Working Conditions

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Below are groups and resources (books, articles, websites, etc.) related to this topic. Click on an item’s title to go its resource page with author, publisher, description/abstract and other details, a link to the full text if available, as well as links to related topics in the Subject Index. You can also browse the Title, Author, Subject, Chronological, Dewey, LoC, and Format indexes, or use the Search box.
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Connexions Library

Alternative Press Annual 1983, The
Case, Patricia (ed)
Book
1984
The Anxious Worker
Sometimes Explode
Article
2014
The author looks at the contemporary conditions of work and examines how these give rise to anxiety and depression.
Das Capital, Volume 1: A Critical Analysis of Capitalist Production
Marx, Karl
Book
1867
Marx's great work sets out to grasp and portray the totality of the capitalist mode of production, and the bourgeois society that emerges from it. He describes and connects all its economic features, ...
China's Worker Protests: A Second Wave of Labor Unrest?: Against The Current vol. 121
Yan, Wong Kam
Article
2006
There has been a 30% rise in collective riots in China in recent years. Whereas in 1993, there were 10,000 reported cases with 700,000 participants, in 2003 it jumped to 60,000 with 3 million partici...
Collective Bargaining Course Book
OPSEU Education Dept.
Book
1979
Connexions Library: Labour and Unions Focus
Website
2009
Selected articles, books, websites and other resources on labour and unions.
Connexions Library: Work Focus Page
Website
2009
Selected articles, books, websites and other resources on work.
The Corrosion of Character
Sennet, Richard
Book
2000
Richard Sennett explores the myth of efficiency in the new business order. This is a book about people who went through being downsized in their work. This is the New Capitalism- All Human Character ...
Domestic Work and Rights in China: Against The Current vol. 133
Wong, May
Article
2008
When China adopted the “open door” policy in 1978, south China, especially the Pearl River Delta area, was the first industrial area created to attract foreign investment, particularly from Hong Kong....
Dubai Labor Fighting Back Vs. Indentured Globalization: Against The Current vol. 132
Francis, Vicky
Article
2008
October, 2007 saw the government of the United Arab Emirates halfway through a "humane" immigration amnesty which, in turn, paved the way for a clampdown on labour. In November a huge strike wave erup...
Falling Behind: The State of Working Canada, 2000
Jackson, Andrew, Robinson, David, Baldwin,Bob, Wiggins, Cindy
Book
2000
An accessible collation of data and analysis, analyzed from a progressive perspective, about the social and economic realities of working people in Canada.
Fishers and Plunderers: Theft, Slavery and Violence at Sea
Couper, Alastair, Smith, Hance D., and Ciceri, Bruno
Book
2015
Fishers and Plunderers focuses on the exploitation of fish and fishers alike in a global industry that gives little consideration to either conservation or human rights. In a business characterized by...
Focus Shifts to Trafficking of Men in Europe
Stracansky, Pavol
Article
2009
The public perception is that human trafficking victims are all vulnerable females forced into prostitution and sexual slavery. But this is not the case. It does not occur to many people that traffick...
Food, Shelter and the American Dream
Aronowitz, Stanley
Book
1974
Discusses the state of the American economy, the consequences for politics and culture that might arise from the new situation, and possible solutions.
India : The United Tea Workers Front (UTWF) launched to break a vicious circle of poverty
UTWF
Article
2013
The United Tea Workers Front (UTWF) has been launched, primarily to raise the issue of a living wages and related matters in the forthcoming wage negotiations in North Bengal.
Informal Labour, Another Wall Faced by Migrants in Latin America
Frayssinet, Fabiana
Article
2017
A large proportion of the 4.3 million migrant workers in Latin America and the Caribbean survive by working in the informal economy or in irregular conditions. An invisible wall that is necessary to b...
The Informal Work Group
Weir, Stan
Article
1973
Stan Weir on some of his life experiences at work and what he saw as the "the only organizational form opposed to formal bureaucracies which cannot be captured by them", the informal work group.
The Jungle
Sinclair, Upton
Book
1906
Upton Sinclair's sixth novel and first popular success, written when he was sent by the socialist weekly newspaper Appeal to Reason to Chicago to investigate conditions in the stockyards. Though inten...
Just a Matter of Gloves
Weir, Stan
Article
An account of a work stoppage over the issue of gloves being supplied in a factory.
The "Labor Aristocracy" and Working-Class Struggles: Consciousness in Flux, Part 2: Against The Current vol. 124
Post, Charles
Article
2006
Whatever the theoretical and empirical problems with the economics of the labor aristocracy thesis, its defenders still claim that well paid workers have generally been more reformist and conservative...
The Making of Jericho Road: Against The Current vol. 132
Williams, Charles
Article
2008
An interview with Michael Honey. The paperback edition of Michael Honey’s Going Down Jericho Road: The Memphis Strike, Martin Luther King’s Last Campaign is released this January 2008.
The Meaning of Socialism
Cardan, Paul (Cornelius Castoriadis)
Article
1961
Paul Cardan's 1961 discussion of modern conceptions of socialism, and the future of socialist movements.
Migrant Workers Fight Exploitation in New Zealand
Treen, Mike
Article
2013
Unite Union has dealt with several cases of extreme exploitation of migrant workers. It seems that some of the liquor shops around Auckland have been employing students from India and paying a pittanc...
Mineworkers of Guyana: The Making of a Working Class
Quamina, Odida T.
Book
Written by a former worker who himself grew up on Alcan's Plantation Mackenzie bauxite mine in Guyana, this is a readable account of the life and history of a Third World working class. It throws new ...
The Newsletter #4
Serial Publication (Periodical)
1974
The No-Nonsense Guide to Fair Trade
Ransom, David
Book
2001
Ransom suggests that fair, environmentally-conscious trade is not only a viable alternative to unfair free trade, but that it is the way of the future.
Other Voices: The Connexions Newsletter - July 23, 2016: Workers and Climate Change
Diemer, Ulli (ed.)
Serial Publication (Periodical)
2016
Working people -- and most of us are workers -- are affected by climate change in every aspect of our lives. As climate change worsens, our lives will worsen. If we are successful in bringing about th...
Out of the Driver's Seat: Marxism in North America Today
Article
1974
Outlines the political perspective of the Windsor-based Labour Centre in the wake of divisions in the Centre in 1974. Issues explored include the nature of the working class, women in the working clas...
PBS's Red Metal: The Copper Country Strike of 1913 commemorates Michigan's bitter labor past
Watson, Debra
Article
2014
One hundred years ago, a major strike by copper miners was continuing in the Keweenaw Peninsula, which protrudes into Lake Superior in northern Michigan. In the middle of the months-long battle agains...
Pilbara strike of 1946: Connexipedia Article
Article
A strike by Indigenous Australian pastoral workers in the Pilbara region of Western Australia for human rights recognition and payment of fair wages and working conditions.
Playing Chicken: Discovering a Diverse Working Class in Trump Country
Dixon, Patrick
Article
2017
Since the election of 2016, much has been written about rural working-class voters who helped elect Donald J. Trump to the presidency. Most of those stories have assumed that the rural working class i...
The Politics of Food and Poverty
Tummon, John
Article
2014
The global food crisis is tightly connected to global poverty, climate change, ecological destruction, migrant workers, imperialism, health and the super-exploitation of workers.
The Politics of Urban Liberation
Schecter, Stephen
Book
1978
A broad-ranging study which covers the political economy of the urban question and the importance of the city in the history of social revolution. Schechter's evaluation of libertarian insurgency high...
A Range of Abuses: The Invisible Deaths of Lebanon's Migrant Domestic Workers
Bajec, Alessandra
Article
2014
Migrant domestic workers generally get very little protection from the Lebanese government and remain under-reported in the media, while the deaths of these workers are rarely discussed in the news. D...
Report from Dubai: Against The Current vol. 131
Francis, Vicky
Article
2007
Dubai — This gulf emirate is shaping up into a key tourist destination. For golf, luxury hotels and high-end shopping, it is firmly established as a key player in the Middle East region. Dubai’s geogr...
The Road to Wigan Pier
Orwell, George
Book
1937
George Orwell's investigation of an English working class community in the 1930s.
Social Determinants of Health: Canadian Perspectives
Raphael, Dennis (ed.)
Book
2004
The social determinants of health are summarized and analyzed by over 30 medical and social academics.
Suburban Sweatshops: The Fight for Immigrant Rights
Gordon, Jennifer
Book
2007
Jennifer Gordon discusses her years spent working with the organization she founded, the Long Island-based Workplace Project.
The Trade Union Movement of Canada, 1827-1959
Lipton, Charles
Book
1967
An account of trade union evolution as a whole for the period 1827-1959, as well as an ouline of continuing sphere's of Labour's effort, such as organization of the unorganized, the fight for better c...
'We are not from another planet': Justice 4 Cleaners campaign and the struggle for recognition
Ojeda, Luis Armando; Munoz, Patricia; Bhandar, Brenna; Matias, Ezequiel; Zalacain, Kramer
Article
2014
The ongoing struggle of the SOAS Cleaners for acceptable working conditions and equality in the workplace.
Windows on the Workplace: Technology, Jobs, and the Organization of Office Work
Greenbaum, Joan
Book
2004
Takes us behind the news stories of the highly efficient, high-tech workplace and shows us the ways in which technologies have been adapted by management to reshape the way work is done.
A Workers' Inquiry
Marx, Karl
Article
1880

