The Ilo From Geneva To The Pacific Rim

This volume of original essays considers how the International Labour Organization has helped generate a set of ideas and practices, past and present, transnational and within a single nation, aimed at advancing social and economic reform in the Pacific Rim.

This volume of original essays considers how the International Labour Organization has helped generate a set of ideas and practices, past and present, transnational and within a single nation, aimed at advancing social and economic reform in the Pacific Rim.

This book is the first comprehensive account of the International Labour Organization’s 100-year history. At its heart is the concept of global social policy, which encompasses not only social policy in its national and international dimensions, but also development policy, world trade, international migration and human rights. The book focuses on the ILO’s roles as a key player in debates on poverty, social justice, wealth distribution and social mobility subjects and as a global forum for addressing these issues. The study puts in perspective the manifold ways in which the ILO has helped structure these debates and has made – through its standard-setting, technical cooperation and myriad other activities – practical contributions to the world of work and to global social policy.

Winner of the Australia and New Zealand Law and History Society (ANZLHS) Prize for 2023 Maritime workers occupy a central place in global labour history. This new and compelling account from Australia, shows seafaring and waterside unions engaged in a shared history of activism for legally regulated wages and safe liveable conditions for all who go to sea. Maritime Men of the Asia-Pacific provides a corrective to studies which overlook this region’s significance as a provider of the world’s maritime labour force and where unions have a rich history of reaching across their differences to forge connections in solidarity. From the ‘militant young Australian’ Harry Bridges whose progressive unionism transformed the San Francisco waterfront, to Australia’s successful implementation of the Maritime Labour Convention 2006, this is a story of vision and leadership on the international stage. Unionists who saw themselves as internationalists were also operating within a national and imperial framework where conflicting interests and differences of race and ideology had to be overcome. Union activists in India, China and Japan struggled against indentured labour and ‘coolie’ standards. They linked with their fellow-unionists in pursuing an ideal of international labour rights against the power of shipowners and anti-union governments. This is a complex story of endurance, cooperation and conflict and its empowering legacy.

Founded in 1919 under the Treaty of Versailles as part of the League of Nations’ system, the ILO is still today the main organization responsible for the international organization of work and the improvement of working conditions in the world. Widely recognized for its efforts in building international labour standards, the ILO remains little studied by development specialists and historians. This book intends to fill this gap and traces the history of international development and its early pioneers, through an analysis of the activities of the International Labour Office, the Secretariat of the International Labour Organization, between 1930 and 1946. In this book, development is used as a key to questioning the ILO's place and function in the expanding inter-war world. The development practices and discourses that emerged in the 1930s were mainly intended to support the ILO's universalization strategy, which was made necessary by the events that shook Europe at the time. Development discourses and practices were also part of the "esprit du temps", as they were closely linked to the affirmation of the planist and rationalist ideas of the 1930s. However, development for the ILO was not reduced to a project of economic modernization, but was seen as a tool for social engineering, as evidenced by the ILO's missions of technical assistance, organized since 1930. The analysis of the expertise work makes it possible to highlight the logics that prevailed in technical assistance, which was more in line with institutional objectives, than with the dissemination of a genuine expertise. This book therefore hopes to bring new insight on the history of internationalism, and international organizations during the inter-war period and the Second World War, as well as on the role of the ILO in the history of international development thinking and practices.

This book brings together a selection of texts from the first three editions of the “ILO Chair”, established by a protocol signed in 2017 between the University of Coimbra, through its Faculty of Economics (FEUC), and the International Labour Organization (ILO). The book is organised into four parts, each of which consists of two chapters and refers to a relevant thematic grouping on the future of work: i) The ILO between the historical legacy and the future of decent work; ii) Labour standards, jobs and climate challenges; iii) Inequalities, work and gender gaps; iv) Work, digital economy and the right to disconnect. Each of the 8 chapters is matched with a commentary co-authored by FEUC professors and/or researchers from its main research centres – the Centre for Social Studies (CES) and the Centre for Business and Economics Research (CeBER). A plurality of dialogues with the ILO on the future of work is thus produced, reflecting the wealth of disciplinary visions that make up the FEUC community.

The Routledge History of Human Rights is an interdisciplinary collection that provides historical and global perspectives on a range of human rights themes of the past 150 years. The volume is made up of 34 original contributions. It opens with the emergence of a "new internationalism" in the mid-nineteenth century, examines the interwar, League of Nations, and the United Nations eras of human rights and decolonization, and ends with the serious challenges for rights norms, laws, institutions, and multilateral cooperation in the national security world after 9/11. These essays provide a big picture of the strategic, political, and changing nature of human rights work in the past and into the present day, and reveal the contingent nature of historical developments. Highlighting local, national, and non-Western voices and struggles, the volume contributes to overcoming Eurocentric biases that burden human rights histories and studies of international law. It analyzes regions and organizations that are often overlooked. The volume thus offers readers a new and broader perspective on the subject. International in coverage and containing cutting-edge interpretations, the volume provides an overview of major themes and suggestions for future research. This is the perfect book for those interested in social justice, grass roots activism, and international politics and society.

Around the world, hundreds of millions of labor migrants endure exploitation, lack of basic rights, and institutionalized discrimination and marginalization. What dynamics and drivers have created a world in which such a huge--and rapidly growing--group toils as marginalized men and women, existing as a lower caste institutionally and juridically? In what ways did labor migrants shape their living and working conditions in the past, and what opportunities exist for them today? Global Labor Migration presents new multidisciplinary, transregional perspectives on issues surrounding global labor migration. The essays go beyond disciplinary boundaries, with sociologists, ethnographers, legal scholars, and historians contributing research that extends comparison among and within world regions. Looking at migrant workers from the late nineteenth century to the present day, the contributors illustrate the need for broader perspectives that study labor migration over longer timeframes and from wider geographic areas. The result is a unique, much-needed collection that delves into one of the world’s most pressing issues, generates scholarly dialogue, and proposes cutting-edge research agendas and methods. Contributors: Bridget Anderson, Rutvica Andrijasevic, Katie Bales, Jenny Chan, Penelope Ciancanelli, Felipe Barradas Correia Castro Bastos, Eileen Boris, Charlie Fanning, Judy Fudge, Jorge L. Giovannetti-Torres, Heidi Gottfried, Julie Greene, Justin Jackson, Radhika Natarajan, Pun Ngai, Bastiaan Nugteren, Nicola Piper, Jessica R. Pliley, Devi Sacchetto, Helen Sampson, Yael Schacher, Joo-Cheong Tham, and Matt Withers