This article examines the conceptual impact of equal pay legislation on Canadian trade unionism. Ambiguous, largely voluntary, legislation poses major challenges to unions negotiating wage parity for their members. Furthermore, the movement finds itself caught between conflicting responsibilities as champion of the underpaid and protector of traditional interests. The authors examine this challenge within the context of the historic development, and fundamental principles of trade unionism. They conclude that many of the conflicts discussed arise directly from (...) established union practices and must, therefore, be resolved by the movement and other affected parties together. (shrink)

The 1950s were a frenetic moment in the European integration process during which the European Economic Community (EEC), the ultimately abortive Free Trade Area (FTA), and subsequently the European Free Trade Association (EFTA) were all negotiated. Trade unions showed keen interest in these schemes; moreover, their own highly institutionalised cooperation suggested they might come to play a key role in shaping them. And yet scholars have argued how divergent traditions and domestic pressures precluded the emergence of a (...) coherent trade union platform on European unity. While not rejecting the structural weaknesses of union internationalism in this regard, this article asks why union centres nevertheless continued to engage with one another on the integration question. Focusing on the British Trade Unions Congress (TUC) and deploying a transnational approach to best understand the interaction between the national and international levels, it shows that union linkages still offered the TUC and its counterparts a valuable chance to learn from and persuade others – and even their governments – of their views, objectives and affairs. Such trade union diplomacy was thus in and of itself valuable despite wider union spats and misgivings, and did at times impact the broader language and approach of the countries involved. (shrink)

Improving working conditions at the bottom of global value chains has become a central issue in our global economy. In this battle, trade unionism has been presented as a way for workers to make their voices heard. Therefore, it is strongly promoted by most social standards. However, establishing a well-functioning trade union is not as obvious as it may seem. Using a comparative case study approach, we examine impediments to farm-level unionism in the cut flower industry (...) in Ethiopia. For this purpose, we propose an integrated framework combining two lenses, namely a vertical one and a horizontal one. We identify 10 impediments that point to three major dimensions contributing to unionisation. These three dimensions include awareness of and interest from workers, legitimacy of trade unions, and capacity of trade unions to act. Furthermore, our results suggest that private social standards may, in certain cases, be counterproductive for the efficient functioning of trade unions. Although we argue that there is no ‘quick fix’ solution to weak workplace unionism at the bottom of global value chains, we stress the importance of considering the dynamics of, and interactions between, the impediments when designing potential support measures that mitigate negative impacts. (shrink)

This book provides a political, economic, and sociological investigation of how neoliberalism shapes 'working class capacities,' or the power of the working class to organize and struggle for its collective interests. Efe Can Gürcan and Berk Mete discuss the global importance of the labor question as it pertains to Turkey. They apply the main theoretical framework of the combined and uneven development of class capacities to Turkish trade unionism. They also address Turkey's recent history of neoliberalization and its (...) repercussions for class capacities, as mediated by national regulations, conservative unionism, and Islamic social assistance networks. Finally, the authors explore how neoliberalism generates intra-class fragmentation through public regulatory mechanisms and cultural differentiation in the sphere of social unionism. (shrink)

Trade unions in Australia have long played an important role in the enforcement of minimum employment standards. The legislative framework today continues to recognize this enforcement role, but in a way that is more individualistic and legalistic than in the past. At the same time that the law has evolved to emphasize the representation and servicing role of trade unions, the Australian union movement has sought to revitalize and grow through the adoption of an “organizing model” of (...) class='Hi'>unionism that emphasizes workplace-level activism. This Article explores how these seemingly opposing trends have manifested themselves in the enforcement-related activities of five trade unions. Considerable diversity was found among the unions in relation to the extent to which and how the unions performed enforcement-related activities. However, all five unions spent significant time and resources on monitoring and enforcing employer compliance with minimum standards and saw this work as a core part of what they do. The case studies suggest, however, that the way in which this work is undertaken within unions and by whom has changed significantly in recent decades. While there was evidence that enforcement work was used tactically by unions in certain cases, this was largely on an ad hoc basis and there was little indication that the enforcement work was integrated into broader organizing objectives and strategies. Overall, the unions were ambivalent, if not skeptical, as to the capacity for enforcement work to grow unions through building workplace activism and collective strength. (shrink)

