In the United States, the percentage of workers who belong to a union has declined to an all-time low since the height of labor militancy in the 1930s. Despite this historic weakness, or perhaps because of it, the labor movement is experiencing a historic moment of dynamism and reform. After decades of wage stagnation, neoliberalism can no longer credibly claim to be delivering the goods. Workers are fighting back. And where union leaderships have been reluctant to lead the charge, workers have taken matters into their own hands.

Starting in the teachers’ unions in the early 2010s, with reform slates leading the first major strikes from Chicago and Los Angeles teachers in decades, and moving now to the Teamsters and United Auto Workers unions where, thanks to direct elections of top international union officers, reformers now occupy some of the top officer positions, the labor movement is embracing change.

But “change” and “reform” can mean many things. We need to look at what new leadership is actually doing to advance worker interests and organize in the twenty-first century context and evaluate if it’s effectively building power. Our union, UAW Local 2865, is a case study in which two very different versions of union reform movements have taken root in the last decade and led to very different material results for workers.