Portal:Organized Labour

Introduction

Image created by Walter Crane to celebrate International Workers' Day (May Day, 1 May), 1889. The image depicts workers from the five populated continents (Africa, Asia, Americas, Australia and Europe) in unity underneath an angel representing freedom, fraternity and equality.

The labour movement is the collective organisation of working people to further their shared political and economic interests. It consists of the trade union or labour union movement, as well as political parties of labour. It can be considered an instance of class conflict.

In trade unions, workers campaign for higher wages, better working conditions and fair treatment from their employers, and through the implementation of labour laws, from their governments. They do this through collective bargaining, sectoral bargaining, and when needed, strike action. In some countries, co-determination gives representatives of workers seats on the board of directors of their employers.

Political parties representing the interests of workers campaign for labour rights, social security and the welfare state. They are usually called a labour party (in English-speaking countries), a social democratic party (in Germanic and Slavic countries), a socialist party (in Romance countries), or sometimes a workers' party.
Though historically less prominent, the cooperative movement campaigns to replace capitalist ownership of the economy with worker cooperatives, consumer cooperatives, and other types of cooperative ownership. This is related to the concept of economic democracy.

The labour movement developed as a response to capitalism and the Industrial Revolution of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, at about the same time as socialism. The early goals of the movement were the right to unionise, the right to vote, democracy and the 40-hour week. As these were achieved in many of the advanced economies of western Europe and north America in the early decades of the 20th century, the labour movement expanded to issues of welfare and social insurance, wealth distribution and income distribution, public services like health care and education, social housing and common ownership. (Full article...)

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Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is a labor union representing almost 1.9 million workers in over 100 occupations in the United States and Canada. SEIU is focused on organizing workers in three sectors: healthcare (over half of members work in the healthcare field), including hospital, home care and nursing home workers; public services (government employees, including law enforcement); and property services (including janitors, security guards and food service workers).

SEIU has over 150 local branches. It is affiliated with the Strategic Organizing Center and the Canadian Labour Congress. SEIU's international headquarters is located in Washington, D.C., and it is one of the largest unions in the country.

The union is known for its strong support for Democratic candidates. It spent $28 million supporting Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election. In 2012, SEIU was the top outside spender on Democratic campaigns, reporting almost $70 million of campaign donations, television ads and get-out-the-vote efforts in support of President Obama and other Democrats. SEIU is a major supporter of the Affordable Care Act and of increased minimum wage laws, including wage increases for fast food workers. The union is the primary backer of the Fight for $15. (Full article...)

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July in Labor History

Significant dates in labour history.

July 01 - The Great Railroad Strike of 1922 began in the U.S.; the Regina Riot occurred during the On-to-Ottawa Trek in Canada in 1935; Lee Pressman was born; P. H. McCarthy died; the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union of Australia was founded; the Westmoreland County coal strike of 1910–11 ended in the U.S.
July 02 - William J. McCarthy was born; Edward Ikem Okeke died; the U.S. Supreme Court decided Brown v. Hotel and Restaurant Employees
July 03 - The United States Army began suppression of the American Railway Union during the Pullman Strike in 1894
July 04 - The Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention came into force
July 05 - "Bloody Thursday" occurred during the 1934 West Coast waterfront strike in the U.S.
July 06 - Peter J. McGuire was born; the Homestead Strike culminated with a battle between Pinkerton agents and striking workers
July 07 - Eugene V. Debs was arrested during the Pullman Strike in 1894; the 1998 Puerto Rican general strike began
July 08 - Jesse Simons died
July 09 - Jackie Presser died; the Transport Workers Union of America won the "Squeegee Strike" at the IRT in 1935
July 10 - Sidney Hillman died; George W. Taylor was born; Donald Richberg was born
July 11 - Frank Duffy died; Sigurd Lucassen was born
July 12 - The British Columbia Teachers' Federation was founded; Arnold Miller died; Clara Lemlich died; Edgar Nixon was born; the Bisbee Deportation occurred in the U.S. in 1917
July 13 - The U.S. Steel recognition strike of 1901 began
July 14 - The Great Railroad Strike of 1877 began in the U.S.
July 15 - The Steel strike of 1959 began in the U.S.; Set Persson died; Michael Costa was born; the Vancouver Police Union was founded
July 16 - Frank Rudolph Crosswaith was born
July 17 - The Cape Breton coal strike of 1981 began in Canada
July 18 - William J. McCarthy defeated Weldon Mathis as Teamsters president in 1988; Robert Georgine was born; the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949, one of the two primary labour conventions of the ILO, came into force
July 19 - The Hatch Act of 1939 was extended to cover state and local government workers in the U.S.; Benjamin Gitlow died; Rhoda Williams died
July 20 - The Newsboys' strike of 1899 began
July 22 - Patrick J. Campbell was born; the 2004–05 NHL lockout ended in the U.S. and Canada
July 23 - Emma Tenayuca died
July 24 - The 1952 steel strike ended in the U.S.; Ben Gold died; the Alliance for Labor Action is formed
July 25 - Farrell Dobbs was born; the Service Employees International Union and the Teamsters announced their intention to leave the AFL–CIO; labor attorney Arthur Goldberg resigned as Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court
July 26 - Elias Motsoaledi was born; William Trenwith died; the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, banning workplace discrimination based on disability, became law
July 27 - The Polish film Man of Iron was released in 1981
July 28 - Harry Bridges was born; the 1913 Paterson silk strike ended in the U.S.; Florence Cohen was born
July 29 - The Sailors' Union of the Pacific was formed; the United Food and Commercial Workers disaffiliated from the AFL–CIO
July 30 - Jimmy Hoffa disappeared in 1975; the Arizona copper mine strike of 1983 began in the U.S.
July 31 - Edward T. Hanley resigned as president of HERE after a corruption scandal

