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Across Sweden, around seventy car mechanics continue to challenge among the world's richest corporations – Tesla. This labor strike at the American automaker's 10 Swedish service centers has now entered its second anniversary, with little indication of a settlement.

One striking worker has remained on the Tesla picket line starting from October 2023.

"It has been a tough period," states the 39-year-old. And as Sweden's chilly winter weather sets in, it is expected to grow more challenging.

Janis devotes every start of the week with a colleague, positioned near a Tesla garage on a business district in Malmö. His union, the Swedish metalworkers' union, provides shelter via a portable construction vehicle, plus hot beverages and light meals.

But it's operations continue normally nearby, where the workshop seems to be at full capacity.

This industrial action involves an issue that reaches to the heart of Scandinavia's labor traditions – the right for worker organizations to bargain for wages and working terms on behalf of their workforce. This principle of negotiated labor contracts has underpinned labor dynamics across the nation for nearly one hundred years.

Today some seventy percent of Swedish employees belong of a trade union, while ninety percent are covered by a collective agreement. Labor stoppages in Sweden occur infrequently.

This is a system welcomed by all parties. "We favor the ability to bargain directly with the unions and sign collective agreements," says Mattias Dahl of the Confederation of Swedish Businesses business organization.

But Tesla has upset established practices. Outspoken chief executive the company leader has said he "opposes" with the idea of unions. "I simply disapprove of anything which creates a sort of hierarchical situation," he informed listeners at an event last year. "I think the unions attempt to create negativity within businesses."

The automaker came to the Scandinavian market back in the mid-2010s, and IF Metall has for years sought to establish a collective agreement with the company.

"Yet they wouldn't respond," says the union president, the organization's president. "And we got the impression that they tried to hide away or not discuss this with us."

She says the union ultimately found no alternative except to announce a strike, which started in late October, 2023. "Typically the threat suffices to make a warning," says the union leader. "Employers usually agrees to the contract."

But not on this occasion.

Janis Kuzma, originally from Latvia, started working with the automaker in 2021. He claims that pay and work terms were often dependent on the discretion of managers.

He remembers an evaluation meeting where he says he was denied a salary increase because he was "not reaching company targets". Meanwhile, a colleague was said to have been turned down for increased compensation because he had an "inappropriate demeanor".

However, some workers participated on strike. The company had some one hundred thirty technicians employed at the time the industrial action was initiated. The union states currently around 70 of its members are on strike.

The automaker has long since substituted these with replacement staff, for which there is no precedent since the era of the 1930s.

"The company has done it [found replacement staff] publicly and methodically," says a labor researcher, an analyst at Arena Idé, a think tank financed by Scandinavian labor organizations.

"It is not against the law, which is important to understand. But it goes against all established practices. Yet the company shows no concern about norms.

"They want to become norm breakers. So if anyone informs them, hey, you are breaking a norm, they see this as a compliment."

The automaker's Swedish subsidiary declined requests for interview via correspondence mentioning "all-time high vehicle shipments".

In fact, the automaker has granted just a single press discussion in the two years since the industrial action started.

In March 2024, the local division's "country lead", the executive, told a business paper that it suited the organization more not to have a union contract, and rather "to work closely with employees and provide workers optimal terms".

The executive denied that the choice to avoid a labor contract was one made by US leadership overseas. "We have a mandate to make independent such choices," he stated.

IF Metall is not completely alone in this conflict. The strike has been supported from several of labor organizations.

Port workers in neighbouring Scandinavian nations, Norway & neighboring states, are refusing to process the company's vehicles; waste is not removed from Tesla's Swedish facilities; and newly built charging stations remain connected to power networks in the country.

Exists an example near Stockholm Arlanda Airport, where 20 chargers stand idle. But Tibor Blomhäll, the leader of enthusiasts group Tesla Club Sweden, says vehicle owners remain unaffected by the labor dispute.

"There exists an alternative power point six miles from here," he comments. "And we can still buy our cars, we can maintain our vehicles, we can power our electric cars."

With stakes significant for all parties, it's hard to envision an end to the deadlock. IF Metall faces the danger of setting a precedent should it surrender the principle of collective agreement.

"The worry is how that would spread," says the researcher, "and ultimately {erode