NYU Professor Marion Nestle, author of the upcoming Soda Politics: Taking on Big Soda (and Winning) (Oxford University Press, October 2015), said Coca-Cola’s partnership with AFT “is an example of Coke’s typical strategy: partner and buy the silence of the partners on issues of labor rights and health.”....corporate crime reporterWe reported this the other day (AFT Partnering with Coca-Cola).
the use of illegal child labor in the dangerous fields of sugar cane harvesting, and Coke’s well-documented complicity in violence against union leaders in Colombia and Guatemala and the outsourcing of thousands of jobs to low-wage subcontractorsThe AFT for sale. We need a union crime reporter.
In October, 2014, the American Federation of Teachers passed a resolution to boycott all Coca-Cola products.Counterpunch
The resolution — “Stop Coca-Cola’s Abuse of Children and Violation of Human Rights” — called for a boycott of Coca-Cola products based upon a litany of violations of workers’ rights and child labor laws on the part of the company.
Now, just four months after that resolution was passed, the AFT executive committee, has reversed course and passed a resolution ending the boycott.
AFT officials said that the passage of the boycott resolution last year “drew an immediate reaction from the Coca-Cola Company, whose national leadership sought an opportunity to provide the American Federation of Teachers with information on actions taken in recent years to address these concerns.”
As a result of these meetings, the AFT “will collaborate with the Coca-Cola
Continue reading:
http://www.corporatecrimereporter.com/ news/200/aft-ends-four-month- old-coca-cola-boycott/
April 01, 2015
Collaborating With a Corporation That Preys on Children
Why Did the AFT End Its Coca-Cola Boycott?
In October, 2014, the American Federation of Teachers passed a resolution to boycott all Coca-Cola products.
The resolution — “Stop Coca-Cola’s Abuse of Children and Violation of Human Rights” — called for a boycott of Coca-Cola products based upon a litany of violations of workers’ rights and child labor laws on the part of the company.
Now, just four months after that resolution was passed, the AFT executive committee, has reversed course and passed a resolution ending the boycott.
http://www.counterpunch.org/EIA:2015/04/01/why-did-the-aft- end-its-coca-cola-boycott/
AFT’s Coke Boycott Ends With a Search for Stakeholders
The first two paragraphs of the agreement are a defense of Coca Cola. The third paragraph declares that AFT has a vast network of stakeholders. Then comes the agreed-upon actions:
* Collaborate to identify local stakeholders in specific countries with expertise in education and/or addressing child labor to facilitate the child labor due diligence studies.Or, to be more concise: Find stakeholders, hold meetings (as needed), find more stakeholders (as needed).
* Facilitate participation of AFT global affiliates Education International and Public Services International in local multi-stakeholder convenings, as needed.
* Collaborate on approaches to the remediation of child labor (when it is identified) and the advancement of school attendance, including engaging with a broader group of stakeholders, as needed.
AFT and Coke will review progress once a year, probably over the phone.
In AFT’s defense, this is about as well as this entire exercise could have ended for the union. The only other alternative was to watch the boycott peter out… assuming more than a handful of AFT members were aware of its existence in the first place.
5 comments:
Glad you are fighting the Cola wars Norm. Our profession is dying before our eyes and you want to write about coke. Yeah it is all related but we have to focus on schools now. Forget killer coke for a while.
To 6:17,
I disagree. This is an excellent example of how the AFT and UFT work. Coke did it with the AFT. The AFT and UFT do the same thing with all opposition."If you can't beat them join them." Opposing group are given seats; rights of the minority (ATRs) are traded; losses are spun as victories - the reason our profession is dying is that the membership has tunnel vision and almost complete apathy.
Excellent points - I think this is a very important issue and I am working on a response in a separate blog post. They do what they do for complex reasons. They are not incompetent or only out for money -- they want to be part of the ruling class and to get that they have to sacrifice the members where necessary.
If any of the holdouts still need proof that Weingrovel works against kids and teachers and parents here you go. The rest of us are like yeah that figures. Once you realize she's against you it all makes sense.
Educating the ostrich like teacher masses that their AFT Prez is working against them is a job that never ends. Too many teachers still think she supports them. This is imperative and Norm is to be commended.
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