97 Hours of Struggle

This was the beginning of the end—200 of us pounding on the walls, on the floors, on the doors, chanting “No More Bullshit,” and “We Say No to Sweatshop Labor.” The 97-hour occupation of the Bascom Hall administration building had come to an end.

It began on Monday evening, February 8, at 5:00 PM at the center of the UW-Madison campus. Some 250 students and workers rallied in front of Bascom Hall. Speakers castigated the Administration for failing to act in the spirit of the campus and the broader community. Our position was clear: The University of Wisconsin must guarantee that the public be provided with full disclosure of the working conditions existent at all work sites involved in the production of UW-licensed apparel, and that a living wage be paid to all those employed at those production sites.

But the administrators in Bascom Hall had not listened to us. For years we had leafleted, testified, editorialized, cajoled, and passed resolutions to limited success. So, as the rally ended, the organizers announced that it was time to occupy the Administration's central building—Bascom Hall. The doors were thrown open and we marched in.

Once inside, the occupiers gathered in the main rotunda and a group of initiators explained the context in which the decision had been made to occupy Bascom Hall. Following this update, the assembled group heard a proposal from the initiators that a coordinating committee of four people be elected, and that this committee lead discussions of the larger group; the initiators also proposed that decisions throughout the occupation be made by a majority vote of two-thirds. After some discussion, a coordinating committee of five people was elected, and the voting process was affirmed.

We immediately reaffirmed the demands for full public disclosure and for implementation of a living wage guarantee. Then we debated the question of a women's rights guarantee as a condition for signing the Collegiate Licensing Company (CLC) Code of Conduct. Eventually, it became clear that most of those present supported adopting the women's rights plank on the basis that these guarantees (maternal leave, protection from harassment, etc.) were too important to ignore. An overwhelming majority voted in favor of adopting the women's rights demand.

With the first steps taken, people met in small groups to discuss tactics and support work, and a security schedule was established. Some people settled down with their class work, others broke out musical instruments and songbooks and began to celebrate. The campus police, for the first time in memory, were conspicuous in their absence. Only a few uniformed cops stuck around to keep an eye on us, and at one point that night Captain Burke stopped by to inform us that they would not contest our presence.

Some 30 people participated in the occupation that first night. On Tuesday night we were 40, on Wednesday we had 60, on Thursday we were 120, and by the time victory was achieved, some 200 of us were holding the administration building hostage. Throughout the week a team of support people worked 18 hours a day to relay messages, provide us with supplies, contact the media for us, and generally do what could be done to further the efficacy of the occupation. Mobilization teams were sent out to distribute leaflets, phone contact lists, and make announcements in front of classes. Bright green We Support the Sit-In signs appeared in offices and store windows across campus and around the city.

Support statements poured in. Students at UW Stevens Point began wearing armbands in solidarity with the sit-in. Student, labor, and democracy organizers at Georgetown, Duke, and a dozen other schools sent messages of support. Small businesses, co-ops, and local unions in the Madison area kept us fed and supplied with coffee. WORT 89.9 FM kept the community up-to-date with regular reports. Members of the faculty, speaking at official university events marking the UW's sesquicentennial year, castigated the Administration for its heartlessness; other professors wrote editorials in support of the occupation.

On February 9, the occupation group decided to call a support rally for the following day at noon. Less than 24 hours later, 300 people were rallying outside of Bascom Hall, thus demonstrating the level of attention and immediacy with which the community regarded our action. On February 11, a crowd of 200 people rallied, and then marched around to the back of the building, entered the basement, and chanted and shouted their way through the building to the Chancellor's offices, where they then proceeded to raise a ruckus until an aide made an announcement that David Ward had agreed to meet with us.

What emerged was a day- by-day back and forth exchange of letters articulating each side's position. The Chancellor would issue a written statement, we would respond with our statement criticizing his position, and then he would respond. By Wednesday we were fed up with the letter writing and demanded that he sit down and talk with us. On Friday, with news circulating that a dozen or so people were preparing to begin a hunger strike, the Chancellor agreed to meet with us and we reached the agreement that ended the occupation.

Many of us recognized that the action we had taken to occupy Bascom Hall was an act of education in its own right. We also saw that the occupation provided further opportunities to study. One work group got together and constructed a giant plaster sewing machine emblazoned with the university's red “W.” This sewing machine was placed on the lap of a giant statue of Abraham Lincoln on top of Bascom Hall. The image of Abe sewing a Wisconsin windbreaker appeared on the front pages of newspapers the next day.