This paper offers a reinterpretation of Eduard Bernstein’s theory of evolutionary socialism. It does so by examining the leading role that he envisioned for unions of skilled workers in the socialist movement. During his time in London in the 1890s, Bernstein’s engagement with English Fabianism led him to emphasize the proletariat’s differentiated nature. He claimed skilled workers most readily organized and became the first proletarians to develop class consciousness. Unskilled workers, on the other hand, remained largely unorganized and estranged from (...) the socialist movement. Bernstein opposed the socialist political strategy of nationalization because it would subordinate unskilled workers to party revolutionaries rather than realize cooperative self-government in industry. This focus on promoting industrial self-government made Bernstein stress the importance of workers’ further unionization and adoption of skilled unionists’ method of collective bargaining. This would produce socialist cooperation because it facilitated cooperative wage determination. In Bernstein’s view, skilled unionists influenced the socialist party to take political action to organize and elevate more proletarians to class consciousness. In contrast to those who claim Bernstein prioritized the party’s autonomous ethical appeals and legislation, I emphasize his focus on union-party interactions and defense of unions as central for the advance into socialism’s cooperative society. (shrink)

Challenging the new political-economic “mainstream” that considers trade unions to be “complicit” in labor market dualization, this article’s analysis of union strategies in Italy and South Korea, most-different union movements perceived as unlikely cases for the pursuit of broader social solidarity, shows that in both countries unions have successively moved away from insider-focused strategies and toward “solidarity for all” in the industrial relations arena as well as in their social policy preferences. Furthermore, unions explored new avenues of political agency, (...) often in alliance with civil society organizations. This convergent trend toward a social model of unionism is ascribed to a response of unions to a “double crisis”: that is, a socioeconomic crisis, which takes the form of a growing periphery of the labor market associated with growing social exclusion, and a sociopolitical crisis, which takes the form of an increasing marginalization of the unions from the political process. (shrink)

Recent debates about the most appropriate political agents for realising social justice have largely focused on the potential value of national political parties on the one hand, and trade unions on the other. Drawing on the thought of Murray Bookchin, this article suggests that democratic municipalist agents – democratic associations of local residents that build and empower neighbourhood assemblies and improve the municipal provision of basic goods and services – can often also make valuable contributions to projects of just (...) social change. I identify a long-term and a more short-term argument for the value of democratic municipalist agency in Bookchin's thought and claim that the latter provides a compelling case for the valuable contributions this form of action can make to the achievement of a wide variety of visions of social justice. This provides a useful partial corrective to recent political theorising about the nature of the partisanship and trade unionism necessary to secure social justice. (shrink)

Recent debates about the most appropriate political agents for realising social justice have largely focused on the potential value of national political parties on the one hand, and trade unions on the other. Drawing on the thought of Murray Bookchin, this article suggests that democratic municipalist agents – democratic associations of local residents that build and empower neighbourhood assemblies and improve the municipal provision of basic goods and services – can often also make valuable contributions to projects of just (...) social change. I identify a long-term and a more short-term argument for the value of democratic municipalist agency in Bookchin's thought and claim that the latter provides a compelling case for the valuable contributions this form of action can make to the achievement of a wide variety of visions of social justice. This provides a useful partial corrective to recent political theorising about the nature of the partisanship and trade unionism necessary to secure social justice. (shrink)

Th is work is a companion piece to "The American Worker," Karl Kautsky's reply to Werner Sombart’s Why Is There No Socialism in the United States? (1906), first published in English in the November 2003 edition of the journal Historial Materialism. In August 1909 Kautsky wrote an article on Samuel Gompers, the president of the American Federation of Labor, on the occasion of the latter's first European tour. Th e article was not only a criticism of Gompers’s anti-socialist "pure-and-simple" (...) class='Hi'>unionism but also part of an ongoing battle between the revolutionary wing of German Social Democracy and the German trade-union officials. In this critical English edition we provide the historical background to the document as well as an overview of the issues raised by Gompers' visit to Germany, such as the bureaucratisation and increasing conservatism of the union leadership in both Germany and the United States, the role of the General Commission of Free Trade Unions in the abandonment of Marxism by the German Social-Democratic Party and the socialists’ attitude toward institutions promoting class collaboration like the National Civic Federation. (shrink)

