For this activity, rather than an example of using the activity, I want to provide "talking points" and questions I might use to orient myself before facilitating this activity. These are not notes for a lecture I would give. They are not the right answers that I am looking for, they are just to help me clarify my own thoughts. They may help you do the same. But you will need to clarify your own ideas.
On the three points of the triangle:
These laws and rules and the related procedures and enforcement agencies form what we can call the institutional side of union democracy. Included in this side are the structures by which the union is organized, the financial structure, the way work is organized, etc. Is there a stewards council? What is its authority? Are business agents elected? How many members does each business agent represent? How big is the union local? Are there committees?
The institutional side of union democracy is crucial. [explain why]
The rules and procedures form the backbone of union democracy, but you need more than a skeleton to walk. We also need to look at the union's culture. By culture I mean the ideas people have about their union, how they feel, what they assume, what feels right/wrong, what members expect of the union leadership and of each other, ...
One place to look for the union's culture is in its publications, all of them: the union newspaper, the union website, the posters and bumper stickers, the t-shirts, the picket signs, etc. All of those reflect the union's culture: what does it tell you when the union newspaper that consists of photos of the union president getting an award, photos of the union president giving an award, photos of the union president watching someone get an award, etc.?
The union's culture is also found in the way people speak, what they say, what jokes they tell, what songs they sing, as well as what they don't say.
And, to introduce another factor, in every aspect of the union's life there is at the same time an official and an unofficial union, what Jane LaTour calls the upstairs union/downstairs union. So, when we talk about a union's culture, we need to talk about the rank-and-file newsletters as well as the official union paper, about the independent blogs and online forums as well as the official union website, about the jokes told in the union office and those told outside the union meeting. The union's culture is shaped by the members as much as it is by the officers and staff.
This brings us to the third point of our triangle: participation. If the institutions form the backbone of union democracy, and the union's culture is its brain, participation is the union's lifeblood and its breath.
By participation I mean the who-does-what, the who-knows-what, the who-decides-what, the who pays and who benefits. Who is a member, who votes in union elections, who runs for office, who works for the union, who knows the union procedures, who has access to the union financial information, who decides what is on the agenda for the union meeting, who decides what the union contract demands should be, who votes on the contract, who does the bargaining, who works for the union, who stays on the job, etc.
Even in a union that has democratic bylaws and officers and staff who promote democracy, if the members are passive and uninvolved, democracy will suffer. In the face of a passive membership, officers and staff will usually substitute their own activity for that of the members, aggravating the condition. They may also blame the members and create an "us vs. them" culture in the union that further disocurages member participation.
Note that the same question of participation exists for rank-and-file groups: it is all too easy to build an opposition group in which a small number of people -- sometimes even just one -- makes all the decisions, writes all the newsletter articles, decides who to run for office, etc.
The basic idea is that when we talk about democracy in a union, we are talking about three things: the institutional stuff, the rules, procedures, organizational structure, financial structure, etc.; the cultural and political stuff, meaning the ideas that officers, staff and members have about the union, the ways the various players think and talk about what they do, about what a union is...; and the participatory stuff, the actual quantity and quality of participation in the union, the who does what, who decides what, who knows what, etc.
It's easy to see the importance of each part of the triangle when you think about it in concrete terms: clearly, having democratic procedures -- like election of local union officers by secret ballot, to take a right union members have under federal law, or ratification of contract by secret ballot vote of the members, a right union members do not have -- is vital.
we say a union is undemocratic when it has rules that violate members' democratic rights (institutional stuff). Likewise, a union that has very democratic rules and procedures, may still have an autocratic culture or way or organizing politically that undermines democracy making the union democratic on paper, but not in reality. Finally, a union may be democratic on paper, and may promote the idea of union democracy, but still suffer from a divide in participation...
Explain triangle tool here, using union democracy and AUD's work as the theme:
Institutions (procedures, rules, Robert's Rules, legal system, but also labor's built environment assets, buildings...) This is big part of AUD's work, why? difficult, so people need help, important
Culture (newspaper, parties, websites, shop talk meeting practices, jokes, nicknames, etc.)
Participation (who does, knows, controls, decides, hears, sees, suffers, what)
internal and external...