Pub Date : 2023-11-29DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10140
Gregor Gall, Mark Harcourt
Unions’ presence and influence in the United States continue to atrophy. One key reason for this decline is the difficulties in certifying via the National Labor Relations Act. Consequently, labor-oriented scholars have developed proposals to overhaul and/or supplement this process. One of the most far-reaching is the ‘Clean Slate’. We contend that, though a welcome advance, ‘Clean Slate’ is a necessary but insufficient law reform to revive unions. Accordingly, we suggest a complementary policy, the union default, to the ‘Clean Slate’. With a union default, ‘Clean Slate’ would produce a much swifter and more dramatic resurgence in union membership and resources, sparking a badly needed virtuous upward spiral.
{"title":"Can the ‘Clean Slate’ ‘Go Big’ on Its Own? The Contribution of the Union Default","authors":"Gregor Gall, Mark Harcourt","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10140","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10140","url":null,"abstract":"Unions’ presence and influence in the United States continue to atrophy. One key reason for this decline is the difficulties in certifying via the National Labor Relations Act. Consequently, labor-oriented scholars have developed proposals to overhaul and/or supplement this process. One of the most far-reaching is the ‘Clean Slate’. We contend that, though a welcome advance, ‘Clean Slate’ is a necessary but insufficient law reform to revive unions. Accordingly, we suggest a complementary policy, the union default, to the ‘Clean Slate’. With a union default, ‘Clean Slate’ would produce a much swifter and more dramatic resurgence in union membership and resources, sparking a badly needed virtuous upward spiral.","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"142 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138529346","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-27DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10137
Stephanie J. Smith
This article analyzes the interactions of artists, Mexico’s Communist Party, or the Partido Comunista Mexicano (pcm), and the Mexican state within the context of Mexico’s vibrant post-revolutionary era. Although during these early years the Party’s official membership numbers remained relatively minimal, this article argues that the extraordinary influence of Mexico’s creative participants on the politics of the period was significant. During the 1920s the pcm derived a great deal of prestige from its association with art and the muralists, including Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros, and as a result Mexico’s lively political and artistic scene attracted the attention of writers, photographers, artists, and intellectuals from all over the world. Art and politics intertwined as artists played major roles in political affairs, and politicians appropriated the arts to transmit the “official” national history. Indeed, during these exhilarating years, the artists and the pcm built a powerful coalition, and one whose influence endured long beyond the 1920s.
{"title":"Envisioning the Revolution: Art and the Creation of Mexico’s Communist Party","authors":"Stephanie J. Smith","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10137","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10137","url":null,"abstract":"This article analyzes the interactions of artists, Mexico’s Communist Party, or the Partido Comunista Mexicano (pcm), and the Mexican state within the context of Mexico’s vibrant post-revolutionary era. Although during these early years the Party’s official membership numbers remained relatively minimal, this article argues that the extraordinary influence of Mexico’s creative participants on the politics of the period was significant. During the 1920s the pcm derived a great deal of prestige from its association with art and the muralists, including Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros, and as a result Mexico’s lively political and artistic scene attracted the attention of writers, photographers, artists, and intellectuals from all over the world. Art and politics intertwined as artists played major roles in political affairs, and politicians appropriated the arts to transmit the “official” national history. Indeed, during these exhilarating years, the artists and the pcm built a powerful coalition, and one whose influence endured long beyond the 1920s.","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"77 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.3,"publicationDate":"2023-11-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"139228872","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-10DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10129
André Thiemann
Abstract Extending from an ethnographic case study that demonstrates the existential troubles of Serbian farmers to continue raspberry production for the global market, this article anthropologically hones in on the intertwining of human and non-human labour (production) with socio-economic and techno-scientific policies of care (reproduction). Different waves of state transformation—the build-up and decay of formal employment coupled with the emergence, then exhaustion of the welfare state, its socio-liberal transformation in the early 2000s, followed by its polypore repurposing for illiberal ends since 2012, have led to a zombified hope in the state’s will to care for its population. Skilled and unskilled workers have emigrated to Western labour markets, while the climate crisis gained momentum because of the underfunding of critical infrastructures of value. Adopting a Marxist-Eco-Feminist care perspective, the case study thus embeds seemingly disconnected concerns within wider struggles on the boundaries of the (welfare) state, economy and techno-science.
