For more than a decade the small Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers (HUCTW) has been waging a losing battle to organize Harvard's 4000 support staff in the face of University opposition. But this year--despite the fact that the University has won almost every past unionizing battle--HUCTW leaders say they are ready to win the war.

The renewed confidence is largely due to the backing the HUCTW received this winter from the AFL-CIO's largest union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). The national endorsement has brought the Harvard labor movement financial support, research assistance and the right to be called the "premier organizing drive for [AFSCME] across the U.S."

AFSCME hopes to make HUCTW a symbol of the new kind of white-collar organizing that unions will face in the eighties. But leaders of HUCTW, which began its organizing drive in the early seventies in the Medical Area, say they are still relying on the same grassroots techniques they have used for the last 16 years.

Organizers hope that this grassroots style will provide the one-on-one contact necessary to achieve a majority of support throughout Harvard, a legal requirement before HUCTW can be recognized as an official bargaining unit. With the help of AFSCME's money, resources and publicity, organizers are confident that the local union which has been a thorn in the side of the University's central administration will finally achieve success this fall.

"It is truly a grassroots movement and it is successful because it is one-on-one," says Thomas Kiley, the head partner of a Boston polling company that has worked with AFSCME for a decade.

To establish and maintain a sense among Harvard workers that their union will be a friend and supporter, HUCTW leaders say that the union must maintain its own autonomy despite its national backing. They add that AFSCME has been wise not to meddle excessively in the local operation.

"AFSCME has a great deal of respect for Kris [Rondeau, HUCTW leader,] and does not want to intrude on the autonomy of the organization," said Kiley.

In the past HUCTW has been at odds with another national union, the United Auto Workers (UAW). Leaders of the local union broke off from UAW, which now maintains a separate Harvard organizing effort. Leaders of HUCTW say their relationship with AFSCME has been much more amicable.

"When AFSCME decided to reach out to us they were impressed with our confidence and ability to win," says Rondeau, who added that HUCTW makes the strategic and timing decisions for the campaign, while AFSCME provides any help requested.

Because the movement to organize Harvard's workers is not focused on one particular issue or grievance, union leaders are stressing their autonomy as a major theme, union labor experts and union leaders say. "The campaign is all about the issue of personal dignity, not one particular issue," Kiley says.

The University holds that workers will not vote for a union because there are not significant grievances, Director of Personnel Daniel Cantor says. But labor experts, union leaders and many workers say that the HUCTW effort transcends simple grievances and addresses the issue of empowerment, which is criticial factor underlying any specific grievance.

As a recent HUCTW letter to University officials put it, "We are not organizing against Harvard, we are organizing for ourselves."

One pro-union secretary in Holyoke Center says that she has no personal grievances, enjoys her job and gets along well with her supervisors--but she supports the union as an effective representative for worker concerns in general.

"The union provides a voice for a lot of people who want to speak up, but don't now," says the secretary, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The recent publicity surrounding the AFSCME support has increased worker awareness about the campaign. Whether workers have decided to back the union or not, they now know it's there. Most support staff are approached by HUCTW organizers about once a month, and most are aware of whom the chief organizer in their working area is.