Workers' History

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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

The Age of Aquiescenence: The Life and Death of American Resistance to Organized Wealth and Power
Fraser, Steve
Book
2015
A groundbreaking investigation of how and why, from the 18th century to the present day, American resistance to our ruling elites has vanished. From the American Revolution through the Civil Rights mo...
The American Working Class in Historical Persepctive
Glaberman, Martin
Article
1973
A review of Jeremy Brecher's Strike! (See CX6590)
The Anarchist Collectives: Workers' Self-Management in the Spanish Revolution 1936-1939
Dolgoff, Sam
Book
1974
Examines the experiments in workers' self-management, both urban and rural, which took place in Spain during the revolution and Civil War.
Angels of the Workplace: Women and the Construction of Gender Relations in the Canadian Clothing Industry, 1890-1940
Steedman, Mercedes
Book
1997
Examines how the intricate weaving together of the meanings of class, gender, ethnicity, family, and the workplace created a job ghetto for women. Detailing the disparities between men and women in te...
Arizona Copper Mine Strike of 1983: Connexipedia Article
Article
1983
Dispute between the Phelps Dodge Corporation and a unionized copper miners.
Arvida Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Began July 24, 1941 when some 700 workers in the Aluminium Co. of Canada (Alcan) in Arvida, Québec, spontaneously walked off the job.
Australian waterfront dispute of 1998: Connexipedia Article
Article
Severe and protracted industrial relations dispute, primarily between the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and Patrick Corporation, a stevedoring and transportation company.
Battle of Blair Mountain: Connexipedia Article
Article
In 1921 between 10,000 and 15,000 coal miners confronted company-paid private detectives in an effort to unionize the southwestern West Virginia mine counties.
Beyond the Fields
Early, Steve
Article
2011
There is a strong historical link between the United Farm Workers in its heyday and myriad forms of progressive activism today. UFW alumni, ideas, and strategies have influenced Latino political empo...
Bracero History Archive
Database
The Bracero History Archive collects and makes available the oral histories and artifacts pertaining to the Bracero program, a guest worker initiative that spanned the years 1942-1964. Millions of Mex...
British Columbia Woodworkers' Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
15 May - 20 June 1946. Twenty-seven thousand workers in both the coast and interior regions, led by district president Harold Pritchett, struck when demands for a 25-cent hourly increase, a 40-hour we...
Bunkhouse Men: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
The term "bunkhouse men" is typically applied to some 50 000 workers who constituted a labour pool for the booming Canadian economy in the first 3 decades of the 20th century. They lived in frontier w...
The Canadian Jewish Outlook Anthology
Rosenthal, Henry M., Berson, S. Cathy (eds.)
Book
1988
A broad range of articles about secular Jewish life and socialist values.
Canadian Labour History Bibliography, 1976-2009
Lonardo, Michael
Database
2010
Recognizing the limitations that must be set on a project that relies primarily on a single individual, the bibliography has been limited to English-language monographs, pamphlets, journal articles, a...
Cape Breton Strikes, 1920s: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
The Cape Breton labour wars of the early 1920s represented an intense local episode of class conflict. In such conflicts militant unions, often led by radical leaders, were attempting to change the ba...
The Case for Grassroots Archives
Diemer, Ulli
Article
2012
Grassroots archives play a valuable role in what has been called "the battle of memory". People's history projects such as grassroots archives preserve and share stories of resistance, hidden historie...
The Case of Occupy and the Longshoremen's Union: Who's Speaking for Whom?
Winslow, Cal
Article
2011
Occupy Oakland should not be pretending to speak on behalf of Oakland's dockworkers, and should not be telling the dockworkers when and how they should strike. Occupy Oakland's actions are the opposit...
La Causa: The California Grape Strike
Fusco, Paul (photos); Horwitz, George D. (text)
Book
1970
A documentary of the California grape workers' strike.
Chávez, César: Connexipedia Article
Article
Mexican American farm worker, labour leader, and civil rights activist who, with Dolores Huerta, co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later became the United Farm Workers (UFW). (19...
The Chicago Anarchists
Aveling, Eleanor Marx; Aveling, Edward
Article
1887
The working-class are up in arms about this matter. Anarchist, Socialist, anti-Anarchist, anti-Socialist alike are astonished, indignant, thoroughly aroused. Everywhere, except in Chicago, meetings ar...
Class Composition and the Theory of the Party at the Origin of the Workers-Councils Movement
Bologna, Sergio
Article
1972
Re-examines a crucial segment of labour history, the German workers' council experience, which bridges the classical socialist phase of the Second and Third Internationals, and the post-Keynesian peri...
Colorado Labor Wars: Connexipedia Article
Article
Colorado's most significant battles between labor and capital which occurred primarily between miners and mine operators.
Common Front Strikes: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Cartel of Québec public- and para-public-sector trade unions formed in 1972 to negotiate with the provincial government.
