The silent treatment:

...Felipe Gonzalez, head of the Spanish Socialist party plus a number of other less prominent representatives of European socialist and trade union movements...

...The contrast between European press and TV coverage and the lack of a corresponding American media presence was quite striking, but subsequent European press reports also indicated a notable lack of focus and interest...

...Among the more prominent foreign trade union participants identified with the ETUC line were Pierre Hureau of the French Confederation of Democratic Trade Unions (CFDT), a body that has evolved out of the post-war Catholic labor movement...

...The AFL-CIO position had also been conveyed to a number of fraternal labor organizations abroad, most importantly the predominantly socialist German Trade Union Federation (DGB), which abstained from participation' despite the fact that the German Marshall Fund was supporting the event...

...In view of all this-big names, timely, topics, capacity crowds-it is worth asking why the conference, at least for those not actually present, so largely turned into a "non-event" whose aims and accomplishments remained ill-understood or totally ignored...

...Such articles as did appear, as a result of press conferences at the Hilton and the National Press Club, dealt mostly with general foreign policy issues and European-American differences over detente, Iran, Afghanistan, etc., rather than with the conference or the current and future role of democratic socialism...

...tional labor affairs...

...Senator Edward Kennedy, for instance, had been willing to be listed as "invited'' on the conference program but in the end limited his role to meeting privately with some of the foreign guests...

...AFL-CIO President Lane Kirkland declined an invitation to participate as did a number of other prominent labor leaders and Democratic party personalities...

...This emphasis along with many of the social and economic themes of the conference undoubtedly had a potentially broader appeal for important segments of the AFL-CIO, especially following the Reagan victory...

...The ''Eurosocialism and America'' conference, according to its organizers, the Institute for Democratic Socialism, an educational foundation close to Harrington's Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee was meant to inject into the "conventional wisdom" of American politics the ideas of European socialist leaders who knew from experience that national economies could be more productive and equitable than the U.S.'s without being based on the "trickle-down" business-oriented policies that have come to dominate Washington...

...Irving Bluestone and various other representatives of the United Auto Workers...

...The cold-shouldering of the Eurosocialist meeting by the AFL-CIO stemmed largely from the historical split of the American socialist movement following the death of Norman Thomas over such issues as Vietnam, the Cold War, and U.S...

...PERHAPS EVEN MORE disturbing for the conference sponsors-and significant for limiting the meeting's impact-was the fact that the mainstream of the American labor movement had kept a deliberate and studied aloofness from this event...

...former Dutch Prime Minister Joop den Uyl...

...Of all the problems to have in a United States which just elected Ronald Reagan-"joked conference chairman Michael Harrington, "too many people at a socialist meeting...

...At the same time neither the press nor the public appeared to have a confidence, extending much beyond good will, in the still nebulous Reagan approach to the economy...

...They should also have realized how many practical obstacles impede the conference themes from receiving a wider hearing...

...European unionists would like to see the AFL-CIO return to the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU)-talks are currently underway-and did not want to antagonize the Kirkland leadership...

...Dan Gallin, Secretary General of the International Union of Foodworkers (IUF), which has a number of American affiliates...

...But leaders like Olof Palme were also interested in a bit of preemptive diplomacy...

...Brian Turner, Economic Policy Director of the Industrial Union Department (IUD) of the AFL-CIO, also participated in one workshop on "Democratizing Capital Formation," an issue of considerable current interest to nearly all industrial unions...

...Among the personalities assembled for the occasion were Willy Brandt, chairman of the Socialist International...

...Following a sobering but eloquent address by Brandt on his "Program for Survival" in a world of limited resources, the largely youthful participants streamed from the closing session elated...

...Francois Mitterrand, candidate for the French presidency together with Michel Rocard, his rival for the leadership of the French Socialist party...

...THE SILENT TREATMENT CAN AN ALTERNATIVE GET A HEARING...

...This star-studded cast and an overflow crowd of participants from the academic community, civil rights groups, the women's movement, consumer and environmental activists, and the world of veteran labor and socialist militants should have assured, by themselves, considerable attention from the media, political commentators, and liberal strategists...

...intervention in El Salvador and advised against the abandonment of North-South concerns for East-West conflict...

...On the American side, besides Harrington the participants included Ronald V. Dellums, Democratic representative from California and member of the Black Congressional Caucus, who claims to be the only socialist in Congress...

