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Bill 6, the government of Alberta’s contentious farm workers’ safety legislation, sparked public debate as no other legislation has done in recent years. The Enhanced Protection for Farm and Ranch Workers Act provides a right to work safely and a compensation system for those killed or injured at work, similar to other provinces. In nine essays, contributors to Farm Workers in Western Canada place this legislation in context. They look at the origins, work conditions, and precarious lives of farm workers in terms of larger historical forces such as colonialism, land rights, and racism. They also examine how the rights and privileges of farm workers, including seasonal and temporary foreign workers, conflict with those of their employers, and reveal the barriers many face by being excluded from most statutory employment laws, sometimes in violation of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. -- Publisher's description

The article reviews and comments on several books, including "Worth Striking For: Why Education Policy is Every Teacher’s Concern (Lessons from Chicago)," by Isabel Nuñez, Gregory Michie, and Pamela Konkol, "How to Jump-Start Your Union: Lessons from the Chicago Teachers," by Alexandra Bradbury, Mark Brenner, Jenny Brown, Jane Slaughter, and Samantha Winslow, and "Strike for America: Chicago Teachers Against Austerity" by Micah Uetricht.

In this essay, I focus on the first wave of [Ukrainian] immigrants who arrived from 1891 to the end of World War I and the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919. My purpose is to understand the conditions that compelled these people to challenge exclusionary and exploitative practices, and expose the logic behind the dominant Canadian historical narrative that is so pregnant with the “pioneer myth." ...Four core contributions stem from my application of a situated critique: first, a rediscovery of the emancipatory praxis of Ukrainian Canadians from the era in question; second, a link between the particularities of their struggle to both coeval and current struggles; third, an analytical framework that exposes the reactionary tendencies in select writings about Ukrainian Canadians, and; fourth, an analytical framework that can be adapted to apply to the study of other groups and historical eras. --From author's introduction

The article reviews the book, "Within and Without the Nation: Canadian History as Transnational History," edited by Karen Dubinsky, Adele Perry, and Henry Yu.