{"title":"Fledgling Farms and Failing Health: How the Polypore State Transforms the Multispecies Relations in Serbia’s Raspberry Fields","authors":"André Thiemann","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10129","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10129","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Extending from an ethnographic case study that demonstrates the existential troubles of Serbian farmers to continue raspberry production for the global market, this article anthropologically hones in on the intertwining of human and non-human labour (production) with socio-economic and techno-scientific policies of care (reproduction). Different waves of state transformation—the build-up and decay of formal employment coupled with the emergence, then exhaustion of the welfare state, its socio-liberal transformation in the early 2000s, followed by its polypore repurposing for illiberal ends since 2012, have led to a zombified hope in the state’s will to care for its population. Skilled and unskilled workers have emigrated to Western labour markets, while the climate crisis gained momentum because of the underfunding of critical infrastructures of value. Adopting a Marxist-Eco-Feminist care perspective, the case study thus embeds seemingly disconnected concerns within wider struggles on the boundaries of the (welfare) state, economy and techno-science.","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"98 45","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135091863","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-09DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10128
Jake Lin, Dennis Arnold, Minh T.N. Nguyen
Abstract Welfare expansion in the global South is partly in response to the social crises caused by neoliberal restructuring since the 1980s, with the 2008 global financial crisis escalating them, and the covid-19 pandemic further exposing the impact on the most precarious working populations. What are the new dynamics of labor struggles against these structural, industrial, and health crises under the expansion of social protection or the lack thereof? How do the state and non-state actors manage recurring and new capitalist crises by reconfiguring labor and social policies? The contributions in this special issue address these questions by engaging with workers’ lived experiences across the global South and post-communist states. They show that current labor and social policies fail the test under various crises. We argue that the neoliberalization of labor and welfare reconfigurations and the recurring crises of global capitalism have reproduced each other in these global South countries.
{"title":"Welfare in Crisis: Labor and Social Protection in the Global South","authors":"Jake Lin, Dennis Arnold, Minh T.N. Nguyen","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10128","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10128","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract Welfare expansion in the global South is partly in response to the social crises caused by neoliberal restructuring since the 1980s, with the 2008 global financial crisis escalating them, and the covid-19 pandemic further exposing the impact on the most precarious working populations. What are the new dynamics of labor struggles against these structural, industrial, and health crises under the expansion of social protection or the lack thereof? How do the state and non-state actors manage recurring and new capitalist crises by reconfiguring labor and social policies? The contributions in this special issue address these questions by engaging with workers’ lived experiences across the global South and post-communist states. They show that current labor and social policies fail the test under various crises. We argue that the neoliberalization of labor and welfare reconfigurations and the recurring crises of global capitalism have reproduced each other in these global South countries.","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":" 2","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135290647","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-06DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10135
Elke Weesjes
Abstract This article examines the postwar cultural sphere of the Dutch communist movement. Drawing on a series of interviews with 27 Dutch cradle communists born between 1935 and 1955, communist archives, and a wide range of other sources, it explores respondents’ cultural upbringing and family leisure time in the period 1945–1965. It challenges the notion that Dutch communists all lived in a closed sectarian milieu or ideological bubble and instead argues that Dutch communists had a close yet complex relationship with the ‘bourgeois’ (non-communist) world.
{"title":"Blending Soviet and Dutch Culture: Communist Family Life in the Netherlands 1945–1965","authors":"Elke Weesjes","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10135","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10135","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article examines the postwar cultural sphere of the Dutch communist movement. Drawing on a series of interviews with 27 Dutch cradle communists born between 1935 and 1955, communist archives, and a wide range of other sources, it explores respondents’ cultural upbringing and family leisure time in the period 1945–1965. It challenges the notion that Dutch communists all lived in a closed sectarian milieu or ideological bubble and instead argues that Dutch communists had a close yet complex relationship with the ‘bourgeois’ (non-communist) world.","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"39 14","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135680081","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-03DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10133
Sara Bigazzi, Sara Serdult, Judit Zeller
Abstract This article delves into the dynamics of the “model change” within the Hungarian higher education during the covid -19 crisis, focusing on grassroots reactions in the University of Pécs. Amid pandemic-related restrictions, the study reveals how online platforms fostered collective action, allowing stakeholders discuss and voice concerns this change. The analysis uncovers a pattern where representative leadership sidelined democratic decision-making, indicating a disconnection between representation and accountability. Rooted in historical relational patterns and prevailing political culture, this detachment highlights the need for improved mechanisms of accountability. By presenting a participatory action research, the study underscores the transformative role of grassroots communities and trade unions in advocating collective interests and values. The paper emphasizes that online platforms, while promoting accessibility and pluralism, need to address the quality of participation. Overall, the research contributes to the complexities of decision-making in higher education transitions and the challenges of representation and accountability.
