Il sindacalismo chicano e i migranti messicani: l’esperienza del Maricopa County Organizing Project (MCOP) in Arizona

The article investigates the peculiar history of farmworker unions in Arizona, and their relation with Mexican migrant workers. Since the bilateral agreement for the importation of workers from Mexico to USA in 1940s, a strong opposition to Mexican migrants developed and progressively fragmented the “color line” that was supposed to unify the community of Mexican descendants. The introduction of the “wet line”, the political practice of the chicano union UFW, led to the final split of the labor movement in 1970s. As a result, the Maricopa County Organizing Project (MCOP) was founded to develop new strategies and political practices of labor organization that would generate the most massive work stoppage of migrant workers in the history of Arizona. The article analyzes the transformation of the MCOP farmworkers movement into a non-profit organization supporting projects of culture, education and health for chicanos, and indigenous and undocumented communities till today.