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Across Sweden, around 70 automotive mechanics persist to confront among the globe's wealthiest corporations – Tesla. This industrial action targeting the US carmaker's 10 Swedish service centers has currently reached its second anniversary, with little sign of a resolution.

Janis Kuzma has remained at the electric car company's picket line starting from October 2023.

"It's a tough time," remarks the 39-year-old. With the nation's cold seasonal conditions sets in, it's likely to grow even tougher.

The mechanic spends every start of the week alongside a fellow worker, standing near a Tesla service center within an industrial park in Malmö. The labor organization, the Swedish metalworkers' union, provides shelter via a mobile construction vehicle, as well as hot beverages & sandwiches.

But it remains operations continue normally nearby, at which the service facility seems to operate in full swing.

The strike involves an issue that reaches to the heart of Swedish industrial culture – the right of trade unions to bargain for wages and working terms on behalf of their workforce. This principle of collective agreement has underpinned labor dynamics across the nation for nearly a century.

Today approximately 70% of Swedish workers belong of a trade union, and 90% fall under under negotiated labor contracts. Labor stoppages across the nation are rare.

This is a system supported by all parties. "We favor the ability to bargain freely with the unions and establish collective agreements," says Mattias Dahl of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise business organization.

But Tesla has disrupted the apple cart. Outspoken chief executive the company leader has said he "opposes" with the idea of labor organizations. "I simply don't like anything which creates a sort of lords and peasants sort of thing," he told listeners in New York in 2023. "I think labor groups try to create conflict in a company."

The automaker came to Sweden back in 2014, while the metalworkers' union has for years sought to establish a labor contract with the automaker.

"But they did not reply," states Marie Nilsson, the union's president. "We formed the belief that they tried to hide away or not discuss this with us."

She says the union ultimately saw no alternative except to announce a strike, which started in late October, last year. "Usually it's enough to issue the threat," comments the union leader. "The company usually agrees to the agreement."

However this did not happen in this case.

The striking mechanic, originally of Latvian origin, started working with the automaker several years ago. He claims that wages & conditions frequently dependent on the discretion of supervisors.

He recalls a performance review at which he states he was denied a salary increase because he was "failing to meet company targets". At the same time, a colleague was reported to be rejected for increased compensation due to having an "inappropriate demeanor".

Nevertheless, some workers went out on strike. Tesla had some one hundred thirty technicians employed at the time the strike was initiated. IF Metall states that today approximately 70 of their represented workers are participating in the action.

The automaker has long since replaced the striking workers with replacement staff, for which there is not occurred since the Great Depression.

"The company has accomplished this [found replacement staff] publicly & systematically," says a labor researcher, an analyst at Arena Idé, a policy organization supported by Scandinavian labor organizations.

"It is not against the law, this being crucial to understand. However it violates all established norms. But the company shows no concern about norms.

"They aim to be norm breakers. So if somebody tells them, hey, you are violating a norm, they perceive that as praise."

The automaker's Swedish subsidiary refused attempts for comment via correspondence citing "all-time high deliveries".

Indeed, the automaker has granted only one press discussion in the two years after the strike started.

Earlier this year, the Swedish subsidiary's "country lead", Jens Stark, told a financial publication that it suited the organization better not to have a collective agreement, and instead "to collaborate directly with the team and provide workers the best possible conditions".

The executive rejected that the choice not to enter a collective agreement was one made by US leadership in the US. "Our division possesses authorization to take our own such decisions," he said.

The union is not entirely alone in this conflict. This industrial action has received backing from several of other unions.

Dockworkers in neighbouring Denmark, Norway and Finland, are refusing to process the company's vehicles; rubbish is no longer collected from the automaker's Scandinavian locations; while newly built charging stations remain connected to the grid across the nation.

There is an example near the capital's airport, where 20 chargers remain unused. But a Tesla enthusiast, the leader of an owner's club Tesla Club Sweden, states vehicle owners are unaffected by the labor dispute.

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

With stakes significant for all parties, it's hard to see a resolution to the deadlock. The union risks setting a precedent should it surrender the fundamental concept of collective agreement.

"The worry is how this could expand," states Mr Bender, "and eventually {erode