Another group of people organized three on-the-spot teach-ins; these involved lectures and discussion on the topics of the rise of corporate power in the United States, labor history circa 1900-1930, and the status of the garment industry in the modern global economy. Additionally, a series of non-violence trainings were held throughout the week.

We were victorious not only in bringing the Chancellor and, therefore, the entire university around to our position; in the end he agreed to require the CLC Code of Conduct to implement full public disclosure, living wages, and women rights guarantees. We were victorious also in substantially shifting the balance of power on campus; the students, campus workers, and the community had finally won an issue of major debate at the UW-Madison. Perhaps most importantly, we were victorious in teaching ourselves and the wider community a lesson about radicalism, about solidarity, and about direct action.

The overall balance of the victory lay with the organizing so many of us had been engaged in for so many years. We had added more links to the chain. What follows is a brief overview of eight of those links.

UW-Madison Alliance for Demo- cracy180/MDE; http://www.Sit. wisc.edu/~democrac.

The UW-Madison Alliance for Democracy 180/MDE was formed in the spring of 1996 partly in response to the signing of a contract between the Reebok sweatshop corporation and the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents. In the years that followed, the Alliance organized numerous protests against UW's involvement in sweatshop labor. The Alliance for Democracy also served as a core group throughout the protest. Because of the nature of the counter-corporate, pro-democracy direct action organizing that the Alliance had done over the years, Alliance members were among the more experienced, connected, and committed people involved in the action. The Alliance was also the group that initiated and sketched out the occupation.

Because of the character of the UW-Madison Alliance for Democracy as an actual “alliance” of people from many different communities of interests, many people took part in the occupation that might not otherwise have acted on the sweatshop issue as being one which was directly relevant to them.

Madison Anti-Sweatshop Coalition (MASC); http://www.Asm. Wisc.edu/masc.

 The Madison Anti-Sweatshop Coalition was formed over the summer of 1998 to broaden the anti-sweatshop fight beyond campus, and as a means to include communities which had recently begun to take on the sweatshop issue in a major way. Over the course of the months leading up to the Bascom Hall occupation, MASC served as the main local organizational force in fighting sweatshops.

MASC provided the occupation with a core group of people who grasped the intricacies of the sweatshop issue both at the local level and more generally. The Madison Anti-Sweatshop Coalition served to bring a much broader and more diverse cross-section of organizations and communities into the anti-sweatshop fight.

Because of their affiliation with the United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS), MASC members ensured that the Bascom Hall occupation stayed in communication with anti-sweatshop activists on other campuses. We were in touch with students at Georgetown and Duke on a regular basis both during the occupation, and in the weeks leading up to it.

Associated Students of Madison (ASM); http://www.Asm.wisc. Edu/.

The Associated Students of Madison is the campus student association, representing the 37,000+ students of UW-Madison. ASM is a rank and file organization in the sense that every student is a member, and that all ASM campaigns and most committees are open to all students. ASM is led by an elected 33-person council, which sets policy and priorities for the organization, and allocates millions of dollars to student organizations and services. In 1998, the radical UNITY! slate won 16 of 33 seats on the Council. The new ASM leadership established the ASM Social Responsibility Campaign, which among other things, took a lead on the sweatshop issue.

ASM, as the campus student association, is unquestionably the most broad-based student organization at UW-Madison; it also has the largest number of members not only on paper, but also in terms of active members. The involvement of ASM leadership in the occupation meant that many students took part in the occupation that had never participated in direct action before. It also meant that the occupation had greater credibility with the Administration and the media as being an action that students in general supported.

ASM resources proved essential in ensuring the success of the occupation. Tools such as quality walkie-talkies, portable computers, cell phones, and megaphones were all readily available due to ASM involvement; the ASM offices and ASM staff organizers, along with the UW Greens Infoshop, served as the main base of support work for phone banking, web and email updates, media work, and so on.

ASM elections provided a forum for students to ratify or reject the goals of the occupation by referenda. Students generally showed their support for the goals of the occupation in the February 23-25 elections by passing the anti-sweatshop referenda with over 76 percent of the vote.

UW Federation of Labor & South Central Federation of Labor; http://www.Sit.wisc.edu/~workers/

The UW Federation of Labor was formed in the fall of 1997 as a means to unite campus labor unions and student organizations. To this date, the UWFL's main project, outside of bringing itself into being as a working federation, has been to fight for a guaranteed living wage for campus workers. Additionally, the Federation has played a role in enabling actions of solidarity around campus labor issues, including contractual struggles involving affiliated campus locals as well as organizing around the rights of student workers and Limited Term Employees (LTEs).

