Activision-Blizzard Studio ‘Proletariat’ Abandons Union Plans Following Backlash From Studio Head
In December of last year, game development studio Proletariat proudly announced its intention to unionize. Recent events involving the studio’s CEO, however, have stopped any union plans dead in their tracks. Proletariat recently assisted on Activision Blizzard’s World of Warcraft: Dragonflight expansion, and could have created the third labor union formed within the publishing behemoth.
In the same month as Proletariat’s announcement, the QA team at Blizzard Albany voted to unionize, following Raven Software’s lead earlier that year. This trend of game industry unions doesn’t stop at Activision Blizzard, however, as Microsoft, which has a vested interest in purchasing Activision Blizzard, saw a union form under its subsidiary Zenimax last year. It appears that senior management has begun pushing back, at least according to a statement from Communication Workers of America (CWA), who were leading the charge for Proletariat.
According to a report from gamesindustry.biz and supported by Eurogamer, the CEO of Proletariat, Seth Sivak, reportedly responded to the news of this union forming by following Activision Blizzard’s party lines of holding multiple union-busting meetings. According to a statement from CWA, these meetings stemmed from Sivak taking the plans to unionize personally, and instead of supporting the workers’ rights to unionize, “demoralized and disempowered” them to a point where any plans for a union were off the table. This abandonment was due to the inability to hold a”free and fair election” in the future as Sivak is actively working against any union being formed.
In a final statement addressing more unions across the video game industry, the representative went on to state “As we have seen at Microsoft’s Zenimax studio, there is another path forward, one that empowers workers through a free and fair process, without intimidation or manipulation by the employer. We will continue to advocate alongside workers in the video game industry for better working conditions, higher standards and a union voice.”
Activision Blizzard just recently had a key member of its team resign in protest over what he deemed to be an unfair stack-ranking policy enforced by upper management, so the chances of a union being formed without active pushback from the “higher-ups” do not seem likely at this time.