Homeworkers are a globally significant part of the informal workforce, commonly regarded as invisible because their work is not recognized (Burchielli et al., 2008; Prugl, 1999). In this qualitative study, we examine homeworker invisibility in the case of Argentinian garment homework using the concepts of work invisibilization and work denial.The work invisibilization concept (Krinsky and Simonet, 2012), referring to devalorized work resulting from the neoliberal agenda, is used to understand recent global trends away from standard work arrangements/protections. Arising from the social relations of domination, invisibilized work is precarious, with irregular/ non-existent employment contracts and relationships. Invisibilization thus provides a valuable lens for analysing homework, which shares key characteristics with emerging forms of invisibilized employment. Homework however, has not transformed but has always been informal, characterized by inferior standards. To account for this, we articulate a concept of denial of work.Cohen's (2001) concept of denial describes broad dimensions, including different forms, strategies and levels of denial. Adapting these, we construct a framework to analyze the denial of Argentinian garment homework, enabling a detailed examination of the specific social actors and processes involved in casting homework as non-work.In considering the denial of homework in relation to invisibilization, we argue that these are related but distinct concepts. Used together, they help explain the low-power condition of two types of garment homeworkers in Argentina while also accounting for their differences: the mostly male, migrant workers employed in clandestine workshops (such as the Bolivians interviewed in our study), and the traditional, mostly female, Argentinian garment homeworkers.Our findings suggest that Bolivian immigrant homeworkers are partially visibilized due to NGO advocacy. However, as there are no improvements to their working conditions, they remained largely invisibilized through the effects of capitalism. By contrast, traditional women homeworkers have no representation and internalize their condition: their invisibilization is explained by the cumulative effects of capitalism and patriarchy. // Globalement, les travailleurs à domicile constituent une partie importante de la main-d'oeuvre informelle et ils sont communément considérés invisibles parce que leur travail n'est pas reconnu (Burchielli et al., 2008; Prugl, 1999). Dans cette étude qualitative, nous examinons l'invisibilité du travailleur à domicile dans l'industrie argentine du vêtement à domicile, en recourant aux concepts d'invisibilité et de déni du travail.Le concept d'invisibilité du travail (Krinsky et Simonet, 2012), lequel réfère à la dévalorisation du travail résultant de l'agenda néolibéral, est utilisé pour comprendre les tendances globales récentes d'éloignement des protections ou des contrats de travail « standard ». Découlant des relations sociales de domination, le travail invisible est précaire, avec des contrats de travail et des relations d'emploi nonexistants ou irréguliers. Le processus d'invisibilité procure alors une loupe intéressante pour analyser le travail à domicile, lequel partage certaines caractéristiques clés avec les formes émergentes de l'emploi invisible. L'emploi à domicile, toutefois, ne s'est pas transformé, mais a toujours été de nature informelle, caractérisé par des conditions de travail inférieures. Afin de rendre compte de ce phénomène, nous développons le concept de déni de l'emploi.Ce concept, emprunté à Cohen (2001), décrit de grandes dimensions, incluant diverses formes, stratégies et niveaux de déni. Adaptant cette réflexion théorique, nous avons construit un cadre d'analyse du déni de l'emploi à domicile dans l'industrie argentine du vêtement, permettant un examen en détail des acteurs sociaux et des processus spécifiques impliqués dans l'édification de ces emplois à domicile comme du non-travail.En considérant le déni de l'emploi à domicile en relation avec le concept d'invisibilité, nous soutenons qu'il s'agit là de deux concepts reliés, mais distincts. Pris ensemble, ils aident à expliquer les conditions de faible puissance de deux types d'emploi à domicile dans l'industrie du vêtement en Argentine, tout en rendant compte de leurs différences : d'abord, celui des travailleurs, principalement des hommes et immigrants, employés dans des ateliers clandestins (comme les Boliviens interviewés dans notre étude); et, ensuite, le secteur traditionnel de l'emploi à domicile argentin, composé principalement de femmes.Nos résultats suggèrent que les travailleurs à domicile immigrants boliviens sont partiellement rendus visibles grâce au travail de défense de leurs intérêts par des organisations non-gouvernementales (ONG). Toutefois, comme il n'y a pas d'améliorations de leurs conditions de travail, ils demeurent largement invisibles sous les effets du capitalisme. En revanche, les travailleuses à domicile traditionnelles ne sont pas représentées et, de ce fait, elles internalisent leurs conditions : leur invisibilité s'explique par les effets cumulatifs du capitalisme et du patriarcat.

Technologies in the first half of 21st century are developing new abilities to perform autonomously and compete with humans directly in more and more tasks, opening up the future possibility of increasing labour substitution. Using the theory of Cognitive Capitalism to examine advanced economies as the most recent form of capitalism shows that in the modern economy work is increasingly central to the lives of individuals due to new cognitive labour which requires more worker engagement than industrial labour. This requirement has strengthened the direct coercive mechanisms of the increasingly precarious wage relationship and weakened alternate income sources. This dissertation argues that automation in this context could be harmful to individuals required to depend on work to survive and evaluates three policy options against the goal of freeing individuals from this institutional constraint to work so that they can continue to fully and freely participate in society if widespread automation occurs.

The fluctuating expansion of oil sands development in northern Alberta, Canada has led to employers hiring a large number of mobile workers. The working conditions for some of these mobile workers are modulated in part by unions through their role in negotiating of collective bargaining agreements. Using a social reproductive framework, this study has two main findings: through collective agreements mobile workers are treated as a distinct category of worker, and there is a simultaneous expansion of workplace rules and regulations alongside a divide of the workplace from the home. The resulting expansion of the union regulated space in contrast to the divide of workplace from the home challenges union revitalization efforts, while also reaffirming traditional gendered experiences of mobility.

