Matthew Dimick teaches at the University at Buffalo School of Law.
Most proposals to revive the labor movement focus on expanding labor’s rights. But the “rights” framework hampers working-class solidarity and makes unions subordinate to the state. To build working-class power, we should focus instead on labor freedoms.
Bernie Sanders’s Workplace Democracy Act would be a major step forward for the labor movement. But what the movement needs most isn’t stronger government support for unions — it’s greater freedom for workers to strike.