Social Movements And Organized Labour

This book is about the building of alliances and about joint activities between two groups of social movement actors ascribed increasing relevance for the functioning and the eventual amendment of democratic capitalism. The chapters provide a well-balanced mix of theoretical and empirical accounts on the political, social and economic catalysts behind the changing motives finding expression in a multitude of novel types of joint collective action and inter-organizational alliances. The contributors to this volume go beyond attempting to place unions, movements, crises, precariousness, protests and coalitions at the centre of the research. Instead, they focus on actors who themselves transcend clear-cut social camps. They look at the values and motives underlying collective action by both types of actors as much as at their structural and strategic properties, and inter-organizational relations and networks. This creates a fresh, genuine and historically valid account of the incompatibilities and the commonalities of movements and unions, and of prospects for inter-organizational learning.

A consensus-shattering account of automation technologies and their effect on workplaces and the labor market In this consensus-shattering account of automation technologies, Aaron Benanav investigates the economic trends that will shape our working lives far into the future. Silicon Valley titans, politicians, techno-futurists, and social critics have united in arguing that we are on the cusp of an era of rapid technological automation, heralding the end of work as we know it. But does the muchdiscussed “rise of the robots” really explain the long-term decline in the demand for labor? Automation and the Future of Work uncovers the deep weaknesses of twenty-first-century capitalism and the reasons why the engine of economic growth keeps stalling. Equally important, Benanav goes on to salvage from automation discourse its utopian content: the positive vision of a world without work. What social movements, he asks, are required to propel us into post-scarcity if technological innovation alone can’t deliver it? In response to calls for a permanent universal basic income that would maintain a growing army of redundant workers, he offers a groundbreaking counterproposal.

This volume attempts to show the emerging contours of ‘transformative action’ in social movements across South Asia. It argues that these contours have been shaped by contestations over questions of equity, justice and well-being on the one hand, and the nature and scope of new and classical social movements on the other. This is manifest in diverse modes through people’s struggles, protest and dissent. The authors examine a variety of themes that have determined the course of the politics of transformative struggles. They critique neoliberalism, ‘primitive’ accumulation, money, class inequalities, as well as aspects of capital–labour conflict. They highlight the contributions of movements by women, dalit and marginalized communities; peace movements; and environmental and agrarian struggles. The volume also appraises the role of internet in grassroots mobilizations and that of civil society networks in the making of participatory democracy. It further argues that the predicaments of cultural, ethnic, national, regional, and linguistic identities are not divorced from capital–labour conflicts. The book will serve as essential reading for students and scholars of sociology, social movements, politics, gender and feminist studies, labour studies, and the informed general reader.

The U.S. labor movement may be on the verge of massive growth, according to Dan Clawson. He argues that unions don't grow slowly and incrementally, but rather in bursts. Even if the AFL-CIO could organize twice as many members per year as it now does, it would take thirty years to return to the levels of union membership that existed when Ronald Reagan was elected president. In contrast, labor membership more than quadrupled in the years from 1934 to 1945. For there to be a new upsurge, Clawson asserts, labor must fuse with social movements concerned with race, gender, and global justice.The new forms may create a labor movement that breaks down the boundaries between "union" and "community" or between work and family issues. Clawson finds that this is already happening in some parts of the labor movement: labor has endorsed global justice and opposed war in Iraq, student activists combat sweatshops, unions struggle for immigrant rights. Innovative campaigns of this sort, Clawson shows, create new strategies--determined by workers rather than union organizers--that redefine the very meaning of the labor movement. The Next Upsurge presents a range of examples from attempts to replace "macho" unions with more feminist models to campaigns linking labor and community issues and attempts to establish cross-border solidarity and a living wage.

Some social movements bring in quick, radical political and social changes while others get incorporated into existing systems or subjected to harsh repression. This book examines why social movements elicit different policy responses and their varying impact on the societies in which they occur. It also seeks to understand why seemingly inconsequential movements can nonetheless have enduring effects. These issues are explored through the comparative historical analysis of four labor movements, in the UK and the U.S. in the late 1800s -early 1900s, in Japan from 1945 to 1960, and in Turkey during the mid to late 1900s, which is the book's primary case study. Turkey's labor movement, although often seen as a failure, greatly influenced state-society relations and contemporary Turkish politics. This significant study offers a new framework of analysis by focusing on social movement impacts rather than successes or failures. This leads to having to reconsider the enduring effects of repressed or failed movements. By doing so, it will help researchers study the likely impact of social movements in today's politics.

Since the turn of the twenty-first century, Canadian unions have scored a number of important Supreme Court victories, securing constitutional rights to picket, bargain collectively, and strike. Unions in Court documents the evolution of the Canadian labour movement’s engagement with the Charter, demonstrating how and why labour’s long-standing distrust of the legal system has given way to a controversial, Charter-based legal strategy. This book’s in-depth examination of constitutional labour rights will have critical implications for labour movements as well as activists in other fields.

This book is a timely and necessary examination of how organized labour and workers movements are engaging with this shifting environment. Based on extensive empirical research into emerging migrant and low-wage workers movements and their media practices, this book takes a critical look at the nature of worker resistance to ever-growing global corporate power in a digital age.

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the need to re-establish the labour movement’s political capacity to exert collective power in ways that foster greater opportunity and equality for working-class people has taken on a greater sense of urgency. Understanding the strategic political possibilities and challenges facing the Canadian labour movement at this important moment in history is the central concern of this second edition of Rethinking the Politics of Labour in Canada. With new and revised essays by established and emerging scholars from a wide range of disciplines, this edited collection assesses the past, present and uncertain future of Canadian labour politics in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Bringing together the traditional electoral-based aspects of labour politics with analyses of newer and rediscovered forms of working-class organization and social movement-influenced strategies, which have become increasingly important in the Canadian labour movement, this book seeks to take stock of these new forms of labour politics, understand their emergence and assess their potential impact on the future of labour in Canada.