Research has consistently demonstrated that the long-term residential care (LTRC) frontline workforce encounters a range of serious health and safety hazards and risks that result in physical and psychological injury, illness, absenteeism, and related costs. Using the lens of feminist political economy, this dissertation explores the risks workers encounter on the frontlines of LTRC, how these workplace risks are shaped by broader social, economic, political, and historical factors, as well as the ways frontline workers resist, challenge, or shape the conditions of their work in this setting. My analysis of primary data is informed by interviews with 17 frontline workers working within for-profit, non-profit, and municipal LTRC facilities within Ontario and 2 key informants. Restructuring and reform of health and social care services under neoliberalism have profoundly transformed the character, funding, organization, and delivery of LTRC. These changes have serious implications for workforce configurations, the conditions of work and care, workplace health and safety, worker control over their labour, and capacities for worker resistance to the conditions of their work. Within the LTRC organizational hierarchy, frontline workers are of marginal status. The frontline workforce is composed predominately of women and increasingly marginalized immigrants and racialized groups, whose care labour on the frontlines is often naturalized, undervalued, and treated as unskilled and safe. This research provides evidence that restructuring and work reorganization processes, policies, and practices constitute a form of structural violence, which contribute to, intensify, and/or give rise to new sources of struggle, inequity, risk, violence, alienation, and exploitation on the everyday/everynight frontlines of LTRC.

Now in its seventh edition, Rethinking Canada presents compelling essays on the fascinating lives, struggles, and contributions of women in Canadian history. Reflecting an interdisciplinary approach, this comprehensive and engaging resources stresses the diversity of women's history and demonstrates the analytical richness of ongoing research in the field. Featuring insightful chapter introductions that provide scholarly and historical context for each reading, [the book] helps students gain a more nuanced understanding of women's experiences across Canads's history. --Publisher's description

Sarah Carter's "Imperial Plots: Women, Land, and the Spadework of British Colonialism on the Canadian Prairies" examines the goals, aspirations, and challenges met by women who sought land of their own. Supporters of British women homesteaders argued they would contribute to the "spade-work" of the Empire through their imperial plots, replacing foreign settlers and relieving Britain of its surplus women. Yet far into the twentieth century there was persistent opposition to the idea that women could or should farm: British women were to be exemplars of an idealized white femininity, not toiling in the fields. In Canada, heated debates about women farmers touched on issues of ethnicity, race, gender, class, and nation. Despite legal and cultural obstacles and discrimination, British women did acquire land as homesteaders, farmers, ranchers, and speculators on the Canadian prairies. They participated in the project of dispossessing Indigenous people. Their complicity was, however, ambiguous and restricted because they were excluded from the power and privileges of their male counterparts. Imperial Plots depicts the female farmers and ranchers of the prairies, from the Indigenous women agriculturalists of the Plains, to the land army women of the First World War. --Publisher's description

Over the past decade, Canada has experienced considerable growth in labour migration. Moreover, temporary labour migration has replaced permanent immigration as the primary means by which people enter Canada. Utilizing the rhetoric of maintaining competitiveness, Canadian employers and the state have ushered in an era of neoliberal migration alongside an agenda of austerity flowing from capitalist crisis. Labour markets have been restructured to render labour more flexible and precarious, and in Canada as in other high-income capitalist labour markets, employers are relying on migrant and immigrant workers as "unfree labour." This book explores labour migration to Canada and how public policies of temporary and guest worker programs function in the global context of work and capitalist restructuring. Contributors are directly engaged with the issues emerging from the influx of temporary foreign workers and Canada's "creeping economic apartheid." --Publisher's description

The article reviews the book, "Terrifying Muslims: Race and Labor in the South Asian Diaspora," by Junaid Rana.

The article reviews the book, "Leverage of the Weak: Labor and Environmental Movements in Taiwan and South Korea," by Hwa-Jen Liu.

The article reviews the book, "Building the Golden Gate Bridge," by Harvey Schwartz.

The article reviews the book, "Comparing Quebec and Ontario: Political Economy and Public Policy at the Turn of the Millennium," by Rodney Haddow.