{"title":"Research for Change: Reflections on Online Collective Activism Against Accelerated Policies of University Privatization during covid-19 Restrictions in Hungary","authors":"Sara Bigazzi, Sara Serdult, Judit Zeller","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10133","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10133","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This article delves into the dynamics of the “model change” within the Hungarian higher education during the covid -19 crisis, focusing on grassroots reactions in the University of Pécs. Amid pandemic-related restrictions, the study reveals how online platforms fostered collective action, allowing stakeholders discuss and voice concerns this change. The analysis uncovers a pattern where representative leadership sidelined democratic decision-making, indicating a disconnection between representation and accountability. Rooted in historical relational patterns and prevailing political culture, this detachment highlights the need for improved mechanisms of accountability. By presenting a participatory action research, the study underscores the transformative role of grassroots communities and trade unions in advocating collective interests and values. The paper emphasizes that online platforms, while promoting accessibility and pluralism, need to address the quality of participation. Overall, the research contributes to the complexities of decision-making in higher education transitions and the challenges of representation and accountability.","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"10 4","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135868012","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-11-02DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10139
Spencer Adams
{"title":"Clean Air and Good Jobs: U.S. Labor and the Struggle for Climate Justice, written by Todd E. Vachon","authors":"Spencer Adams","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10139","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10139","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"218 4","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135974722","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-24DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10132
Carlos L. Garrido
Abstract For W.E.B. Du Bois, the greatest factor preventing the unity of the working-class—both in the US and in the international scale—was racism. In this paper, I argue that Du Bois’s analysis of racism (along with the American assumption) is best understood as a form of what the Marxist tradition calls false consciousness—a comprehensive ideological operation whereby the dominant social order reflects itself in a topsy-turvy appearance integral for the reproduction of the existing state of affairs. A paradoxical situation arises—while united class struggle is stifled by these forms of false consciousness—only through class struggle can they be overcome. The destruction of false consciousness in general—and racist false consciousness in particular—is a process , not a singular spontaneous event. It is attained through the transformation in the mode of life one is engaged in when they dedicate their life to the struggle for the working-class’ conquest of political power. In the process of developing his analysis of the U.S. class struggle and the role of the struggle against racism within it, this paper argues that Du Bois grasps the pulse of the determinate forms the class struggle takes in the U.S. in a manner which prompts his labeling as the founder of ‘American Marxism.’
{"title":"Du Bois’s Black Reconstruction: The Black Worker and Racist False Consciousness","authors":"Carlos L. Garrido","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10132","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10132","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract For W.E.B. Du Bois, the greatest factor preventing the unity of the working-class—both in the US and in the international scale—was racism. In this paper, I argue that Du Bois’s analysis of racism (along with the American assumption) is best understood as a form of what the Marxist tradition calls false consciousness—a comprehensive ideological operation whereby the dominant social order reflects itself in a topsy-turvy appearance integral for the reproduction of the existing state of affairs. A paradoxical situation arises—while united class struggle is stifled by these forms of false consciousness—only through class struggle can they be overcome. The destruction of false consciousness in general—and racist false consciousness in particular—is a process , not a singular spontaneous event. It is attained through the transformation in the mode of life one is engaged in when they dedicate their life to the struggle for the working-class’ conquest of political power. In the process of developing his analysis of the U.S. class struggle and the role of the struggle against racism within it, this paper argues that Du Bois grasps the pulse of the determinate forms the class struggle takes in the U.S. in a manner which prompts his labeling as the founder of ‘American Marxism.’","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"56 6","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135322152","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-20DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10126
Noah Shuster
{"title":"Troublemaking: Why You Should Organize Your Workplace, written by Hughes, Lydia and Jamie Woodcock","authors":"Noah Shuster","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10126","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10126","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"47 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135568149","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-10-16DOI: 10.1163/24714607-bja10131
Michael Menser
{"title":"Participation, Power and the Provision of Basic Goods","authors":"Michael Menser","doi":"10.1163/24714607-bja10131","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24714607-bja10131","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42634,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Labor and Society","volume":"14 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136182227","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}