From the beginning, groups and individuals from the left participated
in the successful struggles of migrant logistics workers that started in 2008 and are still continuing.
Without their participation the struggles would, probably, not have started.
What motivates those left-wing activists to engage in struggles that aren't directly their own?
I take part struggles in logistics as much as I can
because I see it as a struggle of all of us.
The stronger this resistance against the capitalist attacks is,
the stronger we all are as a class.
In Italy, the struggle in logistics has been very intense,
with intense struggles in Emilia Romagna, right here in Bologna,
for about 3 years.
When the struggle started we tried to interact
and create contacts to this struggle.
The networks of militant understood
that the match held in the logistics sector was important.
In Italy, the logistics sector is one of the few productive sectors
which manages to operate in the black, despite the crisis.
When the attack against the workers took place, everyone knew that
the crisis was used as an excuse for the restructuring of production.
It was clear, when in a growing sector the wage costs are lowered,
something bigger was a stake.
With that in mind, the networks of militants understood
that it was important to participate.
To win this conflict meant to open new spaces
for improving the living and working conditions of all.
We took part in the struggles in the logistics sector
because we told ourselves: "Wow, that's what we have to expect,
what we experience every day, in a different form, not as frequent,
but what we have to expect as a generation: precarity, exploitation.
To support the logistics workers
was a step towards unity.
As well as to say: "I support you because I know
that one day you will support me, too, when I need it."
It is nice what the warehouse workers always shout: "We are united!"
That is, basically, what enables us to win the struggles.
That is, to bring students, precarious and workers together,
and single out the exploiter, the boss, as the only common enemy.
Students and precarious, at first from within the networks of militants,
later not necessarily from within those, stood behind the expansion process
which included more people each time.
The students saw that the university
has stopped to function as a social elevator,
so that you finish your studies and, therefore, have access to a better life.
Many young academics knew, that the only jobs that were waiting for them,
were those in the cooperatives.
And in the logistics sector you find mostly cooperatives.
In Italy, the cooperatives
are organizing a big part of precarious labor,
in a process of intense deregulation and casualization of labor.
By destroying the mechanism in the logistics sector
the cooperatives use to lower labor costs,
the students and precarious had the chance to creat instruments
they can use in other work environments that function similarly.
We understood that the crisis is an excuse to lower the labor costs,
to deregulate and abolish the protection and security of workers
while all social groups step down the ladder and impoverish.
That has given us the determination to establish a common terrain of struggle,
and in the end everybody benefitted.
It do not want to say that my living and working conditions are the same
as those of a migrant worker. - Obviously, there are basic differences.
I have the status of a state citizen, and the migrant worker does not.
That is a big difference.
However, despite the different experiences and conditions
have we seen have a common tendency.
For us, the attempt to attack this common tendency,
the constant impoverishment of all, seemed politically important.