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The article reviews the book, "How We Struggle: A Political Anthropology of Labour," by Sian Lazar.

The Lingan strike of 1882–83 was the last in a series of strikes over a two-decade period on Cape Breton Island's Sydney coalfield. With the use of untapped local sources, this article reconstructs the history of this understudied strike within a broader history of social relations on the coalfield. The migration of labourers from the island's backland farms – predominantly from Highland enclave settlements – to the coal mines played a decisive role in shaping the era's new coal mining villages and the character of social conflict. By the early 1880s, structural change associated with National Policy industrialism was eroding the old authority of the coal operators, and miners embraced the Provincial Workmen's Association (pwa) to advance their claims in long-standing and highly localized contestations. Ultimately the coal communities themselves imposed the emergent trade unionism. The Lingan strike marked a transition to a new political order on the coalfield, structured by the place of the coal mines within the wider Cape Breton countryside and built upon a powerful localism and moral economy that recast the public sphere and the miners' place in it.

Welcomes guest editors Lachlan MacKinnon and Steven High to the special issue on deindustrialization.

Pays homage to the wide-ranging interests of the activist and scholar, Teresa Healy (1962-2022).

Ontario’s provincial government enacted legislation in 2021 mandating employers to develop and maintain workplace policies with regard to employees disconnecting from work. The aim of this article is to examine the suitability of Ontario’s legislative response under the Employment Standards Act in the context of the “right to disconnect”. This paper argues that the Canadian “right to disconnect” in its current form is inadequate from a regulatory perspective and advocates for a stronger framework in this respect.

Dans cet article, les contrats de travail signés au Tennessee par les propriétaires fonciers et les affranchis sont placés au centre d'une étude sur un paradoxe de la liberté aux États-Unis. Nous soutenons l'idée que la santé des affranchis – qui comprend les soins médicaux, la subsistance et la protection physique – se négocie durant et après la guerre de Sécession dans le but d'assujettir les intérêts des Noirs, de l'État et des propriétaires terriens à un idéal de relations sociales de production régi par la liberté, le droit et le marché. En examinant les contrats de travail et leurs clauses médicales, nous revisitons l'approche médico-politique qui a maintes fois conduit les historiens à la thèse de l'échec de la Reconstruction. Nous plaçons aussi la famille noire dans le processus d'émancipation et de production par la voie des contrats et d'une relecture de la « culture de la dissimulation » proposée par l'historienne Darlene Clark Hine il y a plus de trente ans. Enfin, nous nous éloignons d'une lecture qui réduit les contrats à la seule oppression dont étaient victimes les Noirs après la guerre de Sécession. En complément, nous invitons le lecteur à examiner les débats sur la citoyenneté qui ont suivi la ratification du treizième amendement.

An illustrated, life-and times portrait of Mike Davis (1946-2022), the American writer, activist, urban theorist, and historian.

The article reviews the book, "Civilization: From Enlightenment Philosophy to Canadian History," by Elsbeth A. Heaman.

Objectif de la recherche : Cet article interroge la pérennité des communautés de pratique (CoP), généralement considérée par des approches déterministes, en utilisant le cadre théorique des communs. Cet article propose donc par analogie d’analyser les CoP en tant qu’organization et organizing. Cette approche doit permettre d’identifier les conditions internes pour une reproduction d’une CoP. L’objectif de cette recherche est ainsi de comprendre les conditions d’auto-organisation et de pérennité d’une CoP. Méthodologie : Pour ce faire, nous utilisons une méthodologie mixte. Après une étude qualitative de plusieurs mois à observer et analyser deux CoP, nous nous appuyons sur une étude quantitative menée auprès de sept CoP au sein d’une entreprise, MUTUALIS. Un questionnaire permettant d’analyser l’organization et l’organizing des CoP a été envoyé aux membres. 76 réponses ont été retenues et analysées avec SMART PLS. Contribution : Si cet article identifie un potentiel de reproduction interne des CoP et donc de pérennité, il souligne également que celle-ci demeure partielle par son usage instrumental. En raison de ce dernier, les CoP minimisent leur reproduction organisationnelle et donc leur auto-organisation. Pour dépasser cette limite, le cadre du commun propose in fine une approche intégrative de l’organisation d’une action collective auto-organisée qui nous amène à penser la démocratisation à une échelle multiniveaux. Finalement, cette étude démontre l’impératif d’une transformation organisationnelle plus générale de l’entreprise qui ne peut être réduite à des dispositifs ou des communautés sporadiques.

Cet article interprète les nombreuses données empiriques sur la croissance, puis la stagnation des « modes de flexibilité » à l’aide de la théorie du procès de travail, en particulier en ce qui concerne le contrôle et la résistance. Dans un « cycle de risque », la direction saisit d’abord une occasion de réduire les coûts en transférant le risque du capital au travail par le biais d’un certain mode de flexibilité. Le mode choisi est de plus en plus utilisé jusqu’à ce que l’expansion soit bloquée par la nécessité de vaincre la résistance, d’obtenir le consentement et/ou d’exercer un contrôle. La direction cherche alors un nouveau mode. Le cycle de risque est cohérent avec les données de l’OCDE sur l’« emploi temporaire » et les données australiennes sur l’« emploi occasionnel ». Les implications pour l’économie à la demande et l’avenir du travail sont abordées.

