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In Sweden, around 70 car technicians continue to challenge one of the world's richest corporations – Tesla. The labor strike targeting the American carmaker's ten Swedish repair facilities has now entered two years of duration, with little sign for a resolution.

One striking worker has been at the electric car company's picket line since October 2023.

"It has been a tough period," remarks the 39-year-old. And as Sweden's chilly seasonal conditions sets in, it is expected to grow even tougher.

The mechanic spends every start of the week with a colleague, standing outside an electric vehicle garage on a business district located in southern Sweden. The labor organization, IF Metall, provides shelter in the form of a mobile construction vehicle, plus coffee and sandwiches.

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

The strike concerns a matter that reaches to the heart of Swedish industrial culture – the right for worker organizations to negotiate pay & working terms on behalf of their workforce. This concept of collective agreement has underpinned labor dynamics across the nation for nearly one hundred years.

Today some 70% of Swedish employees belong of a trade union, while 90% are covered under negotiated labor contracts. Strikes across the nation are rare.

This is an arrangement supported by all parties. "We favor the ability to negotiate directly with the unions and sign labor contracts," says a business representative of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise business organization.

However the electric car company has upset the apple cart. Vocal CEO Elon Musk has stated he "opposes" with the idea of labor organizations. "I simply disapprove of anything that establishes a kind of lords and peasants situation," he informed an audience in New York last year. "I think the unions try to create conflict in a company."

The automaker entered Sweden starting in the mid-2010s, and the metalworkers' union has long sought to secure a labor contract with the company.

"But they wouldn't respond," states Marie Nilsson, the organization's president. "And we got the impression that they attempted to hide away or evade discussing this with our representatives."

She says the organization eventually found no alternative except to call a strike, which started on 27 October, 2023. "Typically the threat suffices to make a warning," comments Ms Nilsson. "Employers usually agrees to the agreement."

However not in this case.

The striking mechanic, who is of Latvian origin, started working for Tesla several years ago. He asserts that wages and work terms frequently subject to the discretion of supervisors.

He recalls an evaluation meeting where he states he was refused an annual pay rise because that he "failing to meet Tesla's goals". Meanwhile, a coworker was reported to have been rejected for increased compensation because he had the "wrong attitude".

However, not everyone went out in the industrial action. The company employed some 130 mechanics employed at the time the strike was called. IF Metall says that today around 70 of its members are on strike.

Tesla has long since replaced these with replacement staff, a situation there is no precedent since the Great Depression.

"The company has done it [found replacement staff] publicly and methodically," says a labor researcher, a researcher at Arena Idé, a policy organization supported by Scandinavian labor organizations.

"It is not against the law, which is crucial to recognize. However it goes against all established norms. But Tesla doesn't care about norms.

"They want to become norm breakers. Thus when anyone tells them, listen, you are violating a standard, they perceive that as praise."

The company's local division declined requests for interview via correspondence mentioning "record deliveries".

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

Earlier this year, the Swedish subsidiary's "country lead", the executive, told a business paper that it benefited the organization more to avoid a collective agreement, and rather "to work closely with the team and give them optimal conditions".

The executive rejected that the choice to avoid a collective agreement was determined at Tesla headquarters overseas. "We have a mandate to make independent such decisions," he said.

IF Metall is not entirely isolated in this conflict. This industrial action has been supported by a number of other unions.

Dockworkers in neighbouring Denmark, Nordic countries & neighboring states, are refusing to handle Teslas; waste is no longer collected from the automaker's Scandinavian locations; while recently constructed power points remain connected to power networks in the country.

There is one such facility close to Stockholm Arlanda Airport, at which 20 chargers stand idle. However Tibor Blomhäll, the president of enthusiasts group the Swedish Tesla association, states vehicle owners remain unaffected by the labor dispute.

"There exists an alternative power point 10km from here," he comments. "And we can still purchase vehicles, we can service our cars, we can charge our cars."

With consequences high on both sides, it is difficult to envision a resolution to the deadlock. IF Metall faces the danger of establishing a pattern should it surrender the principle of negotiated labor contracts.

"The worry is that this could expand," states Mr Bender, "and ultimately {erode