Connexions Library: Labour and Unions Focus
Website
2009
Selected articles, books, websites and other resources on labour and unions.
Connolly, James - Writings - Index
Connolly, James
Article
Writings of James Connolly.
Constitution and By-Laws of Industrial Workers of the World
Article
1905
The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of working people and the few, who make up the employing cla...
A Contest of Ideas: Capital, Politics and Labor
Lichtenstein, Nelson
Book
2013
Compilation and updates of many of Lichtenstein's most provocative and controversial essays and reviews. The author offers perspectives on the relationship of labour and the state, the tensions that s...
A Critique of Kim Moody's An Injury to All
Goldner, Loren
Article
1989
Moody's book is no academic study, but looks at the labor movement "from the bottom up"; the author has witnessed and to some extent participated in the many defeats and handful of victories of the pa...
Critique of Nonviolent Politics: From Mahatma Gandhi to the Anti-Nuclear Movement
Ryan, Howard
Book
1984
Ryan accepts that sometimes nonviolence can be effective, but says that sometimes it is not: "a principled insistence on nonviolence can in some circumstances be dangerous to progressive social moveme...
Crowsnest Pass Strike, 1932: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A strike that began in January 1932 with demands that companies divide available work in the depressed coal-mining industry equally among miners rather than playing favourites. Coal companies refused ...
A Dictionary of Marxist Thought
Bottomore, Tom
Book
1983
Dodge Revolutionary Union Movement: Connexipedia Article
Article
An organization of African-American workers formed in May 1968 in the Chrysler Corporation's Hamtramck Assembly plant, formerly Dodge Main, Detroit, Michigan.
The East York Workers' Association: A Response to the Great Depression
Schulz, Patricia V.
Book
1975
An account of the activity of relief recipients in the township of East York, an eastern suburb of Toronto, in the 1930s.
East York Workers' Association: Connexipedia article
Article
2017
The East York Workers' Association (EYWA) was an unemployment movement that developed during the Great Depression in the township of East York, Ontario.
Essays in Canadian Working Class History
Kealey, Gregory; Warrian, Peter (eds.)
Book
1976
Estevan Coal Miners' Strike, 1931: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A strike which led to the murder of three miners by the RCMP.
Failure of a Dream?: Essays in the History of American Socialism
Laslettt, John H. M.; Lipset, Seymour Martin
Book
1974
Examines the reasons for the relative weakness of American socialism.
The First International Conference of Socialist Women - Stuttgart. 1907
Kollontai, Alexandra
Article
1918
First Published in International Socialist Conferences of Women Workers in 1918.
Flint and the Rewriting of History
Dollinger, Sol
Article
1996
The 1937 sitdown strikes were a thunderbolt shattering minimal labor-management relations. The victory of the Flint auto workers heralded the most profound social changes in the United States since th...
Flint Sit-Down Strike: Connexipedia Article
Article
Changed the United Automobile Workers from a collection of isolated locals on the fringes of the industry into a major union and led to the unionization of the United States automobile industry.
The Flint Sitdown for Beginners
Post, Charlie
Article
1996
The Sitdown Strike at GM's Flint, Michigan Fisher Body and Chevrolet plants (December 1936-February 1937) was a turning point in the history of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).
The Flint sit-down strike, 1936-1937: Jeremy Brecher
Steven
Article
2013
210,000 auto workers joined the American Federation of Labor (A.F.L.) to take part in the strike but the A.F.L leadership however wanted no part in a strike, and managed to postpone it again and again...
Fort William Freight Handlers Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A strike by 700 non-unionized immigrants in August 1909 that was defeated by the use of militia and the RCMP and resulted in the firing of hundreds of workers.
Fraser River Fishermen's Strikes: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A strikes by whites, natives and Japanese fishermen against salmon canneries that lined the lower Fraser River.
Fraser River Railway Strikes: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Strikes which started in March 1912 when railway workers organized by the Industrial Workers of the World walked out of construction camps on the Canadian Northern line to protest conditions.
General Strike France 1968: A factory-by-factory account
Hoyles, Andree
Book
1969
Andre Hoyles analyses the development, organisation and end of the mass strike in France, 1968, with reference to case studies of particular factories.
General Strike of 1842: Connexipedia Article
Article
The strike started among the Staffordshire miners and soon spread through the country affecting factories, mills and coal mines from Dundee to South Wales and Cornwall.
Glaberman, Martin: Connexipedia Article
Article
An influential American Marxist, teacher, and autoworker. (1918-2001).
Martin and Jessie Glaberman Collection: Papers, 1939-2001
Glaberman, Martin & Jessie
Unclassified
The papers of the Marxist radicals Martin Glaberman and Jessie Glaberman, now housed at Wayne State University.
Glaberman, Martin - Writings - Index
Glaberman, Martin
Article
Writings of Martin Glaberman (1918-2001).
Great Strike of 1913: Connexipedia Article
Article
A near general strike that took place in New Zealand in 1913.
