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In Sweden, approximately seventy car technicians continue to challenge one of the world's wealthiest companies – the electric vehicle manufacturer. This industrial action at the US automaker's 10 Swedish repair facilities has currently reached two years of duration, with little indication for a settlement.

One striking worker has remained on the Tesla picket line since October 2023.

"It's a difficult time," states the worker in his late thirties. With Sweden's cold winter weather arrives, it is expected to become more challenging.

Janis spends each Monday alongside a fellow worker, standing outside an electric vehicle garage on an industrial park located in southern Sweden. His union, IF Metall, supplies shelter via a mobile builders' van, as well as coffee & sandwiches.

But it remains operations continue normally across the road, where the service facility seems to operate at full capacity.

The strike concerns an issue that goes to the heart of Scandinavia's industrial culture – the authority of trade unions to bargain for wages & conditions on behalf of their workforce. This principle of collective agreement has supported labor dynamics in Sweden for almost a century.

Today some 70% of Scandinavia's employees belong of a trade union, and ninety percent fall under under negotiated labor contracts. Labor stoppages in Sweden are rare.

It's an arrangement welcomed across the board. "We prefer the right to bargain directly with worker representatives and establish labor contracts," says Mattias Dahl of the Confederation of Swedish Businesses employer group.

However Tesla has upset established practices. Vocal chief executive the company leader has stated he "disagrees" with the idea of labor organizations. "I simply disapprove of anything which creates a kind of hierarchical sort of thing," he informed listeners in New York in 2023. "In my view labor groups try to generate conflict in a company."

Tesla entered the Scandinavian market back in 2014, while IF Metall has long sought to establish a labor contract with the company.

"But they wouldn't respond," says Marie Nilsson, the organization's president. "And we got the belief that they attempted to avoid or evade discussing the matter with our representatives."

She says the union ultimately saw no other option than to announce industrial action, beginning on 27 October, 2023. "Typically the threat suffices to make the threat," comments Ms Nilsson. "The company usually signs the agreement."

But this did not happen in this case.

The striking mechanic, who is of Latvian origin, started working for Tesla in 2021. He asserts that wages & work terms frequently dependent on the whim of managers.

He remembers a performance review where he says he was denied an annual pay rise because that he "not reaching Tesla's goals". Meanwhile, a coworker was said to have been turned down for increased compensation due to he had the "wrong attitude".

Nevertheless, some workers went out on strike. Tesla had some one hundred thirty technicians working at the time the industrial action was initiated. The union says that today around seventy of its members are participating in the action.

Tesla has since substituted these with replacement staff, a situation that has not occurred since the 1930s.

"Tesla has done it [found replacement staff] openly and systematically," states a labor researcher, an analyst at a research institute, a think tank supported by Swedish trade unions.

"It is not illegal, which is crucial to understand. However it goes against all established norms. Yet the company doesn't care about norms.

"They aim to be convention challengers. So if anyone informs them, hey, you are breaking a standard, they perceive this as a compliment."

The automaker's local division declined attempts for comment via correspondence mentioning "all-time high deliveries".

Indeed, the automaker has given only one press discussion during the entire period after the industrial action started.

Earlier this year, the Swedish subsidiary's "national manager, the executive, told a financial publication that it suited the organization better not to have a collective agreement, and rather "to collaborate directly with the team and give workers optimal terms".

Mr Stark rejected that the choice to avoid a collective agreement was determined at Tesla headquarters in the US. "We have a mandate to make independent such decisions," he stated.

The union is not completely isolated in its fight. This industrial action has received backing by a number of labor organizations.

Port workers in nearby Scandinavian nations, Nordic countries & Finland, decline to handle Teslas; waste is not removed from Tesla's Swedish facilities; while newly built charging stations are not being connected to power networks across the nation.

Exists an example close to Stockholm Arlanda Airport, at which 20 charging units remain unused. However a Tesla enthusiast, the leader of enthusiasts group the Swedish Tesla association, states Tesla owners are unaffected by the labor dispute.

"There exists an alternative power point 10km from this location," he says. "Plus we are able to still buy our cars, we can service our cars, we can power our cars."

With consequences significant on both sides, it's hard to envision a resolution to the deadlock. IF Metall risks establishing a pattern should it surrender the fundamental concept of collective agreement.

"The concern is how this could expand," says Mr Bender, "and eventually {erode