The city of Cork experienced a political odyssey between Easter 1916 and the end of 1918. Wartime policies conceived in London manifested themselves unexpectedly in Cork--The Defence of the Realm Act was used to repress political speech; deficit spending generated massive inflation; mandatory arbitration encouraged workers to join trade unions; food rationing panicked a country scarred by the Potato Famine; and military conscription generated virtual rebellion. As a result, the Cork public increasingly turned against the war. The book examines (...) the political situation in Cork prior to the Easter Rising; local reactions to the rebellion; the rapid creation of the Republican mass movement; the dramatic decline of the Irish Party; the explosion of anti-authority street rioting; the mobilization of women in the independence struggle; disturbances against venereal disease treatments and visiting American sailors; the emergence of radical trade unionism; agitation over the retention of local food supplies; the nationalist mobilization during the Conscription Crisis; and Sinn Féin's triumph in the 1918 General Election. (shrink)

J. F. C. Harrison has written that ‘for each age there is a new view of Mr Owen’, which is proof of the fertility and continuing relevance of his ideas. Not just in Britain and America but today around the world anti-poverty campaigners, birth-controllers, collectivists, communitarians, co-operators, ecologists, educationalists, environmentalists, feminists, humanitarians, internationalists, paternalistic capitalists, secularists, campaigners for social justice, trade unionists, urban planners, utopians, welfare reformers can all find something to admire and inspire in the treasure trove that (...) is the thought and actions of Robert Owen. Owen was a creative genius of global significance, a radical writer and activist of international reputation and reach who has inspired those seeking to change human society for the better. The contributors to this volume include not only many of the recognized experts on the life, work and legacy of Owen, but also work from younger scholars or scholars coming to the field afresh. The volume presents the most recent and original research on Owen. Owen notoriously (and impressively) dabbled in many spheres, and this is reflected in the its breadth of content. The unifying themes are Owen’s profile in his own time, and the relevance of his ideas for the generations that followed. His importance for educational and social philosophy, for political economy and for the political theory of socialism are all discussed, as are his contribution as a philanthropic employer, his political activities and the specificities of his historical context. (shrink)

This special issue re-evaluates the 1950s as a period of transnationalism in ideas and political practices, offering innovative insights into political history and political ideas. Without setting the national and transnational spheres against each other, the issue argues that the dialectics between the two was a defining element of Europe in this period. The articles explore transnational cooperation and exchanges among intellectuals, politicians and trade unionists, showing how they were changing in their interaction. The editorial sets out from the (...) research on the postwar configuration of Europe based on the retake of the nation state, combining it with new research of transnational history and putting out some methodological innovations. The editorial also highlights some significant themes across the articles: the central role of translation and localisation, the interaction with local interests and disputes, the Cold War, the acceleration of European integration, the rise of the Third World, the tensions between hope and fear or between nihilism and rebirth of Europe, the centrality of science. (shrink)

Although the Association of Catholic Trade Unionists officially accepted Catholic corporate theory, its primary concerns were aiding trade unionism and attacking Communist influence in the labor movement.

