Furubotn's road to organisational work was through his trade union, the cabinet makers. He became its secretary in 1909, when he was only 19 and for over a decade union work took most of his spare time. He soon became one of the labour movement's radicals joining, for instance, ``Fagopposisjonen'' (the trade union opposition) of 1911. It was an oppositional movement among the unions, formed in Trondheim by Martin Tranmæl. Its objects were to achieve the maximum possible local autonomy within the labour movement, and to campaign for the use of radical weapons in labour struggles - such as the sabotage of tools and machines and preventing non-strikers from working. Furubotn became a member of the trade union opposition's Bergen committee.(6) He must have distinguished himself in his union work, for he was appointed to more and more positions of trust in the unions and in due course in the local Labour Party. In 1920 he reached a temporary peak in his career when he was placed first among nineteen applicants for the post of Secretary of the Bergen local trade union council.(7) At about the same time, the council also selected him to head a union information and agitation centre. His job as secretary was both to coordinate and to direct trade union activities in Bergen, especially during disputes and strikes. This power base was extended and reinforced when he was put in charge of the information centre. From the union point of view, this exceptional concentration of power at the local level was to have two results: the labour struggle was conducted more efficiently, and greater local autonomy was secured in relation to the main unions and the Norwegian Federation of Trade Unions in the capital Kristiania (renamed Oslo in 1924 ). The Bergen trade union council even had laws governing local autonomy which went further than the laws of the Norwegian Federation.(8)

The Secretary of the Bergen trade union council had a great deal of power in the local labour movement: there were strings to be pulled both in the limelight and behind the scenes. But another important aspect of the job was how close it brought him to the working class in which he was born and bred, not only in the formal matters he had to deal with, but because people in need came to him for help. He often functioned as a practical social worker, caring for families in distress. Furubotn was already showing his characteristic combination of far-reaching political vision and ability to deal with individual difficulties in concrete cases. The distress and desperation that was a feature of everyday life intensified his attachment to the utopian vision of creating a Garden of Eden in the real world - at the earliest possible opportunity.

The strong sense of justice Furubotn had shown in childhood was strengthened by the misery he saw at first hand in Bergen, and helps to account for the passion of his performances at public meetings and in assemblies. The indignation with which he condemned the capitalist system that was unable to provide working people with jobs or bread was genuine.

In about 1920, Bergen was considered Norway's main social trouble spot:(9) the heated conflicts there between the labour movement and the authorities included such illegal action as the occupation of factories and houses.(10) Furubotn and a number of others were given prison sentences, and the municipality secretly purchased arms for use against the labour organisations.(11) The ability of local organised labour to mobilise frightened the non-Socialist majority on the town council. The Bergen trade union council took part in demonstrations which must have gathered 10% of the city's population.(12) Altogether it can be said that in the early 1920s Bergen was on the verge of a revolutionary situation, in which local rebellion could easily have broken out. A contributing factor was the impact of the Russian Revolution of 1917, which gripped Bergen all the more strongly due the fact that it had been a base for exiled Russian revolutionaries before and just after 1917. Furubotn had been one of the few members of a top secret organisation which assisted them, under the Labour Party leader Kyrre Grepp. The Norwegian labour movement had had close ties with the Russian revolutionaries since the turn of the century. The Labour Party was the only major established labour or social democratic party in Europe to join in the establishment of the Communist International, the Comintern, in 1919. That organisation soon saw as its main task the dissemination of ideas and directives concerned with the promotion of revolutionary change by centralising power in labour organisations, and Furubotn no doubt helped to spread such ideas through his activities in the Bergen Labour Party. By 1921, some of the party activists had formed a sort of ideological and political party nucleus called the Communist Club(13); Furubotn was chairman.(14) From 1920 to 1923, the Club was Bergen's main labour movement forum for the discussion of ideological and political questions.(15)