All We Got Is Us: Worker Power in the Age of Oligarchy, A Fight Club Story

Amazon is the ubiquitous corporate titan of the present, it’s billionaire owner the quintessence of the ruling elite, and its workforce, the beleaguered millions knowable as the new American working class. In a lot of ways, Amazon’s ascendancy is a familiar story of entrepreneurial intrepidity and domination. So too are the heroic narratives of David-like triumph that surround efforts to organize. And yet, amidst a general social and political atmosphere that feels thick with anticipation, we still seem to be stuck in the prelude of this saga. What makes Amazon unique from its predecessors that lends to its impregnability? And why, in spite of years of public organizing, has the labor movement yet to catapult its ranks in and through an Amazon workforce seemingly hungry for a secure life? Building on over three years of delivery driving and labor/community organizing experience, I walk arm-in-arm with a group of Amazon drivers who would go on to become one of the first groups in the country to demand union recognition for their facility. Along the way, I revisit familiar debates of structural versus associational power as well as theories of collective efficacy and interaction rituals. I build a theoretical case that approaches class power as kaleidoscopic and multi-valent, demanding in turn a new approach to labor organizing fit to the challenges uniquely put forward by Amazon. Though our task is large, I argue it is accomplishable, provided that familiar faces learn to be led, and those learning to lead trust in the power of the people around them.