The idea of ‘Western Philosophy’ is the product of a legitimation project for European colonialism, through to post-second world war Pan-European identity formation and white supremacist projects. Thus argues Ben Kies (1917-1979), a South African public intellectual, schoolteacher, trade unionist, and activist-theorist. In his 1953 address to the Teachers’ League of South Africa, The Contribution of the Non-European Peoples to World Civilisation, Kies became one of the first people to argue explicitly that there is no such thing as ‘Western (...) philosophy’. In this paper, I introduce Kies as a new figure in the historiography of philosophy with important insights, relevant today. I outline his three key arguments: that ‘Western Philosophy’ is the product of political mythmaking, that it is a recent, largely mid-twentieth century fabrication, and that there is an alternative to ‘Histories of Western Philosophy’, namely ‘mixed’ or entangled histories. I show that Kies’ claims are supported both by contemporary scholarship and bibliometric analysis. I thus argue that Kies is right to claim that the idea of a distinctive, hermetically sealed ‘Western Philosophy’ is a recent, political fabrication and should be abandoned. We should instead develop global, entangled historiography to make sense of philosophy and its history today. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Two Cheers for Blueprints, or, Negative Reasons for Positive UtopianismAntonis Balasopoulos (bio)It is well known that the decline of programmatic or so-called blueprint utopias and utopianism came on the heels of a widespread and concerted attack against them during the first two decades of the Cold War. In the writings of thinkers like Hayek, Popper, Talmon, Kolakowski, and many others, program became synonymous with hubris.1 It was construed as (...) a dangerous effort to regulate the diversity of human subjectivity and the complexity of the social organism, a repressive will-to-order and predictability that tainted utopias by associating them with Totalitarianism. In Popper’s exemplary exposition:The Utopian attempt to realize an ideal state, using a blueprint for society as a whole, is one which demands a strong centralized rule of a few, and which therefore is likely to lead to a dictatorship. [...] [Utopia] claims to plan rationally for the whole of society, although we do not possess anything like the factual knowledge which would be necessary to make good such an ambitious claim.2 [End Page 489]Yet, though this view of how Utopia, to recall Robert C. Elliott, became “a bad word,” is accurate in itself, it also reflects only the negative or destructive side of Cold War anti-utopianism, a trend whose logical inconsistencies and ideological biases have already been ably dissected in the work of Russell Jacoby, Marc Olssen, and Darren Webb, to name but a few.3What one could term the “positive” or “productive” side of anti-utopian denunciations of the dogmatically programmatic character allegedly inherent in utopias went well beyond the exigencies of generating a geopolitical and ideological enemy image. It involved an effort to reconcile western subjects to seismic and highly consequential shifts within postwar, late-capitalist societies themselves. If, as I have argued elsewhere, utopian fictions (and, indeed, nonfictions) before the Cold War period can be read as fictions of organization—of everything from architecture and urban planning, to production, sexuality and biological reproduction, clothing, or diet—it is also the case that in them, “organization” is a response, a reaction to traumatic historical experiences of disorganization, from the decline of the ancient city-state in the case of Platonic utopianism; to the impoverishment and dislocation of rural communities in the era of Thomas More; to the experience of the fracturing of religious community during the religious, civil, and international wars that marked the seventeenth century; to the dramatic impact of early nineteenth-century industrialization on artisanal and agrarian communities, on family cohesion and on the rhythms of the premodern working day.4My argument is, then, that the anti-utopian denunciation of blueprint and program was not simply motivated by the liberal capitalist attack against the planned and highly regulated character of economy and society in the countries of so-called actually existing socialism. It was also motivated by the ideological need to normalize and legitimize the transition, within western capitalist societies themselves, to what Scott Lash and John Urry called “disorganized capitalism.” Lash and Urry’s book, originally published during the decade of the triumphant rise of neoliberalism, in 1987, launches its investigation by tellingly quoting the passage of Marx and Engels’s Communist Manifesto that focuses on the creatively destructive aspects of capitalist social transformation: the bourgeoisie, Lash and Urry observe, is a class “with vested interest in change, crisis and chaos”; the social world over which it presides is one “which swings wildly out of control, menacing and destructive.”5 In their introduction, the authors outline the basic features of the postwar shift from the organized capitalism of the mid-nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to its disarticulated successor formation during the rise of [End Page 490] neoliberal governance. Under the rubric of “disorganization” (which is to say, of a mutation within the western capitalist economic and social order), they include de-industrialization and the decline in the absolute and relative size of the working class in the core capitalist economies; the rise of flexible forms of labor organization in the place of defunct Taylorist principles; the weakening of trade unionist organization; the increasing decoupling of large monopolies from the control and regulation... (shrink)

Most reasonable people acknowledge that Karl Helge Hampus Hellekant has committed a grave moral offense: the 33-year-old Swede, also known as Karl Svensson, was convicted of killing trade unionist Björn Söderberg in 1999 at the behest of the Swedish neo-Nazi movement. What is not so clear is whether Hellekant, who is currently free on parole, should be permitted to become a physician. The former extremist was admitted to the medical school at Stockholm’s Karolinska Institute in 2007, but later expelled—following (...) considerable public debate—after school officials discovered that he was temporarily unable to verify his academic records. Sweden’s most prestigious medical school, Uppsala, subsequently confirmed these records and matricatulated him in 2008. (shrink)

Le réseau Labornet a été créé en Californie en 1991 par des syndicalistes, pour donner un nouveau souffle au mouvement ouvrier. Il est aujourd'hui présent dans une dizaine de pays industrialisés, en Amérique du Nord, en Europe et en Asie. La branche japonaise, Labornet Japan, est née en 2001 avec l'aide des militants coréens. À travers une série d'événements annuels comme la Labor Fiesta ou la campagne Union, Yes !, la diffusion de vidéos sur Union-Tube, le réseau Labornet Japan a (...) su développer une nouvelle culture militante qui dépasse les vieux clivages politiques et syndicaux. En dépit de la multiplication des contrats précaires, il attire de nombreux jeunes vers l'action collective.LaborNet network was established in California in 1991 by trade unionists, to reinvigorate the labor movement. It is currently present in ten countries in North America, Europe and Asia. The Japanese branch, LaborNet Japan, was founded in 2001 with the help of Korean activists. Through a series of annual events like the Fiesta or the Labor Union campaign, Yes!, Dissemination of EU-Tube videos on the network LaborNet Japan has developed a new activist culture that goes beyond the old political divisions and labor. Despite the proliferation of precarious contracts, it attracts many young people to collective action. (shrink)