Jan•Feb•Mar•Apr•May•Jun•Jul•Aug•Sep•Oct•Nov•Dec

More Did you know (auto-generated)

... that Surinamese trade unionist Louis Doedel was involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital by the governor-general for 43 years?
... that M. Farooqui, who had been expelled from his studies for having organized a strike in 1940, received his Delhi University degree in a special convocation in 1989?
... that Sting wrote "We Work the Black Seam" because he felt that "the case for coal was never put to the nation" during the 1984–85 British miners' strike, which began 40 years ago today?
... that up to 129,000 Canadian federal workers went on strike?
... that in 1969, the first women's strike for equal pay in the Netherlands was called in a cigar factory in Nieuwe Pekela?
... that during the 1913 El Paso smelters' strike the Industrial Workers of the World and the Western Federation of Miners competed to organize the strikers with their respective labor unions?

Related Portals

Selected image

Image 1J. Warren Madden, the first Chair of the National Labor Relations Board.
Image 2Rally in Dhaka, organized by Jatiyo Nari Shramik Trade Union Kendra (National Women Workers Trade Union Centre), an organization affiliated with the Bangladesh Trade Union Kendra.
Image 3Great Railroad Strike of 1877.
Image 4Mounted police chase demonstrators through Vancouver's East End during the Battle of Ballantyne Pier in 1935.
Image 5George Meany, former leader of the AFL–CIO.
Image 6The Ludlow massacre monument located in Ludlow, Colorado, United States.
Image 7An AFL–CIO protest of Rite Aid, with Rev. Mark Reisinger (Pastor of Grace United Methodist Church in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania), Bill George, and Richard Bloomingdale.
Image 8Illustration from the Brisbane Worker newspaper condemning the brutality of the Queensland Police on Black Friday during the 1912 Brisbane General Strike.
Image 9The Western Federation of Miners' famous flyer entitled "Is Colorado in America?".
Image 10Picket signs at the 2007 Writers Guild of America strike.
Image 11Knights of Labor Grand Master Workman Terence V. Powderly.
Image 12William Green, president of the AFL–CIO from 1924 to 1952.
Image 13National Federation of Federal Employees officials sign a collective bargaining agreement with the U.S. 8th Army in October 2002.
Image 14Australian industrial relations legislation national day of protest, 2005.
Image 15Protesters barricade the street on June 22 during the 2006 Oaxaca protests.
Image 16Strike leaders at the Paterson silk strike of 1913. From left, Patrick Quinlan, Carlo Tresca, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Adolph Lessig, and Bill Haywood.
Image 17Striking I.W.W. members confront Massachusetts National Guard troops in Boston, during the Lawrence textile strike in 1912.
Image 18Empty Gare du Nord train station during the November 2007 strikes in France.
Image 19Barges set ablaze by steelworkers during the Homestead strike in 1892.
Image 20Striking teamsters armed with pipes battle police in the streets during the Minneapolis Teamsters Strike of 1934.
Image 21Members of the United Steelworkers in Ohio phone bank other union members to educate them about critical issues in the 2008 election in the U.S.
Image 22Detail of monument to the Reesor Siding Strike of 1963.
Image 23Samuel Gompers.
Image 24Metropolitan Transportation Authority (New York) notice of subway closure during the 2005 New York City transit strike.
Image 25Public and Commercial Services Union members on strike in Manchester 2006.
Image 26Joe Hill.
Image 27Union members march in Argentina on Human Rights Day in December 2005. The signs read "Worker rights are human rights..
Image 28May Day Rally in Mumbai, India, 2004.
