Following the recent economic recession, elected officials in many states used budget shortfalls as justification for anti-union legislation. Bills that would weaken or remove collective bargaining rights targeted public sector workers’ unions in particular. Additionally, K-12 teachers—the largest category of organized public sector employees—faced losing tenure protections. This talk will focus on electoral tactics, such […]
For many years Mexico has been looking for a strategy to create economic growth and industrial development. The results have been less than positive, however, and at times the public policy in regards to industrial development seems directionless. The Maquiladora Model is an example of a model of industrialization that did not create development and, […]
Since the 1980s, the world's governments have decreased state welfare and thus increased the number of unprotected “informal” or “precarious” workers. As a result, more and more workers do not receive secure wages or benefits from either employers or the state. What are these workers doing to improve their livelihoods? Informal Labor, Formal Politics, and […]
"Labour" is a term that is ceasing to have salience as the descriptor of a class, movement, scholarly or professional domain or field of public policy. Consequently, it becomes increasingly difficult to mobilize working people for political or industrial action or even to defend their legal rights and claim their legal entitlements. Perhaps, then, the […]
Labor Women is a portrait of three immigrant daughters who are part of a new generation transforming the U.S. labor movement. Quynh Nguyen is a trilingual organizer mobilizing meatpackers in their demands for a union contract. Karla Zombro is a lead organizer for the Respect at LAX Living Wage campaign. Jun Chong represents the most […]
The steady immigration of black populations from Africa and the Caribbean over the past few decades has fundamentally changed the racial, ethnic, and political landscape in the United States. But how will these "new blacks" behave politically in America? Using an original survey of New York City workers and multiple national data sources, Christina M. […]
“I realize that I am a soldier of production whose duties are as important in this war as those of the man behind the gun.” So began the pledge that many home front men took at the outset of World War II when they went to work in the factories, fields, and mines while their […]
In this talk, LeFlouria will provide an in-depth examination of the lived and laboring experiences of imprisoned African-American women in the post-Civil War South, and describe how black female convict labor was used to help construct “New South” modernity. Using Georgia—the “industrial capital” of the region—as a case study, LeFlouria will analyze how African-American women’s […]
Urbanization has been a cornerstone of China's modernization project and an important driver of economic growth. As a result, over 50 percent of China’s billion people are now living in urban areas, concentrated in the 160 cities with a population over one million. Based on extensive ethnographic field research, this paper examines the lives and […]
