Jonathan, I had fully expected the kind of arguments that you make to be made in the reply by Wong and Bernard. As China goes through the process of being merged more fully into the global capitalist economy it is inevitable that the various state and party institutions, including the ACFTU, will go through significant change. I am fully prepared to engage in a thorough analysis and discussion of how the genuine trade union movement can relate to those individuals inside the ACFTU who try to make the ACFTU act like a real trade union. Frankly, I think based on the experience of eastern Europe the best way to do that is to give full support to independent labor activity. And that is also the conclusion of the China Labour Bulletin headed by Han Dongfang which wrote a reply to a longer version of the original Wong and Bernard piece in Human Rights in China. In any case, while I respect the work of Anita Chan, I think that there is very little evidence that the ACFTU is giving much assistance to what Michigan sociologist Ching Lee calls a veritable "labor insurgency" now underway among Chinese industrial workers. These workers are acting independently. When I have the time, as I indicated in my original post, I intend to explore these kinds of issues more closely and fully.
However, this is NOT the kind of argument that was contained in the reply by Wong and Bernard to my letter. If you have not read the letters I would ask that you do (I will be happy to fax you a copy, since they are not available electronically). Their reply ignores my focused factual argument about the nature of the ACFTU and instead they call such argument McCarthyite, racist, conservative and national chauvinist. Those are their words. Frankly, my only conclusion is that these people are out of touch with reality. To suggest that the AFL-CIO is racist and conservative is, frankly, absurd. This is particularly true in light of the near decade long evolution of the AFL-CIO - under both Kirkland and Sweeeney, I might add - to express an independent perspective on foreign policy, beginning with their opposition to NAFTA, developing into the Campaign for Global Fairness and a new progressive view on immigration (both of which were reaffirmed at the recent AFL-CIO Convention). I have an article that will appear in the Pepperdine Law Review in the next few months that explores this evolution more closely (with an emphasis on the international labor rights strategy) that I would be happy to provide you. In any case, what is truly remarkable and inexplicable to me is how the heads of two of our most important labor education centers, UCLA and Harvard, could express views that, far from critiquing what they suggest is a Cold War viewpoint, actually TAKE US BACK to the Cold War by using invective not concrete and constructive discussion. Surely we should expect more from those we count on to provide a broader perspective for the trade union movement. Stephen F. Diamond School of Law Santa Clara University [EMAIL PROTECTED]