Image 29Striking workers march moments before the Swedish military opened fire, killing five workers during the Ådalen shootings.
Image 30Cripple Creek, Colo., under martial law, during the 1894 strike.
Image 31Wilma B. Liebman, chair, NLRB.
Image 32Political cartoon about the Coal Strike of 1902 from the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Image 33Exaggerated 19th century engraving showing flames and smoke following the Haymarket riot.
Image 34Camp put up by striking Pepsi-Cola workers, in Guatemala City, Guatemala, 2008.
Image 35United Mine Workers of America poster circa 1902.
Image 36American Federation of Teachers (AFT) president Albert Shanker.
Image 37Richard Trumka.
Image 38Shields used by striking workers at the Carnegie Steel Works during the Homestead Strike in 1892.
Image 39Lewis Hine's 1920 image "Power house mechanic working on steam pump," which shows a working class young American man with wrench in hand, hunched over, surrounded by the machinery that defines his work.
Image 40Striking American Railway Union members confront Illinois National Guard troops in Chicago, Illinois, during the Pullman Strike in 1894.
Image 41Armed vigilantes deport striking copper miners during the Bisbee Deportation in Bisbee, Arizona, July 12, 1917.
Image 42Former headquarters of the United Mine Workers of America and the Congress of Industrial Organizations, 900 15th Street NW, Washington, D.C., in 200.
Image 43Breaker boys, child laborers, working in a U.S. coal mine in 1911.
Image 44The Place de la Sorbonne in Paris is closed by police during the 2006 labour protests in France.
Image 45A. Philip Randolph.
Image 46Big Bill Haywood, a founding member and leader of the Industrial Workers of the World.
Image 47John L. Lewis (right, President of the United Mine Workers, confers with Thomas Kennedy (left), UMW Secretary-Treasurer of the UMW, and a UMW official at the War Labor Board in 1943 about a coal miners' strike.
Image 48Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, and his wife, circa 1908.
Image 49Crowd gathered outside old City Hall during the Winnipeg general strike, June 21, 1919.
Image 50During World War II, a female aircraft worker checks electrical assemblies at the Vega Aircraft Corporation in Burbank, California.
Image 51Union elections with an illegal firing, 1951 to 2007.
Image 52Strike sign used by the German Train Drivers' Union in the German national rail strike of 2007.
Image 53Memorial marker for the Bay View Tragedy.
Image 54AFL–CIO unions protest outside Verizon headquarters in Philadelphia using a giant inflatable rat.
Image 55Union members picketing recent NLRB rulings outside the agency's Washington, D.C., headquarters in November 2007.
Image 56The front page of the Union Record on the Seattle General Strike of 1919.
Image 57Mary Harris "Mother" Jones.
Image 58Registered nurses on strike in 2006 outside Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital.

Selected Quote

"When a scab comes down the street, men turn their backs, angels weep in heaven, and the Devil shuts the gates of Hell to keep him out. ... Judas Iscariot was a gentleman compared to a scab. For betraying his master, he had character enough to hang himself. A scab has not."

— Jack London.

Did you know

...that the 1998 Puerto Rican general strike paralyzed the island for two days, when 500,000 people took to the streets to protest against privatizing the Puerto Rico Telephone Company?
...that the first trade union in Botswana was not recognised by the ruling Bechuanaland Protectorate until 1964, 16 years after its formation?
...that Ron Carey was the first Teamsters General President elected by a direct vote of the membership?

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