Constructing and maintaining the appearance of cooperation

Abstract

THE knot connecting the ILWU and PMA is a complicated one. Keeping the living agreement alive involves doing more than following contractual formalities. For the bargain to live and be jointly kept, private agendas are publicly presented as reciprocated efforts. The two sides try to look like they give as well as take, even when they do not. The union and PMA therefore do more than create contractual language to live with. They also cultivate a relationship in which each side can live with the other. When the appearance of reciprocity is not maintained, one side appears disadvantaged. At this point, living agreements die and defensible disobedience is no longer possible. Making the ILWU–PMA relationship work, therefore, means that the agreement must be kept alive in another sense: The impression of cooperation must be maintained even when one side takes advantage of the other. Expressed differently, a fiction must be established for the relationship to live. Constructing this social fiction is a selfconscious process; it is deliberate and two-sided. Each side is involved in making the illusions joint creations. The fiction is produced in a number of observable ways. CREATING THE ILLUSION OF NEGOTIATION One example emerged during contract talks. Coastwide negotiations began in May and concluded in the middle of July. However, because the ILWU is a decentralized organization and locals are relatively autonomous, the contract is not signed until working rules are negotiated for each port.