Connexions Directory of Groups & Websites

International Labor Rights Forum
An organization dedicated to achieving just and humane working conditions for workers worldwide. They are committed to overcoming child labour, forced labour and other abusive practices. They promote...
News and Letters
An organization of Marxist-Humanists standing for the abolition of capitalism, both in its private property form and ins its state property form. We stand for the deveopment of new human relations; wh...

Sources Experts & Spokespersons

Sources Library

African Journalists leaders summit outlines strategies to roll back impunity and defend journalists' rights
Sources News Release
2009
Leaders of the Federation of African Journalists have condemned at their biannual meeting in Djibouti on June 23rd, the unsafe and precarious working conditions of journalists in Africa.
Cheap clothing proves far too dear
The death of workers in Bangladesh are just the latest tragedy that springs from the west's addiction to fashion
Siegle, Lucy
2010
In Bangladesh one hundred workers died in a garment fire, a common occurence plaguing a workforce that already has the distinction of being the "most poorly paid in the world". The author investigates...
Tomato pickers win higher pay. Can other workers use their strategy?
Florida's tomato pickers took on some of the country's biggest retailers and fast-food chains - and won, transforming working conditions in
Freeman, Melanie Stetson
2017
Tactics like this protest outside Wendy's, repeated in cities across the country, have helped make the Coalition of Immokalee Workers one of the most successful worker organizations in the country. By...

From the Connexions Archives

The Red Menace
A libertarian socialist newsletter
Serial Publication (Periodical)
1975
Articles on topics such as socialism, Marxism, anarchism, work, popular education, organizing, wages for housework, Leninism, bureaucracy, hierarchy, jargon, prostitution, obscenity, science fiction, ...