The Great Transformation: The political and economic origins of our time
Polanyi, Karl
Book
1944
Polanyi analyzes the social and political upheavals that took place in England during the rise of the market economy. Polanyi contends that the modern market economy and the modern nation-state should...
A Guide to Working Class History: Second Edition
O'Brien, Jim; Green, Jim; Faler, Paul; Battye, John; Frank, David; Kealey, Greg; McKay, Ian
Book
1974
A guide to resources about the history of working people in North America. The bulk of it is about the United States; the final section is on Canada.
Haywood, Bill (Big Bill Haywood): Connexipedia Article
Article
American unionist and communist, one of the founders of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) (1869-1928).
Hill, Joe: Connexipedia Article
Article
Swedish-American labour activist, songwriter, and member of the Industrial Workers of the World. (1879-1915).
The Historical Moment That Produced Us
Goldner, Loren
Article
2010
As we emerge, hopefully, from this dismal period of rollback, we recall Rosa Luxemburg's remark, shortly before her murder in 1919: "The revolution says: I was, I am, I shall be!" We assert the ongoin...
A History of International Women's Day in words and images
Stevens, Joyce
Article
2018
An online history of International Women's Day, which includes visual materials and numerous photographs from each decade.
History of union busting in the United States: Connexipedia Article
Article
Union Busting is a term used by labor organizations and trade unions to describe the activities that may be undertaken by employers, their proxies, workers and in certain instances states and governme...
How Our Lives Have Been Changed: An interview with Kate DeSmet
Article
1997
You understand that there's a "common union" and "community," which of course is where "communion" comes from. That's better than what I had before. The best writers write with their own voice; and i...
Huerta, Dolores: Connexipedia Article
Article
The co-founder of the United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO, and prominent member of the Democratic Socialists of America. (Born 1930).
Hungary 1956: A workers' revolt crushed by the "workers' state"
Diemer, Ulli
Article
1973
The Hungarian revolution, brief though it was, did as much as a century of socialist theorizing to show what a united and determined people could do to transform their society.
The Idea of May Day on the March
Luxemburg, Rosa
Article
1913
The brilliant basic idea of May Day is the autonomous, immediate stepping forward of the proletarian masses, the political mass action of the millions of workers who otherwise are atomized by the barr...
Industrial Workers of the World: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A revolutionary industrial union founded in 1905. Wobblies were mostly unskilled, low-status migrant workers. The IWW advocated the organization of all workers into one body and supported direct actio...
Industrial Workers of the World: Connexipedia Article
Article
The IWW contends that all workers should be united as a class and that the wage system should be abolished. They may be best known for the Wobbly Shop model of workplace democracy, in which workers el...
International Women's Day
Article
2018
The annual day for recognition of and struggle for women's economic, social and political rights.
International Women's Day and Working Class History
Beaton, Lynn
Article
1986
In this concise essay Beaton looks at the Socialist roots of International Women's Day.
International Women's Day. A Militant Celebration
Kollontai, Alexandra
Article
1920
Written by Alexandra Kollontai and first published in Mezhdunarodnyi den' rabotnitz, Moscow, 1920.
International Women's Day. Defend the Gains of October
Beaton, Lynn
Article
1987
Beaton calls for the defence of the gains made in the emancipation of women by the October revolution.
International Working Women's Day
Lenin, V.L.
Article
1921
First published on March 8, 1921 in a Supplement to Pravda No. 51.
International Workingmen's Association (The First International): Connexipedia Article
Article
An international socialist organization which aimed at uniting a variety of different left-wing political groups and trade union organizations that were based on the working class and class struggle.
Is that an archive in your basement... or are you just hoarding?: Sources News Release
Article
2012
Are you an 'accidental archivist'? Have you been saving the publications and documents produced by the social justice projects you've been involved in? Then Connexions would like to hear from you.
James P. Cannon on the Legacy of the IWW
Cannon, James P.
Article
1955
Formed in direct opposition to the craft unionism of the American Federation of Labor, the IWW drew its membership largely from young workers who took to the road to find work where they could -- as r...
Jews, Marxism and the Worker's Movement
Website
A subject index of texts from Marx, Engels, Lenin, Trotsky, Leon and Luxemburg; texts from the Jewish Socialist & Labor Movement and the impact of the Russian Revolution on Jews.
Jim Crutchfield's I.W.W. Page
Crutchfield, Jim
Website
Historic documents on the Industrial Workers of the World (Wobblies).
John Sayles and Working-Class History
Roberts, Nora Ruth
Article
1997
Even if we know that community and solidarity will be harder to win than Sayles' newer efforts seem to suggest, the fact that someone is bucking Hollywood forgers of dominant ideology and that audienc...
Karl Marx: Essential Writings
Bender, Frederic L.
Book
1972
A selection of Marx's writings ranging from his early works on philosophy, religion, alienation, and Hegelianism, through the materialist conception of history, the theoretical analysis of capitalism,...
