Workers across the world and in almost all industries are once again feeling the need to struggle against the attacks on our living standards. Unions, which form an important part of our working class history, are the first to offer us a way to channel this struggle collectively. But looking beyond these initial stages of working class struggle, the history of union struggles becomes less rose­ tinted. The history of the class struggle has shown that the unions became gradually integrated into the state’s planning apparatus during the last two world wars.