Based on the life course perspective and the sociology of individuation, this article aims to examine the temporal processes at work in the decision of nurses to leave their jobs and the role played by different life contexts in guiding this decision. Based on a qualitative approach that sought to develop an in-depth understanding of the reasons why so many young nurses want to leave their jobs, we present four job-leaving pathways that account for the social dimensions involved in the nurses' decision to leave their jobs. The findings reveal that the nurses' decision to leave their jobs represents a complex process that involved various dimensions of their lives, and was closely tied to their quest for self-fulfillment through work and in other spheres of their lives. // À partir de l'approche des parcours de vie et de la sociologie de l'individuation, cet article propose d'examiner les processus temporels à l'oeuvre dans la décision de quitter son emploi et le rôle des différents contextes de vie dans l'orientation de ce processus. Une étude qualitative a été menée auprès d'infirmières et d'infirmières auxiliaires afin de comprendre « de l'intérieur », c'est-à-dire à partir de la perspective des acteurs, les raisons motivant autant de jeunes infirmières à vouloir quitter leur emploi. L'approche théorique retenue insiste sur l'importance de considérer l'interaction entre les différents contextes de vie d'un individu, l'environnement social dans lequel il évolue et les choix professionnels qu'il fait. Des entrevues de type récit de vie ont été menées au cours desquelles les infirmières ont été questionnées sur l'ensemble de leur trajectoire professionnelle et les événements de leur vie professionnelle, personnelle et familiale, qui, de leur point de vue, ont contribué à la décision de quitter leur emploi. Au total, 26 infirmières de moins de 35 ans ont été rencontrées. L'analyse des données a permis de dégager une typologie des parcours de départ structurée autour de trois principales dimensions : 1- l'aspect temporel des départs (à court ou à long terme); 2- l'évolution de l'expérience subjective de travail; et 3- la phase de la vie professionnelle ou personnelle au moment de la prise de décision. Les résultats démontrent que la décision de quitter se présente comme un processus qui se construit dans un laps de temps plus ou moins long et qui implique différentes dimensions de la vie des infirmières. Ainsi, deux axes de tensions à la source des départs ont été identifiés : 1- les tensions engendrées par un écart entre les attentes de réalisation de soi au travail et la réalité d'emploi; et 2- les tensions provoquées par un emploi qui limite les possibilités de se réaliser dans les autres domaines de la vie.

Based on focus group interviews of front line staff, this study explored the lived experiences of workers in the developmental services sector in Ontario. The workers were employed at non-profit organizations and provided a range of community and social services to people with developmental disabilities. The impact of government austerity exacerbated chronic problems facing workers in the sector. Common themes in the work experiences included an intensification of workloads, the degradation of services with the return of custodial care, more complex labour relations, and unique forms of solidarity that extended beyond traditional union models. The study demonstrates how workers strive to overcome the barriers to street-level advocacy.

This integrated article dissertation examines some of the new managerial practices that have emerged to handle cognitive capitalism’s ongoing need for creative, flexible labour power. The three articles included in this dissertation offer a glimpse into the widespread processes employed by management to regulate and discipline a workforce that must also be granted a degree of relative flexibility, creativity, and autonomy in order to be effective under post-Fordist conditions of production. The first chapter looks at the emergence of corporate improvisational training at the turn of the twenty-first century as an attempt to cultivate flexible and innovative workers, a move that ultimately succumbs to what Andre Spicer (2013) calls “organizational bullshit”—the deployment of cynical and self-serving discourse that functions to build confidence and legitimacy within workplaces where a clear sense of occupational purpose is lacking. Chapter two explores the recent trend of workplace mindfulness as a specific element of the now-prevalent 'wellness' discourses, which inevitably work to align workers' personal values with those of their employer. The final chapter involves an analysis of the working conditions of voice-over and motion capture actors in the video game industry and the processes of rationalization and neo-taylorization to which they are subjected.

The article reviews the book, "Solitudes of the Workplace: Women in Universities, edited by Elvi Whittaker.

This article reviews the book, "Building Global Labor Solidarity in a Time of Accelerating Globalization," by Kim Scipes.