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In Sweden, around 70 car technicians continue to confront one of the world's wealthiest companies – Tesla. The labor strike at the American automaker's 10 Swedish service centers has now entered two years of duration, with little sign of a resolution.

Janis Kuzma has been on the Tesla picket line since October 2023.

"It's a difficult period," remarks the 39-year-old. With Sweden's cold seasonal conditions arrives, it is expected to become more challenging.

Janis devotes every start of the week alongside a colleague, standing near a Tesla garage within an industrial park located in southern Sweden. His union, IF Metall, provides shelter via a portable construction vehicle, plus coffee and light meals.

But it remains business as usual across the road, at which the workshop appears to be at full capacity.

The strike involves a matter that goes to the heart of Scandinavia's labor traditions – the authority of trade unions to bargain for pay and working terms representing their members. This principle of negotiated labor contracts has supported industrial relations in Sweden for almost one hundred years.

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

It's a system supported across the board. "We prefer the right to bargain freely with worker representatives and establish collective agreements," states Mattias Dahl of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise employer group.

But Tesla has disrupted established practices. Outspoken chief executive the company leader has stated he "disagrees" with the idea of unions. "I just don't like any arrangement that establishes a sort of lords and peasants situation," he told an audience at an event in 2023. "I think labor groups try to generate conflict in a company."

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

"But they wouldn't reply," says Marie Nilsson, the organization's leader. "We formed the belief that they attempted to hide away or evade discussing this with us."

She states the organization ultimately saw no other option than to call a strike, which started in late October, 2023. "Usually it's enough to make a warning," comments Ms Nilsson. "Employers usually signs the agreement."

However not in this case.

The striking mechanic, who is of Latvian origin, started working for Tesla several years ago. He asserts that wages & conditions frequently dependent on the whim of supervisors.

He recalls a performance review at which he states he was refused an annual pay rise on grounds that he "not reaching company targets". Meanwhile, a colleague was said to be turned down for a pay rise due to he had the "wrong attitude".

However, some workers participated on strike. Tesla employed some one hundred thirty mechanics employed when the strike was called. The union states that today around seventy of their represented workers are participating in the action.

The automaker has long since substituted these with new workers, a situation there is not occurred since the era of the Great Depression.

"The company has accomplished this [found replacement staff] openly and methodically," says a labor researcher, an analyst at a research institute, a think tank financed by Scandinavian labor organizations.

"It's not illegal, this being important to understand. But it violates all established norms. But Tesla shows no concern for conventions.

"They want to become convention challengers. So if anyone informs them, hey, you are breaking a norm, they perceive that as a compliment."

The automaker's local division refused attempts for interview via correspondence mentioning "record deliveries".

Indeed, the automaker has given just a single press discussion during the entire period since the strike began.

Earlier this year, the Swedish subsidiary's "national manager, the executive, informed a financial publication that it suited the company better to avoid a collective agreement, and rather "to work closely with employees and give them the best possible conditions".

Mr Stark denied that the decision to avoid a labor contract was one made at Tesla headquarters in the US. "Our division possesses authorization to take our own such decisions," he stated.

The union is not entirely isolated in its fight. The strike has received backing from several of labor organizations.

Port workers in neighbouring Denmark, Norway & Finland, are refusing to handle Teslas; waste is not removed from Tesla's Swedish facilities; while recently constructed power points are not being connected to the grid across the nation.

There is one such facility near the capital's airport, where 20 chargers remain unused. However Tibor Blomhäll, the leader of enthusiasts group Tesla Club Sweden, says vehicle owners are unaffected by the strike.

"There exists an alternative power point six miles from here," he says. "And we can continue to buy our cars, we can service our vehicles, we can charge our electric cars."

With stakes high on both sides, it is difficult to envision a resolution to the stand-off. IF Metall risks establishing a pattern if it concedes the fundamental concept of negotiated labor contracts.

"The concern is how this could expand," says the researcher, "and eventually {erode