Après deux ans de pouvoir de Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, un bilan de cette expérience unique dans la culture politique brésilienne d'une arrivée au pouvoir d'un ouvrier, syndicaliste, peut être tentée. Il s'agit surtout de répérer le changement de paradigme opéré par le président, tant du point de vue du réalisme politique que de celui de la mutation de l'homme lui-même.After two years of power Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, an overview of this unique experience in Brazilian political culture (...) of coming to power of a worker, trade unionist, can be attempted. This is especially the Local orientation paradigm shift made by the President, both from the perspective of political realism as that of the transformation of the man himself. (shrink)

Robert Owen was one of the most extraordinary Englishmen who ever lived and a great man. In a way his history is the history of the establishment of modern industrial Britain, reflected in the mind and activities of a very intelligent, capable and responsible industrialist, alive to the best social thought of his time. The organisation of industrial labour, factory legislation, education, trade unionism, co-operation, rationalism: he was passionately and ably engaged in all of them. His community at (...) New Lanark was the nearest thing to an industrial heaven in the Britain of dark satanic mills; he tried to found a rational co-operative community in the USA. In everything he contemplated, he saw education as a key. This selection of his writings on education illustrates his rationalist concept of the formation of character and its implications for education and society; also his growing utopian concern with social reorganisation; and third, his impact on social movements. Silver's introduction shows Owen's relationship to particular educational traditions and activities and his long-term influence on attitudes to education. (shrink)

Paul Lafargue, the disciple and son-in-law of Karl Marx, helped to found the first French Marxist party in 1882. Over the next three decades, he served as the chief theoretician and propagandist for Marxism in France. During these years - which ended with the dramatic suicides of Lafargue and his wife - French socialism, and the Marxist party within it, became a significant political force. Leslie Derfler explores Lafargue's political strategies, specifically his break with party co-founder Jules Guesde in the (...) Boulanger and Dreyfus episodes and over the question of socialist syndicalist relations. Derfler shows Lafargue's importance as both political activist and theorist. He describes Lafargue's role in the formulation of such strategies as the promotion of a Second Workingmen's International, the pursuit of reform within the framework of the existent state but opposition to any socialist participation in nonsocialist governments, and the subordination of trade unionism to political action. He emphasizes Lafargue's pioneering efforts to apply Marxist methods of analysis to questions of anthropology, aesthetics, and literary criticism. (shrink)

'This is a powerful piece of advocacy. I'd pick Ewing and Gearty for my counsels any day.' -Bernard Porter, LRBThis book is an account of the struggle for civil liberties against the State in which groups such as the anti-war protestors, the Irish nationalists, the Communist party, trade unionists, and the unemployed workers' movement found themselves involved in the first half of the twentieth century. All had to fight for their civil liberties in the face of strong opposition from (...) the State, including the judges whose attitude to civil liberties was often deeply hostile, and at odds with their supposed role as defenders of freedom. (shrink)

This study examines the intersection of individual life-histories, organisational histories and societal histories and reveals how religion, in several different expressions, serves to provide a connection between justice for workers and justice for the environment in the work of trade unionists. The trade union movement is generally seen as secular, and thus in our life-history interviews finding religion as a backdrop to labour activists’ formation was unexpected. Religion becomes manifest in various ways, partly through experiences in the present (...) or at formative periods in unionists’ lives, but also through its cultural embeddedness in language and collective memory. In this way it serves to provide subtle influences on beliefs, concepts of social justice and daily action. (shrink)

