In an era marked by political anxiety and social fragmentation, organized labor has emerged as an unexpected bright spot. Public approval of unions is at historic highs: nearly 70 percent of Americans now view unions favorably, and among people under 30, the number approaches 90 percent. Recent years have also seen headline-grabbing strikes and organizing drives among autoworkers, writers, actors, nurses, warehouse employees, baristas, and academic workers. By any cultural measure, unions are back in the conversation.
Yet beneath this resurgence of interest lies a stubborn reality. Union density in the United States remains strikingly low. Only about 10 percent of workers are unionized overall, and in the private sector, the figure drops below 6 percent. Despite high-profile victories, the labor movement’s footprint continues to shrink relative to the size of the workforce—an erosion likely to accelerate amid hostile court rulings, aggressive corporate resistance, and a federal labor apparatus increasingly stacked with anti-union actors.
This disconnect between enthusiasm for unions and actual union growth is the central problem addressed in We Are the Union, a new book by sociologist Eric Blanc. Blanc argues that labor’s stagnation is not due to worker apathy, but to an outdated organizing model that relies too heavily on professional staff and too little on workers themselves.
The Case for Worker-to-Worker Organizing
Most unions today deploy staff-intensive organizing campaigns, often assigning one organizer for every 100 workers. These campaigns are expensive, slow, and difficult to scale. While they can win individual elections, Blanc contends they are structurally incapable of reversing labor’s long-term decline.
His alternative is what he calls “worker-to-worker organizing”: a decentralized model in which workers initiate, lead, and sustain organizing efforts, with union staff playing a supporting rather than directive role. The goal is scale. If unions want exponential growth rather than marginal gains, they must equip workers everywhere to organize themselves.
Blanc draws on his involvement with the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC), a volunteer initiative launched during the pandemic that connects workers seeking to unionize with experienced organizers via digital tools. EWOC demonstrated that workers—even in small, overlooked workplaces—can learn organizing skills and take collective action without waiting for institutional backing.
Lessons From Recent Campaigns
The Starbucks union drive illustrates the potential of this approach. What began in a handful of Buffalo coffee shops quickly spread nationwide, fueled by peer-to-peer communication, social media, and small-scale job actions. Traditional staff-heavy organizing would have been impractical in such small, dispersed workplaces. Instead, workers shared tactics, momentum, and confidence across hundreds of stores.
Other examples reinforce the point. Workers at the Pacific Northwest fast-food chain Burgerville won a union contract with no formal union backing at all, relying on disciplined internal organizing and sustained collective pressure. At the NewsGuild, a revitalized Member Organizer Program empowered rank-and-file journalists to lead new organizing drives, resulting in thousands of newly unionized media and tech workers.
Across these cases, the pattern is clear: workers who organize their own workplaces are often the most effective organizers of others.
Why the Terrain Has Changed
Blanc situates his argument in a broader economic shift. The mass workplaces of the 1930s—giant factories drawing workers from nearby neighborhoods—are no longer the norm. Today’s economy is dominated by geographically dispersed, multi-unit corporations like Walmart, Amazon, and Starbucks, whose employees commute long distances and rarely share community life.
In this context, organizing can no longer rely on leafleting factory gates or shutting down a single strategic plant. Digital tools, remote communication, and decentralized leadership are not optional innovations; they are necessities. Social media, Zoom meetings, and online training have significantly reduced the cost of organizing and enabled workers to connect across vast distances.
Limits and Risks
Still, worker-to-worker organizing is not a cure-all. Small “hot shop” victories can be isolated and vulnerable, especially when employers retaliate aggressively. Legal expertise, financial resources, and coordinated bargaining power remain essential—roles that established unions are uniquely positioned to play.
There is also the question of scale and composition. Much of the recent wave of grassroots organizing has occurred among relatively educated workers in academia, media, healthcare, and cultural institutions. Any true labor revival must reach the other 85 percent of the workforce, particularly in logistics, manufacturing, retail, and service sectors, where workers retain enormous structural power.
Recent large-scale victories—such as successful UAW campaigns in auto and battery plants, as well as mass organizing among nurses and hospital workers—demonstrate what is possible when grassroots energy converges with institutional strength.
What It Will Take
Blanc is right that worker initiative is indispensable. But worker-to-worker organizing alone will not rebuild the labor movement. Success will require a convergence of forces: labor law reform, aggressive enforcement against union-busting, bold union leadership, and sustained grassroots activism. Above all, it will require a widespread recognition that a functioning democracy depends on a strong, growing labor movement.
Unions may be popular again—but popularity must now be translated into power.