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Ce livre retrace en 15 chapitres le parcours de l'historien Guy Gaudreau qui a choisi les textes les plus représentatifs de sa carrière. --Quatrième de couverture

The renowned Harry Glasbeek unpacks how law has been used to ensure that workers' aspirations are kept in check. Law at Work uncovers how the legal system, through its structures and mechanisms, legitimizes and reinforces the exploitation of workers. Using historic and contemporary examples, Glasbeek illustrates how conscious manipulations of law are part and parcel of how law protects capitalists at the expense of workers. He proves how the very laws designed to safeguard rights and freedoms often act as invisible shackles, compelling readers to reflect on their own struggles as they navigate a world where the legal system fails to serve their interests. These manipulations are made to look innocent because the underlying structures and ideology which give rise to specific rules are not challenged or challengeable. This thought-provoking book is an indispensable resource for those seeking to understand the hidden dynamics of worker oppression, empowering readers to question prevailing narratives and envision a future where the law truly serves the interests of all. -- Publisher's description

This dissertation provides the first historical overview of the Confederation of Canadian Unions (CCU) and its affiliates from 1969 to 1992. Formed at the end of the 1960s as a foil to the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC), the CCU sought to nationalize the Canadian labour movement by fomenting the formation of Canadian unions. As a left-nationalist labour body, the CCU charged the CLC with conservatism, complacency, and collaboration in its approach to organizing and collective bargaining. Chief among the CCU’s concerns was the domination of American international unions in the CLC. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, the CCU organized workplaces in unorganized industries, bringing a host of immigrant women into the ranks of the Canadian labour movement, while establishing large bargaining units in industries primarily organized by American unions. At the same time, the CCU forwarded a left-nationalist politics inspired by the New Canadian Political Economy (NCPE) that criticized Canada’s economic, political, and cultural dependence on the United States, and used this politics to mobilize its members against continental free trade and towards a nationalized, socialized home economy. The CCU and its affiliates also formed important linkages with the New Left and the women’s movement during these decades and proved itself a militant actor in confrontations with the state and industrial law. Several CCU affiliates eventually merged with the Canadian Autoworkers (CAW) in the 1990s in the wake of extensive economic restructuring and corresponding changes in the Canadian labour movement. The dissertation contributes to the scholarship on industrial relations, industrial legality, and nationalism by providing a historical case study of a left-nationalist labour institution that simultaneously challenged and was shaped by federal and provincial law. It provides a critical institutionalist perspective on union federations that accounts for the law as a contested terrain, and nationalism as a historically contingent politics.

The article reviews and comments on the books, "Harry Bridges: Labor Radical, Labor Legend" by Robert W. Cherny, "Labor under Siege: Big Bob McEllrath and the ILWU's Fight for Organized Labor in an Anti-Union Era," by Harvey Schwartz with Ronald Magden, "Under the Iron Heel: The Wobblies and the Capitalist War on Radical Workers," by Ahmed White.

The article reviews the book, "Building That Bright Future: Soviet Karelia in the Life Writing of Finnish North Americans," by Samira Saramo.

This article examines the interest representation of European Employers’ Organizations (EEOs) in the European Union (EU). Previous literature in employment relations focused on employer activity in social dialogue, while literature in political science focused on political representation and how business associations lobby EU political institutions. Going beyond this dualism in the literature, this article suggests that gaining a full understanding of the interest representation of European Employers Organizations requires analyzing interactions between the political and social dialogue arenas. We argue that EEOs gain legitimacy through participating in social dialogue to facilitate their primary focus of political interest representation. Strategic and institutional perspectives on legitimacy provide insights into how EEOs respond to challenges and manage their environment within the EU to pursue their interests.

The article reviews the book, "The Real Living Wage: Civil Regulation and the Employment Relationship," by Edmund Heery, Deborah Hann, and David Nash

Le concept de marque employeur (ME) suppose de communiquer une promesse d’emploi unique et désirable afin d’attirer puis fidéliser. La consistance de la ME dans le temps (perçue par les candidats puis vécue par les salariés) conditionnerait la fidélité. Pourtant, de récents travaux démontrent que la ME n’est pas consistante dans le temps, sans que cela n’affecte négativement la fidélité. La recherche demeure relativement aveugle aux facteurs expliquant cette évolution et ses effets, soit ce qui se joue durant l’expérience du collaborateur (EMX). Le concept d’EMX, élusif et peu stabilisé, souffre d’un manque de clarté théorique et de modalités d’investigations pratiques. Cette étude étudie ainsi des récits expérientiels de 40 informants sur une année de contrat, afin de contribuer à une meilleure compréhension et appréhension pratique de l’EMX et d’en apprécier les effets sur la ME et la fidélité. Les résultats permettent de valider quatre propriétés structurantes de l’EMX, clarifiant le concept et guidant son investigation : interactionnelle, enracinée, indéfinie et source d’apprentissage. Cette dernière propriété semble jouer un rôle crucial dans l’évolution des perceptions de la ME observées, et expliquer leurs effets sur la fidélité.

