Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
This episode highlights the lengths to which California growers went to
prevent the unionization of their workers and maintain tight control over
farm labor. Growers tried to control the bodies of strikers (through intimi-
dation and violence), the public's perception of the confl ict (through
public relations and CASV), and the solidarity of lettuce growers and
packers (through pressure from GSVA). The sophistication of these prac-
tices is a testament to the importance of labor in California's niche market
industries. Despite all this organization, planning, and action, however,
labor relations in the lettuce industry stayed the same. Growers clearly saw
the packing shed workers' attempt to gain union recognition as a crisis, a
major threat to the structure of their industry, but their actions were aimed
toward maintaining the status quo. Unionism was a problem to be addressed
through intervention, and solutions such as bargaining and union recogni-
tion were ruled out as a matter of course. Those growers who entertained
the idea of signing a contract with the shed workers were marginalized by
others who used the ideology of anti-Communism and the interlocking
power of the three associations to suppress dissent. In all, the growers
deployed powerful cultural frames and organizational techniques to main-
tain their control and power.
Sympathetic and Critical Voices in California Agriculture's Farm Labor
System
Aside from the fi nancial, political, and police groups that California growers
have relied upon to address labor confl icts, other organizations have pro-
vided support and advice to growers with respect to labor issues. For
instance, UC scientists and administrators also recognized a farm labor
problem and sought to provide counsel and solutions to help growers deal
with labor issues. At the same time, others within the UC identifi ed Cali-
fornia agriculture's labor system as problematic, exploitative, and unsus-
tainable, and challenged growers to make radical changes in it. These critics
joined the activists who were directly involved in labor organizations by
calling for an end to the status quo in California agriculture, presenting a
powerful and very public counterpoint to growers' attempts to preserve
and repair the labor system already in place. In this section I explore these
divergent voices, their visions of labor use in California, and their solutions
for its problems. As a large organization, the university accommodated a
