By Herb Mills

Page 1

Within the past fifteen years, the maritime industry of the nation has undergone a major technological revolution. Change has been rapid and all-encompassing. Both the shoreside and the shipboard operations of the industry have been transformed by the changes which have occurred in its technical base. Indeed, the pace and dimensions of this revolution may be compared to those which distinguished the replacement of sail by steam.

The economics of this industrial modernization have received a great deal of attention, although its social consequences have been very largely ignored. For example, the ways in which the new technology has changed the nature of the work performed by longshoremen and seamen and the attitude of these workers toward their work have not been detailed.

The same is true of the ways in which that technology, and the manner in which it has been utilized by contract, has affected the job-related social relations of the dock workers and those of the seamen. It is from such a perspective, however, that the present discussion will focus on one small sector of the industry's workforce, the San Francisco longshoremen 1.

On the West Coast, the technology of modem longshoring has been introduced and utilized under a series of contracts negotiated by the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union (ILWU) and the Pacific Maritime Association.

The economic components of these contracts initially received close scrutiny from labor, industry, and commerce because they were advertised as providing a "model" for harmoniously introducing labor-saving devices and methods to the advantage of employer and employee alike.

To most observers, these agreements were also of particular interest because the West Coast union of longshoremen had played an exceptionally important and progressive role within the labor movement since the early 1930s. For many years, those men had also been distinguished by an extraordinary on-the-job militancy and "toughness."

While these circumstances have generated a lively and continuing interest in the industry, the ways in which the work and job-related social experience of the longshoremen have been effected by the utilization of new technology have received less attention. This essay will explore the changes which have occurred in the occupational experience of the San Francisco longshoremen.

The baseline experience of what is often referred to as "the good old days" will first be delineated. Most longshoremen remember that period beginning in the late 1930s when the ILWU had very effectively asserted its presence on the waterfront for several years. The passing of what is remembered as a "golden age," dates to the mid-1960s.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Thanks are due to a fellow longshoreman, Jake Arnautoff, for permission to reprint some of the sketches from his "Man on the Ladder"
(copyright 1967 Jacob V. Arnautoff)

©1976 Herb Mills

Herb Mills received his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, Irvine. He has been a San Francisco longshoreman for 13 years and for the past 4 years has served as an elected official of his local-Local 10 of the International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union.

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