Karl Marx's Theory of Revolution: Volume II: The Politics of Social Classes
Draper, Hal
Book
1978
Draper ranges through the development of the thought of Marx and Engels on the role of classes in society.
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 Labour Companion: A bibliography of Canadian labour history. Second edition.
Vaisey, G. Douglas
Database
1980
he Canadian Labour Bibliography was an initiative of the Committee on Canadian Labour History in the 1970s. The initial efforts to create an annual reading list of publications dealing with Canadian ...
Labor Film Database: Films, videos and film festivals that focus on work, workers and worker’s issues
Website
Over 1,700 films and videos are listed here, searchable by title, director, actors and/or keywords
The Labor Wars
Lens, Sidney
Book
1973
A survey of landmark events in the U.S. labour movement.
Labor's Giant Step: The First Twenty Years of the CIO: 1936–55
Preis, Art
Book
1964
The story of the explosive labor struggles and political battles in the 1930s that built the industrial unions.
Leadville Colorado, Miners' Strike: Connexipedia Article
Article
Occurred as a result of rapid industrialization and consolidation of the mining industry.
Live Working or Die Fighting: How the Working Class Went Global
Mason, Paul
Book
2010
Mason realtes a series of struggles for worker and human rights over the past two hundred years and compares them to current struggles.
Luddites: Connexipedia Article
Article
A social movement of British textile artisans in the early nineteenth century who protested - often by destroying mechanized looms - against the changes produced by the Industrial Revolution, which we...
Marx and Engels Collected Works Volume 4: Marx and Engels 1844 - 1845
Marx, Karl; Engels, Friedrich
Book
1845
Includes The Holy Family, or Critique of Critical Criticism, and The Condition of the Working-Class in England.
Marxism and the Trade Unions
Draper, Hal
Article
1970
Draper argues that essentially, no Marxist group has ever carried on any systematic revolutionary work in trade unions.
Marxism and Workers' Organisation: Writings of Marxists on Trade Unions, the General Strike, Soviets and Working Class Organisation
Website
Writings of Marxists on Trade Unions, the General Strike, Soviets and Working Class Organisation.
A Marxist History of the World part 51: The origins of the Labour Movement
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2011
Capitalism's industrial revolution gave birth to its own gravediggers, argues Neil Faulkner as he examines the rise and fall of Chartism.
A Marxist History of the World part 55: The Making of the Working Class
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2011
The development of capitalism entails two complementary processes. The first, explored in MHW 54, is competitive capital accumulation. The second, explored here, is the making – and continual re-makin...
A Marxist History of the World part 65: The 1905 Revolution: Russia's great dress rehearsal
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2012
Neil Faulkner looks at how the Russian Revolution of 1905 helped Leon Trotsky formulate an answer to the century-old riddle of Russian history: what form must the revolution take in order to be victor...
A Marxist History of the World part 70: 1917: the February Revolution
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2012
As WWI turned into a protracted, bloody struggle the initial enthusiasm gave way to growing class tensions which exploded first in Russia's February Revolution.
A Marxist History of the World part 75: The German Revolution
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2012
At the end of the First World War, the epicentre of revolution moved from Petrograd to Berlin. Why did the German communists fail where the Bolsheviks had succeded?
A Marxist History of the World part 76: Italy's 'Two Red Years'
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2012
Like Germany, Italy was on the brink of revolution in the summer of 1920, after the strains of imperialist war had levered open deep fractures in an unstable social order.
A Marxist History of the World part 78: The First Chinese Revolution
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2012
In 1927, the Chinese nationalists smashed the country's first working-class revolutionary movement – a defeat that would shape the whole subsequent history of China.Counterfire
A Marxist History of the World part 86: The Spanish Civil War
Faulkner, Neil
Article
2012
In 1936, after General Franco had led an unsuccessful coup against a democratically elected government, revolution swept across Spain. Neil Faulkner explains why the workers were ultimately defeated.
MarxistHistory.org
Website
Website dealing with the history of the early American Marxist movement. A repository of source material 1864 - 1946.
The Mass Strike, the Political Party and the Trade Unions
Luxemburg, Rosa
Book
1906
Luxemburg writes that "the mass strike in Russia [in 1905] has been realised not as means of evading the political struggle of the working-class, and especially of parliamentarism, not as a means of j...
May Day & SDS & SNCC Jubilee
Linebaugh, Peter
Article
2010
Class consciousness is the knowledge that emancipation is ours. Class struggle is the fight for it, the fight to be a class, and then the fight to abolish the class system. It is not economistic; it...
Mine Wars Museum Opens, Revives Lost Labour History
Todd, Roxy
Article
2015
Mine Wars museum opens in Matewan to revive West Virginia’s labour history.
Miramichi Lumber Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
The Miramichi Lumber Strike began 20 August 1937 when 1500 millworkers and longshoremen along the Miramichi River in northern New Brunswick struck 14 lumber firms for increased wages, shorter working ...
