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In Sweden, approximately 70 car technicians continue to confront one of the world's wealthiest corporations – the electric vehicle manufacturer. This labor strike at the US carmaker's 10 Swedish service centers has now reached its second anniversary, and there is little indication of a settlement.

One striking worker has been on the Tesla protest line starting from the autumn of 2023.

"It's a difficult time," remarks the worker in his late thirties. And as Sweden's chilly seasonal conditions sets in, it's likely to grow even tougher.

The mechanic spends every start of the week alongside a fellow worker, standing outside an electric vehicle garage within an industrial park in Malmö. The labor organization, IF Metall, provides shelter via a portable construction vehicle, as well as hot beverages and light meals.

But it's business as usual nearby, at which the service facility appears to be at full capacity.

The strike involves a matter that goes to the core of Scandinavia's labor traditions – the right for worker organizations to bargain for wages & conditions representing their workforce. This concept of collective agreement has supported industrial relations across the nation for nearly a century.

Currently some seventy percent of Scandinavia's employees are members to labor organizations, and 90% are covered by a collective agreement. Strikes across the nation are rare.

It's an arrangement welcomed across the board. "We favor the right to negotiate directly with worker representatives and sign collective agreements," says Mattias Dahl from the Association of Swedish Businesses business organization.

However the electric car company has disrupted the apple cart. Vocal CEO the company leader has stated he "opposes" with the concept of labor organizations. "I simply don't like any arrangement that establishes a sort of lords and peasants sort of thing," he informed an audience in New York in 2023. "I think labor groups attempt to create negativity in a company."

The automaker entered the Scandinavian market starting in 2014, and the metalworkers' union has long wanted to secure a labor contract with the company.

"But they wouldn't reply," says the union president, the organization's president. "And we got the impression that they attempted to avoid or evade discussing this with our representatives."

She states the union ultimately found no alternative than to announce a strike, beginning on 27 October, 2023. "Usually the threat suffices to issue the threat," comments the union leader. "The company usually agrees to the agreement."

However not in this case.

Janis Kuzma, who is from Latvia, started working with the automaker in 2021. He claims that wages & work terms frequently subject to the discretion of managers.

He recalls an evaluation meeting where he says he was denied an annual pay rise because he was "failing to meet Tesla's goals". Meanwhile, a colleague was said to be turned down for increased compensation because having the "wrong attitude".

Nevertheless, some workers participated in the industrial action. Tesla employed some 130 mechanics working at the time the strike was called. The union says that today around 70 of its members are on strike.

Tesla has since replaced the striking workers with new workers, for which there is not occurred since the era of the 1930s.

"The company has done it [found replacement staff] publicly and methodically," states German Bender, a researcher at Arena Idé, a think tank supported by Scandinavian labor organizations.

"It's not illegal, this being crucial to understand. However it goes against all established norms. Yet Tesla doesn't care for conventions.

"They want to become norm breakers. Thus when somebody tells them, hey, you are violating a norm, they see that as a compliment."

The automaker's Swedish subsidiary refused attempts for interview in an email mentioning "all-time high vehicle shipments".

Indeed, the company has given only one media interview during the entire period after the strike started.

Earlier this year, the Swedish subsidiary's "national manager, Jens Stark, told a business paper that it benefited the company better to avoid a union contract, and rather "to collaborate directly with employees and provide workers the best possible conditions".

Mr Stark rejected that the decision not to enter a labor contract was one made at Tesla headquarters overseas. "Our division possesses authorization to take independent such choices," he said.

IF Metall is not entirely isolated in this conflict. This industrial action has received backing from several of labor organizations.

Dockworkers in nearby Scandinavian nations, Norway & neighboring states, decline to handle Teslas; waste is no longer removed from Tesla's Scandinavian locations; and recently constructed charging stations are not being connected to power networks across the nation.

Exists an example close to the capital's airport, where 20 charging units stand idle. But Tibor Blomhäll, the president of an owner's club Tesla Club Sweden, says vehicle owners remain unaffected by the labor dispute.

"There exists an alternative power point 10km from here," he comments. "Plus we are able to continue to buy our cars, we can maintain our cars, we can charge our cars."

With stakes significant on both sides, it's hard to see a resolution to the deadlock. The union faces the danger of establishing a pattern should it surrender the fundamental concept of negotiated labor contracts.

"The concern is that that would spread," states the researcher, "and eventually {erode