This paper interprets extensive empirical data on the growth and then stagnation of “modes of flexibility” by using labour process theory, specifically with respect to control and resistance. In a “risk cycle,” management initially seizes an opportunity to reduce costs by transferring risk from capital to labour through some mode of flexibility. The chosen mode is used more and more until further expansion is blocked by the need to overcome resistance, to obtain consent and/or to exercise control. Management then seeks a new mode. The risk cycle is consistent with OECD data on “temporary employment,” and Australian data on “casual employment.” Implications for the gig economy and the future of work are discussed.

The article reviews the book, "Les couleurs de la révolution. La gauche à l’épreuve du pouvoir. Venezuela, Équateur, Bolivie : un bilan à travers l’histoire," by Patrick Guillaudat and Pierre Mouterde.

The article reviews the book, "Putting Skill to Work: How to Create Good Jobs in Uncertain Times," by Nichola Lowe.

The article reviews the book, "Frontiers of Feminism: Movements and Influences in Québec and Italy, 1960–1980," by Jacinthe Michaud.

This article will present a case study of Cargill’s High River meatpacking plant operations to show how at crucial historical junctures racial capitalism shaped its working conditions and in so doing determined the spread of COVID-19. First, the Canadian meatpacking industry’s 1980s-era economic restructuring relocated and reorganized its workforce from a core to peripheral one, allowing for the low wage employment of many precarious workers; this restructuring enabled the Cargill company to gain overwhelming control of the meatpacking industry in Canada and to become a “choke point” in the supply chain. Second, Canadian immigration policy from 2006 to 2010 supported a marked increase in migrant workers to meet the labour market needs of business; this reconstituted the labour class to heighten their disposability. With these pieces in place, the Albertan provincial government could classify meatpackers as “essential workers” who worked even in the face of mass COVID infection in April through June 2020. Across this crucial historical period racial capitalism enabled the plant to circumvent public health interventions protecting workers through the onset of the pandemic. Political championing of business interests, enacted through legislative mechanisms, allowed for the exploitation of workers and consistently rendered workers personally responsible for their own health and safety, despite their lack of control over what exposed them to risk.

The article reviews the book, "Justice at Work: The Rise of Economic and Racial Justice Coalitions in Cities," by Mark Doussar and Greg Schrock.

The article reviews the book, "Work and the Carceral State," by Jon Burnett.

In the 1970s, women in Toronto created the Waitresses Action Committee to protest the introduction of a "differential" or lower minimum wage for wait staff serving alcohol. Their campaign was part of their broader feminist critique of women's exploitation and the gendered and sexualized nature of waitressing. Influenced by their origins in the Wages for Housework campaign, they stressed the linkages between women's unpaid work in the home and the workplace. Their campaign eschewed worksite organizing for an occupational mobilization outside of the established unions; they used petitions, publicity, and alliances with sympathizers to try to stop the rollback in their wages. They were successful in mobilizing support but not in altering the government's decision. Nonetheless, their spirited campaign publicized new feminist perspectives on women's gendered and sexualized labour, and it contributed to the ongoing labour feminist project of enhancing working-class women's equality, dignity, and economic autonomy. An analysis of their mobilization also helps to enrich and complicate our understanding of labour and socialist feminism in this period.

In this article, I will analyze the ways in which Brazilian workers are using social media to organize and mobilize. Although analysis of social media use has made great progress, in the case of worker movements it still needs further development. I will focus on the experience of Brazilian app-based delivery workers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite their dispersion across the country, delivery workers were able to carry out two national strikes through intense use of WhatsApp, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. Using qualitative analysis of posts from worker organizations on social media, it was possible to identify the challenges faced by these movements when using digital media. Social media helped solve some organizational and communication problems, while producing others that workers had to deal with.

The covid-19 pandemic severely disrupted the education system in Canada from March 2020 throughout the 2020–21 school year. It also had disproportionate secondary effects on women in terms of unpaid care, economic loss, and poor mental health. This article explores the lived experience of women educators in the province of Alberta, drawing on interviews and focus groups with 39 educators. Findings indicate that the pandemic not only exacerbated the triple burden that women educators, in particular, bear but added additional layers of responsibility related to public health management, educating children at home, elder care responsibilities, and emotional labour. The essential role women educators fulfilled within the covid-19 response, at work and at home, cost them time, professional development opportunities, mental wellness, and the positive rewards that had drawn them to the educational field. Current concerns around educator burnout and retention may be mitigated by acting on the recommendations of women educators regarding the development of more equitable education systems and social policy.