Murdochville Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
On 10 March 1957 the 1000 workers of Gaspé Copper Mines, Murdochville, Qué, struck for the right to unionize. The conflict lasted 7 months and ended in defeat for the miners.
New Hogtown Press: After Retrenchment, A Few Steps Forward
Diemer, Ulli
Article
1975
A profile of New Hogtown Press, a radical book and pamphlet publisher and distributor.
New Hogtown Press: Connexipedia Article
Article
2010
New Hogtown Press was a Canadian left-wing publisher active during the 1970s and 1980s.
Newfoundland Loggers' Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
The Newfoundland Loggers' Strike began 31 December 1958 when hundreds of loggers employed by Anglo-Newfoundland Development Co at Grand Falls struck for wage increases and for improvements in living c...
Nine-Hour Movement: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Was an international workers' attempt to secure shorter working days.
1905
Trotsky, Leon
Book
1922
For a number of years, when the reaction was triumphant, the year 1905 appeared to us as a completed whole, as the Russian revolution.
Notes from a Revolution Dying: Against The Current vol. 134
Pirani, Simon
Article
2008
In June 1922, five years on from the Russian Revolution, a group of Moscow communists gathered to discuss a letter by Vladimir Petrzhek, an auto worker, tendering his resignation from the communist (o...
The occupation of the factories: Italy 1920 - Paolo Spriano
Spriano, Paolo; Williams, Gwyn A (translator)
Book
1964
The story of the mass wave of strikes and factory occupations which swept Italy 1920-21 told from the documents and accounts of the time. Written in 1964 and translated into English in 1975 by Gwyn A ...
On E.P. Thompson's Legacy
Cohen, Sheila
Article
2014
In a tribute to E.P. Thompson, Cohen gives insights into his work "The Making of the English Working Class" regarding its valuable focus on the self-activity and self-organization of the people.
On International Women's Day
Lenin, V.I.
Article
1920
Written by Lenin in Pravda, March 4, 1920.
On Roediger's Wages of Whiteness
Allen, Theodore, W.
Article
2002
An extended discussion and critique of David Roediger's book Wages of Whiteness. Allen writes: "David Roediger's Wages of Whiteness, because of its almost universal acceptance for use in colleges and ...
On The Non-Formation of a Working-Class Political Party in the U.S., 1900-1945
Goldner, Loren
Article
1983
Thus the basic thesis presented here is that no major working-class political party developed in the U.S. in the 20th century because in the U.S., in contrast to all other major capitalist countries, ...
On to Ottawa Trek: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
In 1935, 1500 residents of federal unemployment relief camps in BC went on strike and moved by train and truck to Vancouver, spurred by angry concern for improved conditions and benefits in the camps...
On-to-Ottawa Trek: Connexipedia Article
Article
A 1935 social movement of unemployed men protesting the dismal conditions in federal relief camps scattered in remote areas across Western Canada.
One Big Union: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
In 1919 delegates from most union locals in western Canada met at the Western Labour Conference in Calgary and proclaimed support for the Bolshevik and other left-wing revolutions. They decided to con...
One Big Union: An Outline of a Possible Industrial Organization of the Working Class, with Chart
Trautman, Willaim E.
Article
1911
This is the first edition of a booklet that was revised and republished many times by both the I. W. W. and Daniel De Leon's "Detroit I. W. W." (later the W. I. I. U.), to which the author defected in...
Organizing Immigrant Labour
Verzuh, Ron
Article
2014
Barriers to unionizing the smelter workers of Trail, British Columbia, during the Second World War.
Oshawa Strike 1937: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
In 1937, more than 4000 workers if General Motors plant in Oshawa, Ontario, went on strike to fight for better wages and working conditions.
Other Voices: The Connexions Newsletter - February 26, 2015: Ukraine
Diemer, Ulli (editor); Khan, Tahmid (production)
Serial Publication (Periodical)
2015
Ukraine is spotlighted in this issue of Other Voices, with several articles on the events of the past year, from the overthrow of the government, to the rise of the far right, the armed conflict in th...
Other Voices: The Connexions Newsletter - September 10, 2015: Labour Day issue
Diemer, Ulli (editor); Rickwood, Darien Yawching (production)
Serial Publication (Periodical)
2015
Labour Day issue, with articles examining the relentless pressure put on workers to work ever longer hours, at the cost of their health and family life; anti-worker legislation, Zapatista popular educ...
Other Voices: The Connexions Newsletter - December 5, 2015: Ecosocialism, environment, and urban gardening
Diemer, Ulli (ed.)
Serial Publication (Periodical)
2015
This issue of Other Voices covers a wide range of issues, from the climate crisis and the ecosocialist response, to terrorism and the struggle against religious fundamentalism, as well as items on urb...
