It has been nearly two decades since “The Rank and File Strategy” was written. Since that time, much has changed in the world and in the US labor movement.

We have seen the Great Recession, the eurozone crisis, resistance to the austerity these have brought on in Mediterranean Europe and elsewhere, and the Arab Spring and the disappointing retreats that often followed, to mention some of these changes. The US labor movement has continued to shrink, with most of its efforts to grow failing.

Partly in response to this failure, six unions, led by the SEIU, split from the AFL-CIO in 2005, creating the Change to Win Federation. Some unions fell into a virtual civil war. Public sector unions have seen an unprecedented attack not only on wages and conditions, but on the very right to bargain and, perhaps, exist. On the other hand, the role of immigrant workers has grown and with it new organizations and resistance. At the same time, moments of high-profile resistance, like the 2011 Wisconsin upsurge or the September 2012 Chicago teachers’ strike, display labor’s potential power.