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In Sweden, around seventy automotive technicians persist to confront among the world's wealthiest companies – Tesla. This labor strike targeting the US automaker's 10 Swedish repair facilities has now entered two years of duration, and there is minimal indication for a settlement.

One striking worker has remained at the electric car company's protest line starting from the autumn of 2023.

"It has been a tough period," remarks the 39-year-old. With the nation's cold winter weather arrives, it is expected to grow more challenging.

The mechanic spends every start of the week alongside a fellow worker, positioned outside an electric vehicle service center within an industrial park located in southern Sweden. His union, the Swedish metalworkers' union, provides shelter via a portable builders' van, plus coffee & light meals.

However it's operations continue normally nearby, at which the service facility seems to operate in full swing.

The strike involves a matter that reaches to the heart of Swedish labor traditions – the right for worker organizations to negotiate wages & working terms representing their members. This concept of negotiated labor contracts has supported labor dynamics across the nation for nearly one hundred years.

Today approximately 70% of Swedish workers are members of a trade union, while 90% fall under by a collective agreement. Labor stoppages in Sweden are rare.

This is an arrangement supported by all parties. "We prefer the right to negotiate freely with the unions and establish collective agreements," says Mattias Dahl of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise employer group.

But Tesla has upset established practices. Outspoken chief executive Elon Musk has said he "disagrees" with the concept of unions. "I just don't like anything which creates a kind of hierarchical sort of thing," he informed listeners at an event last year. "In my view labor groups attempt to create conflict in a company."

Tesla came to Sweden back in the mid-2010s, and the metalworkers' union has for years wanted to establish a collective agreement with the automaker.

"Yet they did not respond," states Marie Nilsson, the union's president. "And we got the impression that they attempted to hide away or evade discussing the matter with our representatives."

She states the union ultimately found no alternative except to call industrial action, which started in late October, 2023. "Typically it's enough to issue a warning," comments Ms Nilsson. "The company usually agrees to the agreement."

But not on this occasion.

The striking mechanic, originally from Latvia, began employment with the automaker in 2021. He claims that pay and conditions were often dependent on the discretion of managers.

He recalls a performance review at which he says he was refused an annual pay rise on grounds he was "failing to meet company targets". At the same time, a coworker was said to have been rejected for increased compensation because he had the "wrong attitude".

However, some workers participated on strike. Tesla had approximately 130 technicians working when the strike was called. The union says currently approximately seventy of their represented workers are participating in the action.

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

"Tesla has done it [found replacement staff] publicly and methodically," says German Bender, a researcher at a research institute, a policy organization supported by Swedish trade unions.

"It's not against the law, this being crucial to understand. However it goes against all established practices. Yet Tesla shows no concern for conventions.

"They want to become convention challengers. Thus when anyone tells them, listen, you are violating a standard, they see that as praise."

The company's Swedish subsidiary declined attempts for comment via correspondence mentioning "all-time high deliveries".

In fact, the company has given only one press discussion in the two years after the industrial action began.

In March 2024, the Swedish subsidiary's "country lead", Jens Stark, informed a business paper that it suited the company better not to have a union contract, and rather "to work closely with the team and give workers optimal conditions".

The executive rejected that the choice to avoid a labor contract was determined at Tesla headquarters in the US. "Our division possesses authorization to take independent such decisions," he stated.

IF Metall is not completely alone in its fight. The strike has been supported from several of other unions.

Port workers in nearby Denmark, Nordic countries and Finland, are refusing to process the company's vehicles; rubbish is no longer removed from Tesla's Scandinavian locations; and recently constructed power points are not being linked to power networks across the nation.

There is one such facility close to the capital's airport, where twenty chargers stand idle. However a Tesla enthusiast, the leader of enthusiasts group the Swedish Tesla association, states Tesla owners are unaffected by the strike.

"There's another charging station 10km from here," he says. "Plus we are able to continue to purchase vehicles, we can service our cars, we can charge our electric cars."

With stakes high on both sides, it's hard to envision a resolution to the deadlock. IF Metall faces the danger of setting a precedent if it concedes the fundamental concept of negotiated labor contracts.

"The worry is that this could expand," says Mr Bender, "and ultimately {erode