New Books in Public Policy Biko Koenig, "Worker Centered: Allyship & Action in the Contemporary Labor Movement" (Oxford UP, 2024)
Mar 11, 2026
A ground-level ethnographic look at a workplace organizing campaign among low-wage, immigrant workers. Tensions between promised worker leadership and ally-driven practice come into focus. Strategies, measurement mistakes, and why a campaign failed are discussed. Broader questions about representation, movement goals, and how allies should build power are raised.
AI Snips
Chapters
Books
Transcript
Episode notes
Embedded Campaign Where Worker Leadership Failed
- Biko Koenig spent 18 months embedded at the Clara Lemlitz Project (CLP) working a campaign at a 150-person mostly immigrant workplace attempting to build a worker-led union.
- The campaign won public leverage and meetings with the employer but failed to build worker participation or a sustained worker-led organization.
Worker Leadership Ideals Can Mask Strategic Gaps
- Strong ideological commitment to worker leadership can obscure practical strategic needs when organizing unactivated workers.
- CLP treated workers as already mobilizable, but organizing requires transforming unengaged workers, not just offering opportunities to act.
Mobilizing Versus Organizing Explained
- Koenig uses Hariri Han's mobilizing vs organizing distinction: mobilizing calls in the already committed, organizing must transform the uncommitted.
- CLP largely treated the workforce as mobilizable rather than needing deep organizing work.
