CAMPAIGN TO ORGANIZE FEDERAL TRANSPORTATION SECURITY OFFICERS: A MODEL OF OPEN SOURCE UNIONISM

All discussions with people on the American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO (AFGE) campaign to organize federalized airport screeners—reclassified in 2006 as “Transportation Security Officers” (TSA), ultimately end with the adage that the mobilization effort is righteous. The author, who has organized over fifty organizing campaigns in nearly thirty years as a labor organizer, has never before worked on a unionization drive that feels as righteous as that to organize TSA workers.