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The article reviews the book, "The Southern Key: Class, Race and Radicalism in the 1930s and 1940s," by Michael Goldfield.
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Autoworkers unionized the General Motors plant in Oshawa in 1937 after a bitterly fought strike that pitted them against a rabidly anti-union government, hostile press and GM corporation. It was a major turning point in Canadian labour history. Crucial factors contributing to the strike’s success include the historical background of working-class struggle in the community, patient and courageous prior organizing by Communists, the engaged leadership of rank-and-file GM workers, and the solid support of the United Autoworkers International Union. The author focuses on the voices and actions of rank-and-file workers and on the day-to-day events, many of which have been misunderstood or misinterpreted. The Truth About the ’37 Oshawa GM Strike takes down the long-accepted—but false—narrative espoused by the academic Irving Abella that the Oshawa workers were “on their own” without significant support from the UAW/CIO leadership and that they would have been better off not to organize under the banner of an international union. It also shows how that narrative fails to grasp the degree to which class struggle organizing principles were crucial to the strike’s success. A true understanding of the ’37 strike provides valuable lessons for people seeking to revive the labour movement today. --Publisher's description
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Unifor President Jerry Dias called it “a home run.” The media headlines were all about “reopening the Oshawa plant.” Unifor, the union that represents workers at the Detroit Three auto companies in Canada, announced a tentative agreement with General Motors Canada on November 5 that included a $1.3 billion investment to “restart” the Oshawa Assembly Plant. GM had ended vehicle assembly there last year, eliminating the jobs of 5,000 assembly and supplier workers. The prospect of jobs returning is very welcome. What’s missing from the news coverage, though, is the reality that GM is not really reopening the old plant. Instead the new operation will be a “pop-up” assembly plant—designed to meet the short-term need for additional production of hugely profitable pickup trucks. The company is making no long-term commitments to the workers it will hire, nor to the community where its pickups and profits will be made. In effect, GM will open a brand new plant inside the shell of the old plant—with an almost entirely new workforce, an inferior wage scale, fewer benefits, and no job security.
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On November 26, 2018, General Motors announced a number of plant closures in North America, the largest of which was in Oshawa, Ontario. The Oshawa facility, once the largest auto complex on the continent, was to end all its assembly operations by the end of 2019. ...This pamphlet provides background material on Oshawa and joins Green Jobs Oshawa in encouraging workers elsewhere to prepare now for the threats to their jobs and productive capacity that will inevitably come. --From introduction. Contents: Introduction: Realizing ‘Just Transitions’: The Struggle for Plant Conversion at GM Oshawa -- Mission Statement of Green Jobs Oshawa -- Unifor Settlement with GM – Footprint or Toe Tag? / Tony Leah -- GM Oshawa: Lowered Expectations Unexplored Opportunities; The GM Strike and the Historical Convergence of Possibilities / Sam Gindin -- Bringing SNC-Lavalin to Mind During an Uninspiring Federal Election / Leo Panitch -- Take It Over: The Struggle for Green Production in Oshawa / Linda McQuaig -- Green Jobs Oshawa and a Just Transition / Rebecca Keetch -- Why GM’s Oshawa Assembly Line Shutdown is a Black Eye for Unifor’s Jerry Dias / Jennifer Wells -- Appendix: Feasibility Study for the Green Conversion of the GM Oshawa Facility: Possibilities for Sustainable Community Wealth: Summary Overview / Russ Christianson. Contents: Introduction: Realizing ‘Just Transitions’: The Struggle for Plant Conversion at GM Oshawa -- Mission Statement of Green Jobs Oshawa -- Unifor Settlement with GM – Footprint or Toe Tag? / Tony Leah -- GM Oshawa: Lowered Expectations Unexplored Opportunities; The GM Strike and the Historical Convergence of Possibilities / Sam Gindin -- Bringing SNC-Lavalin to Mind During an Uninspiring Federal Election / Leo Panitch -- Take It Over: The Struggle for Green Production in Oshawa / Linda McQuaig -- Green Jobs Oshawa and a Just Transition / Rebecca Keetch -- Why GM’s Oshawa Assembly Line Shutdown is a Black Eye for Unifor’s Jerry Dias / Jennifer Wells -- Appendix: Feasibility Study for the Green Conversion of the GM Oshawa Facility: Possibilities for Sustainable Community Wealth: Summary Overview / Russ Christianson.
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