La couverture médiatique du conflit social des Forges de Clabecq s'est caractérisée par le développement croissant de stéréotypes censés rendre compte de la personnalité très singulière du chef de file de la délégation syndicale. Populiste, extrémiste, dictateur, gangster ou encore gourou, les figures journalistiques du leader « prolétarien » se sont succédé tout au long du conflit. Cette criminalisation croissante du mouvement social s'explique par l'intensité des enjeux politiques de ce dossier mais aussi par la méconnaissance profonde de la classe (...) ouvrière dans le chef de journalistes appartenant pour la grande majorité d'entre eux aux classes moyennes.The journalistic coverage of the social struggle of the Forges de Clabecq was characterized by the growing development of stereotypes which were supposed to describe the very singular personality of the trade unionist leader. Populist, extremist, dictator, gangster or even guru, the journalistic figures of the proletarian leader followed one another throughout the conflict. This growing criminalization of the social movement is explained by the intensity of the political stakes of this affair but also by the deep ignorance of the working-class in the case of journalists who belong to the middle class. (shrink)

Kautsky’s Road to Power was received in very different ways in Germany and Russia. In Germany, it earned Kautsky hostility from the trade-unionists on the right of the party and the radicals on the left. Later writers dismiss the book as preaching “revolutionary passivity.” In Russia, the Bolsheviks immediately seized on the book as an endorsement of specifically Bolshevik positions. After the war broke out, they used it to show that Kautsky was a renegade who did not live up (...) to his stated views. In the end, Road to Power helped inspire Kautsky’s greatest fans turned fiercest foes to make what he considered a tragic mistake: the October revolution. (shrink)

Tomorrow’s politics will be a politics of multiplicity. Contemporary Marxism, in its political and trade-unionist manifestations, appears as a major obstacle, given its inability to escape from totalising categories and to reflect upon the political need for innovation . Maurizio Lazzarato attempts to show that this double inability originates in an ontological view of relations, present in Marx himself, a view which needs to be reconsidered in light of the philosophy of multiplicity developed during the same period. William James’ (...) pragmatism, for instance, allows us to understand how deeply Marx’s ontology of relation is indebted to the idealist philosophy of the 19th century, thus revealing the ontological limits of Marxist politics. (shrink)

By focusing upon three figures: a trade unionist, who can no longer understand or reconcile himself with his past misogynist behaviour; Spinoza’s Spanish poet, who loses his memory and can no longer write poetry or even recognise his earlier work; and Spinoza’s lost friend, Burgh, who became a devout Catholic, I draw out Spinoza’s description of radical change in beliefs. I explore how, for Spinoza, radical changes that involve an increase in our powers of acting are conceived differently from (...) those changes that reduce our power. These transitions—which can be viewed as both personal and political—are not symmetrical because of the way in which they can be understood in relation to selfhood. To highlight the originality of Spinoza’s argument on personal change, I then compare it with that of his contemporary John Locke, who in Chapter 27 of the Essay Concerning Human Understanding famously theorises the maintenance of personal identity. I draw out one common aspect of the work of Étienne Balibar and of Janet Coleman to compare the ways in which Spinoza and Locke produce different answers to the same questions: how do we conceptualise our encounters with bodies and with ideas? How do these encounters affect our identity over time? In the final section, I switch from analysing personal (but also political) change to consider political change itself, by juxtaposing Warren Montag’s Spinozist analysis of the will, with Carole Pateman’s feminist critique of contract and consent. (shrink)

Despite continued social protest, something quite fundamental has changed in the regulation of class relations in France. This article explores two paradoxes of this transformation. First, a dense network of institutions of social dialogue and worker representation has become implanted in French firms at the same time as trade union strength has declined. Second, the transformation has involved a relaxation of centralized labor market regulation on the part of the state, yet the French state remains a central actor in (...) the reconstruction of the industrial relations system. Institutional reform of industrial relations could not take place without the active intervention of the state because employers and trade unions alone were unable to create durable industrial relations institutions. The collapse of trade unionism meant the need for new actors on the labor side and only the state could both create and confer legitimacy upon those new actors. (shrink)

In this Article we offer a new conceptualization of industrial citizenship, which is sensitive to gender and migration status. Our conceptualization builds on the theoretical distinction between active and passive citizenship and the analyses of active industrial citizenship. We suggest that active industrial citizenship should be detached from the old and influential tradition of trade unionism that is connected with the public/private divide. Our proposed conceptualization leads to attaching value to activities related to ethics of care and to (...) the pursuit of legal status, which should be seen as forms of activism. The discussion focuses on organizing domestic workers. We argue that this new conceptualization of active industrial citizenship leads to the recognition of domestic workers as active industrial citizens, rather than passive victims of abuse. It also transforms the way we view organizational forms within the labor market, making it possible to appreciate on an equal basis membership in trade unions and participation in NGOs and other civil society organizations, thereby building cooperation as well as taking part in other aspects of public life. We ground our argument on theoretical literature as well as a qualitative study, a series of interviews with key trade union and NGO actors with expertise in organizing and supporting domestic workers in Israel and the United Kingdom. (shrink)