Thousands of children and youth across the country took to the streets for two weeks in spring 1947 to protest a three-cent increase in the price of chocolate bars. The protest initially generated enthusiastic press coverage and had widespread popular support, but when the National Federation of Labor Youth (nfly), the Communist Party's youth organization, announced its support, anti-communists in the press and the community red-baited the protesters. The campaign quickly lost momentum, which anti-communists attributed to the presence of Communists but was more likely due to their own red-baiting attacks in the press. Some of these protests were spontaneous reactions to a 40 per cent increase in the price of candy bars, while others were led or inspired by nfly. Either way, the countrywide mobilization of thousands of children and youth marks a turning point in the history of Canada's left. Erupting in tandem with a nationwide strike of industrial workers and protests of activist consumers demanding greater economic security and a more responsive state, the children's chocolate bar protest provides a window on this critical moment in the class struggle. The attacks on this popular protest at the moment that the long run of community-based militancy was about to be demonized, delegitimated, and silenced by red-baiting marks a significant milestone in Canada's Cold War. In addition to adding the youngsters' challenge to capital and the state to the history of the popular left, the event contributes to the growing literature on children and youth engaged in political protest, while their creative protest strategies offer a youthful dimension to the study of performance activism.

This book deals with the Crown Employees Collective Bargaining Act and the Public Service Act, the statutes that primarily govern unionized and non-unionized employment and labour relations in the Ontario Public Service and Crown Agencies. This updated edition provides a full review of all sections, and all judicial and arbitral consideration, of both acts. It also discusses the unique treatment of the Crown and its employees in the Public Sector Labour Relations Transition Act and the Employment Standards Act. -- Publisher's description

Ce texte s’inscrit dans une perspective critique où, à la lumière des différentes évolutions et changements, le moment semble opportun pour appeler à un réexamen ou à un renouveau de la gestion des ressources humaines (Delbridge et Keenoy, 2010 ; Hallée, Taskin et Vincent, 2018). La Critical Human Resource Management est une posture qui remet en cause le discours managérial dominant et qui valorise les voix exclues de la réflexion en GRH (Delbridge et Keenoy, 2010). Ces préoccupations sont liées à une tradition de critique humaniste, notamment l’injustice sociale et la remise en question des systèmes sociaux et économiques que des entreprises servent et reproduisent (Adler, Forbes et Willmott, 2007). Les enjeux liés au genre, à l’inégalité, à la gouvernance, au pouvoir et à la domination font partie du questionnement (ibid., Lee Ashcraft, 2009). Nous avons mobilisé la théorie de critique de la justice sociale de Fraser où des enjeux de citoyenneté, de reconnaissance, de redistribution et de participation y sont notamment discutés (Fraser, 1989). Ces concepts, que nous associons à des pratiques de GRH, ont fait l’objet d’une recherche à partir d’emplois du care qui sont à prédominance féminine. L’un des problèmes fondamentaux de la dévalorisation du travail « dit » féminin repose sur l’idée que les activités professionnelles similaires aux divers types de travaux à domicile sont naturelles chez la femme et donc, issues de dispositions biologiques plutôt que de compétences acquises (Kymlicka, 1999). Nos résultats montrent que les disparités de traitement pour les emplois du care pourraient s’assimiler, dans les faits, à une exclusion déguisée, malgré des discours contraires. Les titulaires des emplois du care ne participent pas suffisamment à l’interaction sociale sur un même pied d’égalité, considérant les obstacles institutionnalisés formels et informels liés à la reconnaissance, à la redistribution et à la participation.

The article reviews the book, "Le Québec en mouvements : Continuité et renouvellement des pratiques militantes," by Pascale Dufour, Laurence Bherer, and Geneviève Pagé.

