L.A. Longshoremen Keep Mum on China Trade Talks.

The International Longshore and Warehouse Union, traditionally at the forefront in protesting social injustice, is noticeably silent as Congress considers granting permanent normal trade relations with China.

While the issue, coupled with admission of China into the World Trade Organization, was enough to trigger rioting in the streets and an eight-hour shutdown at seaports in Seattle a few months ago, longshoremen in Los Angeles are merely shrugging.

"The WTO and China is the last thing on the workers' mind here," said Mike Puliselich, secretary-treasurer of ILWU Local 13 in Wilmington. "They worry about themselves. China will come into the WTO anyway, and it will only mean more business for us."

Indeed, a significant portion of the exploding volume of container traffic arriving in the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach comes from China. The value of two-way trade between the Los Angeles Customs District and China grew from $4.5 billion in 1989 to $28.7 billion in 1998, the latest available figure. That represents a 537.8 percent increase and makes China the second largest trading partner with L.A., after Japan.

And that soaring volume is creating a boom in L.A. port jobs, which are among the highest paying union jobs in the world.

If the ILWU does break ranks and chooses not to lend its considerable muscle to organized labor's attempts to block a trade deal with China, it would be a dramatic departure from its past. Longshoremen have, for example, refused to unload ships from South Africa during the apartheid years and coffee from El Salvador during the military regime there.

'Very surprising'

ILWU's silence on the China issue "is very surprising," said Sanford Jacoby, a professor at the UCLA Anderson School. "Historically the ILWU has been very active in supporting social issues overseas and they have often faulted the AFL-CIO for being slow on taking a position on these issues."

But Kent Wang, director of the UCLA Center for Labor Research and Education, sees the ILWU's stance as consistent with its independent attitude.

"Many people in the ILWU believe that there has been lot of disinformation about China in the U.S. media," said Wong. "They look at the AFL-CIO's opposition to China as an anti-Communist position and a remnant of the Cold War era."

At least officially, the ILWU remains undecided.

"At this point the union has not taken a position yet," said ILWU spokesman Steve Stallone. "It's neither a high priority for us nor a low priority. We have many other important things on the agenda, and I can't say when or whether we will deal with this issue."

It's not that the ILWU has been totally absent. Last November, during the anti-WTO demonstrations in Seattle, ILWU International President Brian McWilliams spoke out against the WTO, and longshoremen in Oakland and Seattle shut down the ports there for an entire eight-hour shift out of solidarity with the protesters.

But longshoremen in the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles stopped work for just two hours -- and during a time when the workers would normally be attending a labor meeting.

"Why should we punish the shipping lines and their customers only to make a political point?" said Puliselich of Local 13 in Wilmington. "In any case, closing down the port here for a few hours has just as much effect as shutting down the port in Seattle for eight hours, because we get a lot more traffic here."

Shipping-industry insiders see the local longshoremen's attitude as indicative of a developing rift within the ILWU.

"The locals up north tend to be more political, whereas those here are more militant about labor issues," said one industry source. "That is also reflected in a split in the ILWU leadership. McWilliams is the president, but (Vice President) Jim Spinoza is really running the show. He led the negotiations with the (Pacific Maritime Association) last summer, and he seems to be less interested in political issues than in labor ones."

It also may reflect a rift between unions representing low-wage workers and those representing high-wage workers.

The United Auto Workers and International Brotherhood of Teamsters, two unions that have been vocal in their opposition to permanent normal trade relations with China, fear that more international trade would mean an increasing number of U.S. jobs being siphoned off to low-wage countries. The ILWU, on the other hand, does not fear an increase in international trade because it would bring more jobs to the waterfront.

Specifically, the number of jobs on the L.A. waterfront has risen from 8,500 in 1989 to 13,500 in 1999, largely as a result of this huge increase in trade with China and other Asian countries.

If and when the U.S. Congress approves permanent normal trade relations with China; and China is admitted to the WTO, still-existing trade barriers would be dismantled -- and that would drive trade volume even higher, creating even more waterfront jobs.