Other Voices: The Connexions Newsletter - December 17, 2017: Collective Memory and Cultural Amnesia
Diemer, Ulli
Serial Publication (Periodical)
2017
Our society is obsessed with the short-term present. It devalues memory and the past. But there are those who do remember, and who work to preserve and share our collective memory. But they have to co...
Out of the Ghetto - Review
Article
1999
This book deals with working class, predominately Jewish, life in the East End of London in the years between the first and second world wars.
Pig Iron Bob
Pires, Sandra
Film/Video
2015
On the 75th anniversary of the Dalfram Dispute in Australia, reenactments capture the waterside dispute where 180 men prevented pig iron being loaded onto ships bound for the Japanese war machine.
Plunderbund and Proletariat: A History of the IWW in B.C.
Scott, Jack
Book
1975
A history of working class struggle from the workers' perspective.
Politics and Memory in the Flint Sitdown Strikes: A comment on Historiography
Lichtenstein, Nelson
Article
1996
The General Motors strike of 1936-37 was the most important union victory of the 20th century, but the very meaning of its success was ambiguous indeed.
Portugal: The Impossible Revolution?
Mailer, Phil,
Book
1977
The story of what happened in Portugal between April 25, 1974 and November 25, 1975, as seen and felt by a deeply committed participant.
Preface to Martin Glaberman's Four Essays on the Working Class
Diemer, Ulli
Article
1975
Glaberman insists that the working class is not merely a victim of capitalism. Working people are active participants in creating their own consciousness, their methods of struggle and their own histo...
La Presse Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Two days later, the 3 main Union Centrals defied a municipal ban to organize a huge march in solidarity with the newspaper workers. More than 12 000 people clashed with 100 Montréal policemen. The out...
Primitive Rebels: Studies in Archaic Forms of Social Movement in the 19th and 20th Centuries
Hobsbawm, E. J.
Book
1959
A study of 'primitive' or 'archaic' forms of social agitation.
Pullman Strike: Connexipedia Article
Article
A nationwide conflict between labour unions and railroads that occurred in the United States in 1894.
Raising the Workers' Flag: The Workers' Unity League of Canada, 1930-1936
Endicott, Stephen L.
Book
2012
A history of the Workers' Unity League, the Canadian affiliate of the Communist Red International of Labour Unions.
Rank and File: Personal Histories of Working Class Organizers
Lynd, Alice; Lynd, Staughton (eds.)
Book
1973
A collection of stories and recollections from labour movement organizers.
Rebel Rank and File: Labor Militancy and Revolt from Below During the Long 1970s
Brenner, Aaron; Brenner, Robert; Winslow, Cal (eds.)
Book
2010
A collection of essays that concentrate on struggles by American workers at the workplace and the political and economic context in which they took place.
Red Clydeside: Connexipedia Article
Article
A term used to describe the era of political radicalism that characterised the city of Glasgow in Scotland, and urban areas around the city on the banks of the River Clyde such as Clydebank, Greenock ...
Reflections on the Revolution in France: 1968
Posner, Charles (Editor)
Book
1970
In May 1968 France was on the threshold of something entirely new. In this 'pre-revolutionary situation' nothing went unquestioned. The writers, trade unionists and students who contribute to this vol...
Revolutionary Teamsters: The Minneapolis Truckers' Strikes of 1934
Palmer. Bryan D.
Book
2013
A book on the Teamster's strike of 1934.
The Rosa Luxemburg Reader
Luxemburg, Rosa. [Anderson, Kevin; Hudis, Peter (eds.)]
Book
2004
A definitive one-volume collection of Luxemburg's writings.
Rosa Luxemburg, Women's Liberation, and Marx's Philosophy of Revolution
Dunayevskaya, Raya
Book
1981
Part I - Rosa Luxemburg as Theoretician, as Activist, as Internationalist. Part II - The Women's Liberation Movement as Revolutionary Force and Reason. Part III - Karl Marx: From Critic of Hegel to Au...
Scargill, Arthur: Connexipedia Article
Article
British trade unionist and political party leader. (Born 1938).
The Seattle General Strike of 1919
History Committee of the General Strike Committee
Article
1919
From February 6 to February 11, 1919, nearly 100,000 Seattle workers participated in a general strike. This pamphlet is a history of the strike, written by the History Committee of the General Strike ...
Seeds of Fire: A People's Chronology
Diemer, Ulli
Article
2012
Recalling events that happened on this day in history. Memories of struggle, resistance and persistence.
Short History of the World Working-Class Movement from Lassalle to Neo-Liberalism: The Distorting Hegemony of the Unproductive Middle Classes
Goldner, Loren
Article
1988
This essay is a kind of "thought experiment", attempting to trace the career and impact of the "man of negation", ultimately theorized by Hegel as the "Prussian monarch" who "universally labors" in th...
Silvertown: The Lost Story of a Strike That Shook London and Helped Launch the Modern Labor Movement
Tully, John
Book
2014
In 1889, Samuel Winkworth Silver's rubber and electrical factory was the site of a massive worker revolt. The factory was notorious for oppressive working conditions and its largely unorganized, unski...