‘One person, one vote’ (OPOV) is an important slogan in democratic movements, a principle that undergirds a landmark series of cases in US constitutional law, and a widely accepted axiom of democratic theory in philosophy and political science. It is taken to be sacrosanct; some even state that OPOV “is, like the injustice of chattel slavery, a ‘fixed point’” (Kolodny 2023: 291). This is a rare distinction for an ideal. For all the ink spilt on Rawls’ Difference Principle, no one (...) printed it on the pamphlets and placards of trade unionist, decolonial, and anti-Apartheid protests; it never appears in US Supreme Court decisions; and none of its defenders would say that denying it is akin to accepting slavery. But despite this, OPOV has proved remarkably hard to pin down. It is not meant to be a mere slogan. It is meant to explain why practices of plural voting and vote dilution are inegalitarian. But there is no consensus and little debate about what it means. Many leave the principle undefined. Others say OPOV means anonymity, or equal voting weight, or equal representation, or equal voting power. These accounts differ significantly. But little is said about one should be preferred to its rival. -/- My goal is to convince you that the meaning of OPOV poses a deep, urgent problem, for which we have no adequate solution. I will argue that all current accounts of OPOV should be rejected. The key upshot will be that we need, but lack, a good explanation of the datum that practices of plural voting and vote dilution robustly fail a minimal condition for political equality. In closing, I’ll explain why my arguments also push us towards embracing what has often been considered a radical and overly demanding implication: namely, that all district-based systems—including those used in the US House of Representatives, Senate, and Electoral College—violate OPOV. (shrink)

In its 2021 report on the state of world democracies, the US-based thinktank Freedom House declared that democracy was “under siege,” with worrying signs of retreat and resurgent authoritarianism across the world. In this book, a former university lecturer and trade unionist and now journalist and Green New Deal organiser takes up the problem of democracy as fundamental for understanding the opportunities and challenges facing the Left. In the wake of pessimism and right-wing populism, Ridley...

En s’appuyant sur une enquête de terrain concernant un établissement de la filière automobile, cet article cherche à montrer que le temps de travail a adopté un caractère flexible et fragmenté à la suite de transformations concomitantes de l’organisation du travail et des relations professionnelles. Ce temps est articulé au flux et au volume de production, ce qui le rend moins régulier et prévisible pour les salariés. Leur temps de travail peut ainsi varier à la hausse ou à la baisse (...) selon des contraintes de marché ou des aléas industriels. À cette flexibilité s’ajoute la désynchronisation du temps des différents ateliers et équipes à l’usine. En conséquence, les salariés et leurs représentants ont de moins en moins de prise sur un temps de travail qui semble s’imposer à eux, de l’extérieur. Face à cette situation, les marges de revendication des élus du personnel se réduisent. Ils tentent de redonner une certaine régularité et synchronicité au temps de travail quand il ne s’agit pas de négocier des contreparties salariales. Les transformations de l’organisation du travail en cours remettent donc en cause – mais de façon discrète – l’une des mesures dominantes du travail en régime fordien en réformant profondément les modalités de négociation sur le temps de travail. (shrink)

Historians of modern design and sociology have shown little interest in the leaders of the ever resourceful and influential British Positivist Society. One of the aims of this essay is to show that the Positivist polymath Frederic Harrison (1831–1923) cultivated ideas and practices that are compatible with modernists’ aspirations to improve the lives of the masses. It is accordingly shown that Harrison was an ardent supporter of working-class causes and that on this basis he developed sociological survey methods and produced (...) social programmes to initiate the comprehensive reorganisation of cities. Harrison intended to realise a modern utopia called the “Occidental Republic”, created by Auguste Comte, the Positivist Philosopher who – during the 1830 and 1840s – introduced both sociology and the Religion of Humanity. While many studies pore over the Positivists’ “church” rituals, this essay is the first to argue that the Religion of Humanity and sociology were of equal consequence – and that together they formed the basis of their controversial spatial theory and practice, which was considered the means to realise Comte’s utopia. This vision, it is argued, is central to appreciating how Positivism percolated into the “modern movements” of architecture and planning. (shrink)