The Progressive Labour Agenda is intended to provide Manitoba policy makers with a set of clear policy measures to improve the conditions of work for Manitobans while promoting overall well-being in our province. These policy measures respond directly to issues in labour and employment such as the proliferation of low-wage work, gaps in employment standards and health and safety enforcement, declining private sector union coverage, and inequities experienced by women and migrant workers, among other issues. The policy options outlined in the Progressive Labour Agenda cover three major themes: 1) ensure access to unions and fair collective bargaining; 2) modernize labour legislation to close gaps in employment standards and improve conditions for non-unionized workers; and 3) improve workplace health and safety. These are ideas that are well supported by public policy research and that are actionable at the provincial level. --Website description

Indigenous doulas in Canada carry added responsibilities as they juggle with cultural and societal expectations to appropriately support their communities and extended relations. They not only face socioeconomic challenges as a result of doula care being excluded from the universal healthcare system, but also deal with the affective costs of caregiving. Through an Indigenous-centred intersectional lens, the idea of Indigenous doula work as exploitative labour is examined under four key areas: (1) the historical role of doulas in Indigenous communities; (2) colonial policies and processes that devalued Indigenous women; (3) colonial policies and processes that devalued birth workers, and; (4) challenges that Indigenous doulas face today. This study aims to provide context to the challenges faced by Indigenous doulas working within the dominant, Western medical system and confines of capitalism. The study concludes that the policies and processes that derived from these systems have led to the hardships imposed on Indigenous doulas, which reveal a need for policy solutions that recognize the value of Indigenous doulas in the healthcare system.

This dissertation establishes that work injury and injured workers are relatively neglected in Critical Disability Studies (CDS). A further observation is that CDS tends to avoid a class analysis of disability politics in favour of identitarian approaches. This research focuses on income security. Through a Marxist critical policy historiography, I compare workers’ compensation benefits and state-sponsored benefits for disabled people whose disabilities originated outside of the workplace in Ontario. I argue that the workers’ compensation program is superior to the state-sponsored program because of the class location and politics of the respective groups of people with disabilities seeking income security. The discussion also highlights some of the reasons for the missing injured worker in CDS. Specifically, injured workers experience disability as a loss worthy of compensation rather than a positive identity. Further, rather than viewing prevention measures as the erasure of disabled people, injured workers support the prevention of disability through occupational health and safety laws and workplace practices. By focusing on the political economy of each program, the historical narrative suggests that disability benefit programs in Ontario were developed less by moral suasion and more because of their role in capital accumulation. Although the argument holds for the early history of the two programs in their early history. the negative impact of neoliberalism on both workers’ compensation and the current benefits program in Ontario (the Ontario Disability Support Program) has created a convergence of interests between permanently impaired injured workers and other disabled people, underscoring the importance of including injured workers’ perspectives in CDS.

The article reviews the book, "Solidarity Beyond Bars: Unionizing Prison Labour," by Jordan House and Asaf Rashid.

We generally take for granted that everyone has the right to a say—and certainly a vote—in what our governments do. But in the workplaces that rule many of our waking hours, these democratic rights are largely absent. In a time of extreme inequality, deteriorating social cohesion and reduced trust in our institutions, why shouldn’t workers have more control over the firms they work in? Enabling employees to take more ownership and control in their working lives is a promising antidote. With advocacy from a broad coalition of supporters—including many business owners—the federal government has tabled legislation to create a new Employee Ownership Trust legal structure that makes it easier for business owners to sell firms to their employees. However, to tap the full potential of employee ownership, a much broader suite of policies is needed. This report examines what an ambitious public policy agenda would look like to unleash the promise of democratic employee ownership in Canada. --Website description

The article reviews the book, "El Golpe: US Labor, the CIA, and the Coup at Ford in Mexico," by Rob McKenzie and Patrick Dunne.

The article reviews the book, "A Field in Flux: Sixty Years of Industrial Relations," by Robert B. McKersie.

Annie Buller makes for an interesting case study of Canada’s World War II security state and how it functioned vis-à-vis the Communist Party of Canada and its allies. Her experiences speak to gender, party history, and broader elements of political policing, community responses, and confinement experiences. Like her life, her wartime encounters with the Canadian security state were concurrently like and different from those of other criminalized female and male activists at the time about whom we know more. Among the apprehended and incarcerated, female or male, Buller was somewhat of an anomaly and warrants special attention. Buller’s particular situation helps to shed light on lesser-understood elements of the Communist wartime carceral experience, including the lack of trust officials had in these processes at times to accomplish the intended repression and important details about efforts to free those incarcerated. Ultimately, Buller’s case and the movement to liberate her and the other incarcerated members of the party illustrate the power of grassroots activism in challenging oppressive systems.