Subjects Archives: Labor

  Editor’s Introduction It’s no secret that there exists (1) a high turnover rate among entry-level organizers, many of whom are (2) young college graduates, rather than people recruited out of the communities that are organizing targets — the interrelated problems that Kevin Funk’s essay below illustrates. Daisy Rooks’ qualitative study (based on interviews with […]

Capitalism’s demand for cheap labor is the thread that runs throughout the history of immigration in the U.S. and remains the central issue today.  Currently, the crux of the immigration issue is the status of the undocumented Mexican and Central American labor force working in this country.  Just how closely the U.S. economy is linked […]

  Andrew Stern, president of the 1.7-million-member Service Employees International Union, once likened the leadership of a mass movement to the crew on a sailboat.  What matters is the wind in the sails, he said, not the fight over who steers. The wind behind the movement for immigrant rights had reached gale force by May […]

A union presence at the Sago mine might well have prevented the disaster. Training at a union mine is strictly enforced.  Workers, in rotation, walk the three alternate escape routes monthly and train on priorities in case of an emergency.  Barricading as was done at Sago is the fourth and final resort. There were no […]

En ce Premier Mai 2006,  des milliers et des milliers de Latinos se sont absentés du travail et de l’école, ont manifesté dans les rues des principales villes américaines et ont fait grève de consommation pour protester contre le projet de loi HR 4437 sur le contrôle de l’immigration illégale et faire reconnaître leur apport […]

As labor activists from around the country and world converge on Dearborn, Michigan in early May for the Labor Notes Conference, it’s worth reflecting back on a year that has brought back hopes for a revitalization of the labor movement. Several months ago, the Wall Street Journal described an increase in strikes in the United […]

  Yiwen Cheng lives in Kansas City, and Stephen Philion lives in Minneapolis.

  SOLIDARITY FOR SALE: How Corruption Destroyed the Labor Movement and Undermined America’s Promise by ROBERT FITCH AUTHOR’S NOTE READ EXCERPT BUY THIS BOOK Michael D. Yates: Robert, let’s start off with a question not directly connected to your book Solidarity for Sale.  Some commentators say that today labor unions and labor movements are irrelevant […]

“It is with great pride that I announce Gov. Blagojevich has signed House Bill 3471, the Day Labor Services Act today,” said Illinois Deputy Chief of Staff of Labor, Esther Lopez.  “We think today is a historic day.  It is a law that is the most aggressive protection for day laborers in the country.” With […]

  “Predictions are suspect.  But something new is happening. . . .” — Paul Buhle1 A people’s movement against the “class war from above” is beginning to crystallize across Thailand.  Students and unionized workers have suddenly emerged as a new force in the streets in helping to organize a broad-based people’s alliance to oust the […]

  Download the flyer: pdf; and doc! Guest Speakers: Jerry Tucker: Former UAW Intl Executive Board Member & co-founder of the New Directions Movement in that union and labour educator/activist; Dennis Delling: Long-time Delphi worker and participant in current struggle; Mike Vince: President, CAW Local 200 (Ford); Sam Gindin: Retired CAW staff and currently Packer […]

  José Martí and Simón Bolívar, two of Latin America’s most respected independence fighters, recognized nearly a century ago that their homelands would never be free of imperial domination, until Latin America came together in solidarity as a united force. Martí and Bolívar’s insights remain relevant in the age of neo-liberal globalization.  The colonizers of […]

  [This essay is a winner of an essay contest held by Left Hook and sponsored by Monthly Review. — Ed.] During the last two summers, I did not spend my days relaxing on a beach reading great novels and poems.  I did not write the grand story I promised myself I would write.  Instead, […]

Unless political elites change strategy and tactics in 2006, North-South relations will continue to degenerate.  By the end of last year, opportunities ranging from rock concerts to summits and trade negotiations were lost. South Africa’s role in this failure of global nerve was substantial.  Three leading politicians of South Africa — Thabo Mbeki, Alec Erwin, […]

Only last year, Honda’s humanoid robot, Asimo, was learning how to walk. Now, the five-year-old droid is ready to take on simple office work, greet visitors and fetch refreshments. Japan’s third-biggest auto manufacturer introduced Tuesday a second-generation Asimo that can also push a cart weighing up to 22 pounds, and walk straight, sideways or backwards […]

Clinton Jencks, from Salt of the Earth Legendary labor organizer Clinton Jencks, who led mineworkers in New Mexico in a strike depicted in the classic movie Salt of the Earth, died Dec. 15 in San Diego of natural causes.  He was 87. An international representative of the Amalgamated Bayard District Union of Mine, Mill, and […]

  A young man by the name of Erik Hartmann graduated from Evergreen Park Community High School in Evergreen Park, Illinois in June of 1976 without having a clue of what to do beyond that. He had played sports in all four of his high school years and was quite the physical specimen. He was […]

  We do not have coffee break at my work. No one yells, “Break time!” to remind you to stop for a minute. We do not sit together on flipped, five-gallon paint buckets. And no one shares homemade cookies, made by someone back home who makes working worth something. We do not have lunch break, […]

On December 10th, International Human Rights Day, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney pointed out that “[f]or all practical purposes, Americans have lost the freedom to form unions.”  Accordingly, the AFL-CIO and its allies engaged in a series of protests and rallies in over 100 cities across the country (as well as in eight countries around the […]

The United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE) and UE Local 150, which represents thousands of public employees who work for state agencies and municipal governments in North Carolina, filed a complaint with the International Labor Organization (ILO) on December 9, 2005, charging the U.S. government and the State of North Carolina with […]