...LAST DECEMBER, only one month after the election of Ronald Reagan, a conference en "Eurosocialism and America" brought some two thousand participants together in Washington-hundreds were turned away and many had to stand during the opening ceremony...

...former Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme...

...Only Willy Brandt received national TV attention, and the Washington Post and Star provided minimal backpage coverage...

...they warned the Reagan team of their bitter disapproval of U.S...

...foreign policy as well as rival ties with the Socialist International of Harrington's group and the Social Democrats-USA...

...Ilkka Erich of the Central Organization of Finnish Trade' Unions, and the three CGIL members...

...If you don't contain him, we will have to impose import restrictions...

...This emphasis may have reflected a difference in priorities between the European guests and conference's sponsors...

...The ETUC now includes among its ranks not only socialist movements, but also the Italian Communist CGIL and a number of Christian unions...

...Rudolf Meidner of the Swedish Labor Organization...

...The principal ties of Harrington's Democratic Socialists with the American labor movement are thus the UAW, the Machinists, the State, County and Municipal Workers (AFSCME) and a few other national and local labor groups inside and outside the AFL-CIO, which are generally identified with the "left...

...Its members meet freely with trade union groups of the Soviet bloc and their internationals, and the ETUC generally identifies with detente and non-alignment vis-a-vis the "superpowers," themes viewed by the AFL-CIO as essentially anti-American and compromising the concept of free trade unionism...

...Tony Benn, contender for the leadership of the British Labor party...

...Ever since the election there had been much opining that liberal ideas were threadbare, either in their actual workability or their political allure...

...As this fact became known, U. S. labor participation became further reduced and in the end was largely limited to the I AM, several representatives from AFSCME, the Bricklayers, the Graphic Arts International Union, and the UAW...

...but the likelihood of infusing the mainstream American labor movement with such ideas was sharply limited by the persistent divisions within American and European unionism and the differences over international affairs expressed at the conference...

...On the European side trade union attendance was conspicuously weighted with labor leaders identified as proponents of the political and ideological line of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), an offspring of the ICFTU which had made itself independent from that body over questions of membership restrictions and East-West union contacts...

...Milton Friedman . . . is your worst export," jabbed the former Dutch prime minister Joop den Uyl...

...Sentiments of concern along the ETUC lines found expression in arguments raised at some of the workshops that the new administration may renew the practice of exploiting AFL-CIO international activities and its regional institutes for "intelligence" and other realpolitik objectives...

...The turnout, however, was understandable, given the unprecedented panoply of stars from the Socialist International and the principal European social democratic and labor parties...

...Clive Jenkins of the British Trades Union Congress (BTUC...

...but some of the conference organizers persisted in suspecting they were up against a politically motivated editorial decision...

...and Gloria Steinem, editor of MS Magazine...

...One of the main themes of the conference-and of the high-level closed meeting of economic experts, unionists, and political figures that preceded it-was the central role of trade unions in revitalizing democratic socialism and in bringing about a new democratic economic order...

...The New York Times did not carry a word about the meeting, an odd kind of silent treatment considering the number of prominent European personalities involved...

...Ever since this break the Social Democrats have maintained close cooperative ties with the AFL-CIO, whereas Harrington's group assumed positions on a number of international and domestic issues more closely in tune with those of the European socialists but in conflict with policies propounded by the late George Meany and largely continued by his successor Lane Kirkland...

...On their side, the European leaders hoped to address the economic problems facing all advanced industrial nations, problems they feared were being exacerbated by the conservative trend represented by Margaret Thatcher and now Reagan...

...The Times later admitted to a journalistic failure...

...An added provocation in the eyes of the AFL-CIO was the fact that the organizers had included among the invitees a three-member delegation of the Communist-dominated Italian CGIL headed by its Secretary for International Affairs Giacinto Miltello...

...Thus "the word" got around from AFL-CIO headquarters to avoid any appearance of endorsing the conference and its objectives...

...GEORGE E. LICHTBLAU (George E. Lichtblau is a former labor attache who has served in Africa, the Far East, and the Middle East, and has written and lectured on international labor affairs...

...But there was a further reason why "Eurosocialism and America" was an apt theme...

...William Winpisinger of the International Association of Machinists (IAM...