The affiliated unions of the UWFL played a significant role in the Bascom Hall occupation action; the Teaching Assistants Association (TAA/AFT) membership and the members of AFSCME 171 and 2412 were very supportive.

The South Central Federation of Labor (SCFL) is the regional labor council of the State of Wisconsin AFL-CIO. SCFL involvement in the Madison Anti-Sweatshop Coalition meant that the occupation received significant labor support throughout the region, that SCFL's Union-Labor News provided coverage of the action, and that the AFL-CIO phone lists were activated to turn people out for anti-sweatshop events. The South Central Federation of Labor is also the most recognized and established labor organization in our region of Wisconsin.

Student of Color Organizations

On the night of Thursday, February 20, leaders of various students of color organizations joined the occupation and stayed overnight. Thus, the action taken by leaders from within the Asian American Student Union, the Black Student Union, MEChA, and other student of color organizations represented a widening of the overall struggle and a shift in the cultural and political content of the protest.

Students of color and progressive white students have worked together over the past several years on a number of fronts. The Civil Rights Defense Coalition served a role in coordinating the struggle for the adoption of a strong affirmative action, or so-called “Design for Diversity,” program across the UW System. Last fall, the Black Student Union led a multiracial crowd of 500 students in a demonstration of support for affirmative action. Later that night some 250 of us confronted University of California Regent and corporate executive Ward as he spoke at a Bradley Foundation-funded attack on affirmative action and multiculturalism. The multiracial UNITY! slate ran 27 candidates for ASM Council, and won 21 of those races. All of the UNITY! candidates participated in the occupation.

Community; http://mcc.student- org.wisc.edu/

Community support for the occupation was strong throughout. Local elected officials affiliated with the New Party, the Green Party, and the progressive wing of the Democratic Party came to offer support. Food co-ops and small businesses donated food, housing co-ops donated blankets and other supplies, community members dropped off cakes, pizza places delivered free pizzas (one pizza box came with word “Revolution!” inscribed within), and the Cafe Assisi Collective contributed coffee.

Faculty

Another important development was the support among members of the UW-Madison faculty. A dozen professors broke through the silence, which normally greets student-led actions on this campus and spoke out strongly in support of our position. After the occupation came to an end, Chancellor Ward indicated that it was in part due to the support we received from professors whom he respected that he decided to reevaluate his position. Some of the faculty who spoke out had been involved in the effort to form the United Faculty and Academic Staff (UFAS/TAUWP/AFT) union, others had been involved in the Democracy Teach-Ins over the years, and still others spoke out due to students approaching them directly for support.

Media

Community radio WORT 89.9 FM and community television WYOU both carried daily in-depth stories about the occupation. The campus dailies, the Badger Herald and Daily Cardinal, as well as the Capital Times, the Madison Times, and the Isthmus, all ran editorials strongly supporting our action.

The media attention the occupation of Bascom Hall received was instrumental in bringing public pressure on Chancellor Ward. We knew he couldn't really afford to have the anti-sweatshop protests outshine all other stories about UW during our sesquicentennial celebration year. Did Chancellor Ward really want UW-Madison to be known as a campus of building takeovers, radical politics, and a heartless administration?

So what to conclude? Well, for one thing, many people reversed their positions because of the occupation. Chancellor David Ward reversed his position on sweatshops because of our protest. Ward also has been heard recently wondering on the radio whether Wisconsinites are aware that the public status of the University of Wisconsin is at stake; this from a person who several years ago said that he liked to think of the UW as if it was “almost like running a conglomerate.”

The Daily Cardinal (neo-liberal) and Wisconsin State Journal (conservative), both of which had editorialized against us only a week before, also eventually came out in support of our position in editorials and cartoons. Even some members of the College Republicans reversed course and came out to support our demands; this coming from an organization whose members registered the “Enslave Burma Coalition” as a student organization only a year or so ago.

The Bascom Hall Blackhawk Anti-Sweatshop Occupation was a success chiefly because it was a long time coming. Over the years, we organized, organized, and organized some more. Through our collective labor, we created an opportunity to seize a victory in the struggle between democracy and corporate rule. We seized that opportunity, and we won. But it's not over yet.                        Z

Ben Manski is a member of UW-Madison Alliance for Democracy. Photos by John E. Peck.