Six Weeks of Solidarity
Dobchuk, Victor (Director)
Film/Video
1995
A look at the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike, 75 years later.
Slaughterhouse Fight: A Look at the Hormel Strike
Boyce, Steve; Edwards, Jake; Wetzel, Tom
Article
1986
Spontaneity and Organization: Some Comments
Montgomery, David
Article
1973
A contribution to a symposium on Jeremy Brecher's book Strike!
Ssangyong Motors Strike in South Korea Ends in Defeat and Heavy Repression
Goldner, Loren
Article
2009
The hard-right Korean government is signaling with these measures -- its latest and most dramatic "take no prisoners" victory over popular protest in the past year and a half -- its intention to steam...
Stayin' Alive: The 1970s and the Last Days of the Working Class
Cowie, Jefferson
Book
2009
A social and cultural history of the 1970s in the United States.
Steel strike of 1952: Connexipedia Article
Article
A strike by the United Steelworkers of America against U.S. Steel and nine other steelmakers.
Strike!: The True History of Mass Insurgence from 1877 to the Present
Brecher, Jeremy
Book
1972
A history-from-below that brings to light strikes as authentic revolutionary movements against the establishments of state, capital, and trade unionism.
The strike that led to Tahir Square: An act of courage that launched a revolution
Sly, Liz
Article
2012
Labour struggles at Egypt's largest cotton mill, starting in 2006, laid the groundwork for the revolution of 2011.
Strikes and Lockouts: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A strike is the withholding of labour by workers in order to obtain better working conditions; such withholding of labour is generally accompanied by demonstrations, such as picketing, parades, meetin...
Strikes, List of: Connexipedia Article
Article
The following is a list of deliberate absence from work related to specific working conditions (strikes) or due to general unhappiness with the political order (general strikes).
Thompson, E. P.: Connexipedia Article
Article
English historian, writer, socialist and peace campaigner (1924-1993).
Thompson, E.P. - Writings - Index
Thompson, E.P.
Article
Writings of E.P. Thompson (1924-1993).
Toronto's Poor: A Rebellious History
Palmer, Bryan D.; Heroux, Gaetan
Book
2016
Toronto’s Poor reveals the long and too often forgotten history of poor people’s resistance. It details how the homeless, the unemployed, and the destitute have struggled to survive and secure food an...
Towards the Abolition of Whiteness
Roediger, David
Book
1994
Roediger's genda is to show how race consciousness among whites needs to be fought so that the working class can be brought to an emancipatory agenda.
Traces of Magma: An Annotated Bibliography of Left Literature
Knight, Rolf
Book
1983
An annotated bibliography of left wing novels which deal with the lives of working people during the twentieth century.
Union busting: Connexipedia Article
Article
A wide range of activities undertaken by employers, their proxies, and governments, which hinder workers from freely organizing, joining and maintaining trade unions.
UK miners' strike (1984 - 1985): Connexipedia Article
Article
1984
A major industrial action affecting the British coal industry.
Uprising of 1953 in East Germany: Connexipedia Article
Article
A widespread uprising against the Stalinist German Democratic Republic government.
Vancouver Island Coal Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A strike that began in September 1912 when miners at declared a holiday to protest the firing of a worker.
The Wages of Whiteness is Early Death
Street, Paul
Article
2015
The white working class has never had it easy in American history. It's been viciously exploited, disrespected, deceived, divided, repressed, and otherwise and generally abused from the United States'...
We're Going to Run This City: Winnipeg's Political left after the General Strike
Epp-Koop, Stefan
Book
2015
Explores the dynamic municipal politics thqt came out of the largest labour protest in Canadian history and the ramifications for Winnipeg throughout the 1920s and 1930s.
West Coast Longshore Strikes, 1923 and 1935: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Strikes by members of the International Longshoremen's Association.
Western Federation of Miners: Connexipedia Article
Article
Radical labor union that gained a reputation for militancy in the mines of the western United States and British Columbia.
Who's Afraid of the White Working Class?: On Joan C. Williams's 'White Working Class: Overcoming Class Cluelessness in America': Book Review
Roediger, David
Article
2017
A book review on White Working Class Overcoming Class Cluelessness in America (Written By Joan C. Williams).
The William Morris Internet Archive
Website
A subarchive of the Marxists Internet Archive, featuring the works of the English socialist, writer, and artist William Morris.
Windsor Strike 1945: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Windsor Strike, 12 Sept-20 Dec 1945, at the WINDSOR, Ont, plant of Ford Motor Co. There was really only one strike issue at Ford: union recognition. The united automobile workers demanded it; the comp...
Winnipeg General Strike: Connexipedia Article
Article
The Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 was one of the most influential strikes in Canadian history, and became the platform for future labour reforms. In March 1919 labour delegates from across Western C...
