algorithmic management systems. But we all know how politically infeasible that is—especially now. I wish I had a better answer for how to escape this death spiral. For now, I would tell union leaders to run significant education campaigns, and militantly hold employers accountable. Fight surveillance tooth and nail. Make surveillance technology widely, wildly unpopular. The revolution seems distant, but organizing and solidarity will get us there. Unions, however weakened and adrift they may be, still have the potential to drive that change.
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Not one word of anything written by a labor union is cited here, or indeed by anybody else. So one obvious route to improvement would be to put the next draft in touch with some literature, and in particular some learning about how unions are in fact dealing with workplace surveillance issues. The existing draft "would tell union leaders" without actually doing any listening to them. That doesn't seem quite like what studying is about, or the best way to be part of working peoples' collective self-determination.

 
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Revision 3r3 - 04 May 2025 - 12:39:20 - EbenMoglen
Revision 2r2 - 24 Mar 2025 - 21:30:18 - MichaelSosnick
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