This article argues that centralized wage bargaining alters the causal logic in explanations of wage inequality, in the sense that common explanatory factors have different effects, given the degree of bargaining centralization. The evidence presented supports the theoretical argument. Using aggregate time-series cross-country data from fifteen capitalist democracies, the article shows that—given decentralized bargaining—trade with less developed countries, resources devoted to research and development, and government employment have inegalitarian effects on the wage distribution, whereas leftist governments and unionism (...) compress wages. However, given centralized wage bargaining these effects gradually disappear or, in some cases, change direction. (shrink)

To what extent does the loosening of the ties between a social democratic party and its sister unions indicate a shift in the party's traditional objectives or bases of support? In this article it is argued that the estrangement between these parties and their unions is not always an indicator or a proof of the abandonment of workers and solidaristic goals by social democratic parties. The evolution of the party-union relationship is not only shaped by the economic and social policies (...) of the party but is also constrained by the organizational context of the trade unions. And when a close relationship exists in a context of competitive unionism and a growing economy, it is highly likely that the pressure and threats that unions direct at their social democratic parties are largely inspired by their need to maintain and enhance their organizational position vis-à-vis their union rivals rather than by a change in the goals and policies of their sister parties themselves. (shrink)

In India, more than ninety percent of the workforce is informal. In spite of this enormous percentage of informal workers, these workers remain invisible to law and policy circles. One of the reasons for such exclusion and invisibility is the absence of unionism involving informal workers. In order to overcome this invisibility, informal workers are increasingly organizing into associations that are different from traditional trade unions. These organizations devise their strategies and their legal statuses in view of the (...) atypical characteristics of informal activities. In this Article, I document some of these organizations of self-employed informal workers in India – their characteristics and functions. On this basis, I contend that these organizations offer a model for collective action by informal workers. I argue that these associations are a sui generis organization of informal workers, and could become a precursor to solidarity-based collective initiatives by informal workers globally. In the backdrop to this proposition, I analyze the role of law in promoting such aggregation of informal workers in furtherance of their collective action. I argue that while organizations of informal workers in India employ the existing legal framework to the best of their advantage, the law fails to recognize some of their status as workers, thereby creating hurdles towards informal workers’ collective action. A small farmer works on her own farm. In tough times, she also works on other farms as a laborer. When the agriculture season is over, she goes to the forest to collect gum and other forest produce. Year round, she produces embroidered items either at a piece rate for a contractor or for sale to a trader who comes to her village to buy goods. Now, how should her trade be categorized? Does she belong to the agricultural sector, the factory sector, or the home-based work sector? Should she be categorized as a farmer or a farm worker? Is she self-employed or is she a piece-rate worker? Because her situation cannot be defined and contained neatly in a box, she has no work status and her right to representation in a union is unrealized. She is denied access to financial services or training to upgrade her skills. The tyranny of having to belong to a well-defined “category” has condemned her to having no “identity.” — Ela R. BhattEla R. Bhatt, We Are Poor but So Many: The Story of Self-Employed Women in India 17. (shrink)

During human evolutionary history, there were “trade-offs” between expending time and energy on child-rearing and mating, so both men and women evolved conditional mating strategies guided by cues signaling the circumstances. Many short-term matings might be successful for some men; others might try to find and keep a single mate, investing their effort in rearing her offspring. Recent evidence suggests that men with features signaling genetic benefits to offspring should be preferred by women as short-term mates, but there are (...) trade-offs between a mate's genetic fitness and his willingness to help in child-rearing. It is these circumstances and the cues that signal them that underlie the variation in short- and long-term mating strategies between and within the sexes. Key Words: conditional strategies; evolutionary psychology; fluctuating asymmetry; mating; reproductive strategies; sexual selection. (shrink)

John Harsanyi has offered an argument grounded in Bayesian decision theory that purports to show that John Rawls's original position analysis leads directly to utilitarian conclusions. After explaining why a prominent Rawlsian line of response to Harsanyi's argument fails, I argue that a seemingly innocuous Bayesian rationality assumption, the continuity axiom, is at the heart of a fundamental disagreement between Harsanyi and Rawls. The most natural way for a Rawlsian to respond to Harsanyi's line of analysis, I argue, is to (...) reject continuity. I then argue that this Rawlsian response fails as a defence of the difference principle, and I raise some concerns about whether it makes sense to posit the discontinuities needed to support the other elements of Rawls's view, although I suggest that Rawls may be able to invoke discontinuity to vindicate part of his first principle of justice. (shrink)