Winnipeg General Strike: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
In Winnipeg on May 15, when negotiations broke down between management and labour in the building and metal trades, the Winnipeg Trades and Labor Council called a general strike.
Wobblies!: A Graphic History of the Industrial Workers of the World
Alewitz, Mike; Coe, Sue; Jones, Sabrina; Buhle, Paul; Schulman, Nicole
Book
2005
The stories of the hard-rock miners’ shooting wars, Elizabeth Gurly Flynn (the “Rebel Girl”), the first sit-down strikes and Free Speech fights, Emma Goldman and the struggle for birth control access,...
Women at Work - Ontario, 1850- 1930
Goldsmith, Penny; Shephard, Bonnie.
Book
...
'Women's Day' February 1913
Kollontai, Alexandra
Article
1913
The article by Alexandra Kollontai was first published in the newspaper Pravda one week before the first-ever celebration in Russia of the Day of International Solidarity among the Female Proletariat ...
Women's Labour Leagues (Canada): Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
Women's Labour Leagues emerged in Canada prior to WWI. Their purpose was to defend the struggles of women workers and support the labour movement.
Worker-Student Action Committees France May '68
Gregoire, R.; Perlman, F.
Book
1969
An account of the May-June 1968 events in Paris. The authors state that "our intention is not to 'clarify' the sequence of events which took place in France in order to make possible a ritual repetiti...
Workers Unity League: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
A national trade union federation that was formed in 1929 on the initiative of the Communist Party of Canada in line with the decision of the Communist International (Comintern) in 1928 that communist...
Working Class Experience: Rethinking the History of Canadian Labour, 1800-1991
Palmer, Bryan D.
Book
1983
From nineteenth-century tavern life to late twentieth-century cinema, from rough canallers and the first stirrings of craft unionism to contemporary public-sector strikes, this books provides a sweepi...
Working-Class History: Connexipedia: Article in the Canadian Encyclopedia
Article
The story of the changing conditions and actions of all working people.
The Writings of David Roediger
Horowitz, Roger
Article
1997
Roediger criticizes Marxists for too often reducing racial discrimination to conflicts over resources, such as jobs or housing, that are manipulated by a society's upper classes in order to divert att...

Connexions Directory of Groups & Websites

Against the Current
Bi-monthly magazine oriented toward movements for social and economic justice; radical, socialist and feminist in orientation.
Anarchy Archives
An archive of anarchist writings by classic authors such as Rocker, Goldman, Proudhon, and Malatesta.
Break Their Haughty Power
Articles on capitalism, socialism, and revolution, from a left-Marxist perspective.
Connexions Archive & Library
The Connexions Archive & Library is Toronto-based project dedicated to keeping alive the rich history of grassroots movements for social justice. Connexions preserves 'alternative' histories that r...
International Labor and Working Class History
ILWCH explores diverse topics from globalisation and workers' rights to class and consumption, labor movements, class identities and cultures, unions, and working-class politics.
Labour/Le Travail
A bilingual journal holding no rigid position on the definition of labour. The editorial board hopes to foster imaginative approaches to both teaching and research in labour studies through an open ex...
Marxists Internet Archive
Large archive of the writings of Marx and Engels and of others in the Marxist tradition. Searchable.
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...
Workers' Vanguard
Newspaper of the International Communist Leage (Fourth Internationalist).

Sources Experts & Spokespersons

Sources Library

Building Identify Through Struggle - Book Review
Against The Current vol. 158
Post, Charlie
2012
Socialists seeking to win support among working people in the United States today face twin obstacles. A conservative, pro-business officialdom, tied to the capitalist Democratic Party and opposed to ...
Dying to Better Themselves: West Indians and the Building of the Panama Canal
Senior,Olive
2014
Senior draws on diverse sources such as journals, books, songs, sayings, literature and testimonies to answer questions surrounding those who went to Panama.
Newfoundland Sealing Disaster
Sources Select Resources Encyclopedia
SS Newfoundland was a sealing ship which lost 78 sealers on the ice during extreme weather conditions in March 1914 which claimed lives from three sealing ships in an event known as the 1914 Newfoundl...

From the Connexions Archives

Against the Current
Serial Publication (Periodical)
1986
Bi-monthly magazine oriented toward movements for social and economic justice; radical, socialist and feminist in orientation.
Bulletin de liaison, Vol.1, No.1
Periodical profile published 1978
Serial Publication (Periodical)
1978
Ideas and Action
Periodical profile published 1981
Serial Publication (Periodical)
1981
Archive of some articles published in Ideas and Action, a radical paper published by the Workers Solidarity Alliance from 1981 to 1997.
Marxists Internet Archive
Website
Large archive of the writings of Marx and Engels and of others in the Marxist tradition. Searchable.
News and Letters
Serial Publication (Periodical)
Articles from a Marxist-Humanist perspective.
Radical America - Volume 7, Number 2 - March-April 1973
Working Class Struggles in Italy
Serial Publication (Periodical)
1973