"Universities have a sense of being special as employers, but their conduct belies that idea," he says. "Universities don't take it very easy in bargaining. They bargain in a very hard-nosed way."

Ultimately universities see themselves as business operations, according to Clete, which threatens the ideal conception of the university as a community based on unified educational and humanitarian ideals. "These universities increasingly take on the feeling of corporations," Clete says. "There is not a hell of a lot of evidence that forms a difference between a university and an employer."

Clete says Harvard is no exception to this trend. He says he is not surprised by Harvard's attempts to try to bring Local 254 contract more into "market" value or alter HUCTW's health benefits.

However, he does say he was surprised by Harvard's decision to finally stop fighting after HUCTW refused to accept the new contract.

"Harvard will try to get away with it but will back away when the cost becomes too high," he says.

A Higher Standard?

James A. Gross, a colleague of Clete's at SILS who recently wrote a four-volume history chronicling labor relationships stemming from the 1935 Wagner Act, says the issue is larger than if Harvard is merely playing within the legal boundaries.

"They should be held to a higher standard than GM or Bethlehem Steel," he says. "It's supposed to be an organization which is not profit-motivated."

And for Gross, Harvard's tendency to see itself simply as an employer, although entirely legal, is a moral failure for the greater goals of the University.

"My point is that even if they're operating within the boundaries...it's lawful, but it's immoral," he says. "Is that what Harvard is about?"

Many Harvard workers agree, saying they see no reason why those who worked for the University should be excluded form its prosperity.

"I don't think it treats us fairly at all," Duarte says. "Upper management makes extremely big salaries and they're the same people that are telling us we're making too much an hour. Harvard is a bunch of hypocrites."

"You can't force Harvard to move," he adds. "It moves when it wants to, which is a damn shame. Because when it wants you to move, you hup-to."

Beck says Harvard is to be blamed for the guards' stalled contract negotiations, not the union.

"It's not the unions that are apathetic. It's Harvard that's apathetic in dealing with the unions," he says. "Harvard has no sense of urgency. It moves on its own time."

With contract negotiations at an impasse, members of the guard union say they are worried about the threat of outsourcing, as several graduate schools have recently turned to sub-contracted security guards.

"We're wondering what Harvard's next move will be," McCombe says. "These guys are worried about their jobs."

And union members say that this "typical" situation should not be permitted at a university with the money and moral stature of Harvard.

"Obviously, Harvard exists as a teaching and research institution and it wasn't founded to merely create jobs in Cambridge. But if you take one of the many spokes of the wheel out, it would not be as effective," Williams says. "We can't just say Harvard exists purely as a teaching and research organization, but also as an employer, a landlord and a neighbor."