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Across Sweden, around 70 car technicians continue to challenge one of the world's richest companies – Tesla. This labor strike at the US automaker's 10 Swedish repair facilities has now entered two years of duration, and there is little sign of a resolution.

One striking worker has been on the Tesla protest line starting from the autumn of 2023.

"It's a tough period," states the worker in his late thirties. With Sweden's chilly winter weather sets in, it's likely to grow even tougher.

Janis spends every start of the week with a fellow worker, standing outside a Tesla service center on a business district in Malmö. The labor organization, the Swedish metalworkers' union, supplies shelter in the form of a mobile builders' van, plus hot beverages & sandwiches.

But it remains operations continue normally nearby, at which the workshop appears to operate in full swing.

This industrial action concerns an issue that reaches to the core of Swedish industrial culture – the right for worker organizations to negotiate wages & conditions on behalf of their members. This concept of negotiated labor contracts has underpinned labor dynamics across the nation for nearly a century.

Today approximately 70% of Swedish employees are members of a trade union, and ninety percent fall under by a collective agreement. Labor stoppages in Sweden are rare.

It's an arrangement supported across the board. "We favor the ability to bargain freely with worker representatives and establish labor contracts," states a business representative from the Association of Swedish Businesses employer group.

But Tesla has upset the apple cart. Vocal CEO Elon Musk has said he "disagrees" with the idea of unions. "I simply disapprove of anything that establishes a sort of hierarchical sort of thing," he informed an audience at an event in 2023. "I think the unions try to create conflict within businesses."

The automaker came to the Scandinavian market back in 2014, while the metalworkers' union has for years sought to establish a labor contract with the company.

"But they did not respond," says Marie Nilsson, the organization's leader. "We formed the belief that they attempted to avoid or evade discussing this with our representatives."

She states the organization eventually saw no other option than to announce a strike, beginning in late October, 2023. "Typically the threat suffices to issue the threat," comments the union leader. "The company usually signs the agreement."

But this did not happen in this case.

Janis Kuzma, who is from Latvia, began employment for Tesla several years ago. He asserts that wages & conditions were often subject to the discretion of supervisors.

He recalls a performance review where he states he was denied an annual pay rise because he was "not reaching Tesla's goals". At the same time, a coworker was said to have been rejected for a pay rise because he had the "wrong attitude".

However, some workers participated in the industrial action. Tesla had approximately 130 mechanics employed when the strike was initiated. IF Metall says that today approximately seventy of their represented workers are participating in the action.

The automaker has long since replaced these with new workers, for which there is not occurred since the 1930s.

"Tesla has done it [found replacement staff] publicly and methodically," says a labor researcher, an analyst at Arena Idé, a policy organization supported by Swedish trade unions.

"It's not illegal, this being important to understand. However it goes against all established norms. But the company shows no concern for conventions.

"They aim to be norm breakers. Thus when anyone informs them, listen, you are breaking a norm, they perceive this as praise."

The automaker's Swedish subsidiary refused requests for interview via correspondence mentioning "all-time high deliveries".

In fact, the company has granted only one press discussion during the entire period after the strike began.

In March 2024, the Swedish subsidiary's "country lead", Jens Stark, told a business paper that it suited the organization more not to have a union contract, and rather "to collaborate directly with the team and give workers the best possible terms".

The executive denied that the choice to avoid a labor contract was determined by US leadership overseas. "Our division possesses authorization to make our own such decisions," he stated.

IF Metall is not completely alone in its fight. The strike has received backing by a number of labor organizations.

Port workers in nearby Denmark, Nordic countries & neighboring states, decline to handle the company's vehicles; waste is not removed from the automaker's Swedish facilities; and newly built power points are not being linked to the grid across the nation.

There is one such facility close to Stockholm Arlanda Airport, at which 20 chargers stand idle. However Tibor Blomhäll, the president of enthusiasts group Tesla Club Sweden, says Tesla owners remain unaffected by the strike.

"There exists another charging station six miles from this location," he comments. "And we can continue to purchase vehicles, we can service our cars, we can power our cars."

With stakes high on both sides, it's hard to see a resolution to the stand-off. The union faces the danger of establishing a pattern should it surrender the principle of negotiated labor contracts.

"The worry is that that would spread," says the researcher, "and ultimately {erode