In my column today, I comment on how the union movement seeks to address its shrinking membership rolls.

AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka said in March, “To be blunt, our basic system of workplace representation is … failing miserably…”

To stem the decline, he proposes “to open membership to anyone who wants to join and build a dynamic new workers’ movement — one that working men and women can join without having to go through the trial by fire of an NLRB election.”

Well, yes, elections can be a problem. And collective bargaining, which requires workplace approval, remains the goal. But “at least initially,” Trumka says, new forms of membership may not include it.

To get a handle on how the AFL-CIO is responding, the 2013 preconvention outreach and engagement final report is a useful primer. Released last month, it’s a set-up for the group’s quadrennial convention in Los Angeles next week.

The strategies borrow from what Josh Eidelson has dubbed the alt-labor movement. His January 29 story on alt-labor in the American Prospect lays it out well. A former union organizer, Eidelson has followed the recent spate of fast food strikes. I quote from his recent Salon article, as I think it’s a good preview of what lies ahead. Here’s the longer version of the excerpt I used in the column.

A source who took part in a private SEIU meeting with allies last week in Las Vegas said that the union presented two tracks under serious consideration for transforming the industry. First, escalating pressure on fast food corporations – McDonald’s, Burger King and Wendy’s, in particular – with the goal of reaching a joint agreement under which the corporations would cover the costs of improved labor standards in their stores.

And second, a legislative push for local living wage laws requiring improved compensation for fast food workers. Because most cities lack the legal authority to mandate higher wages for jobs that aren’t publicly subsidized, that push would involve statewide ballot measures in 2014 to allow cities to hike private sector workers’ wages.

A lot of the organizing uses controversial “worker centers,” the focus of a recent Wall Street Journal story.

The community groups, called worker centers, are often backed by unions. But they aren’t considered “labor organizations” by law because they don’t have continuing bargaining relationships with employers. That gives them more freedom in their use of picketing and other tactics than unions, which are constrained by national labor laws.

The new approach is sparking a backlash from some businesses, who call it an end-run around labor laws that can be used to help unionize new groups of workers.

In Seattle and SeaTac we’re seeing the approach play out in the fast food workers strikes and the Prop. 1 “living wage” initiative. Regardless of what happens in November, we can expect this movement to linger. Unlike Occupy Whatever, those behind alt-labor have a clear agenda, ample funding, and a survival imperative.