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The article reviews and comments on the books "Killing for Coal: America’s Deadliest Labor War," by Thomas G. Andrews, "The Politics of Identity and Civil Society in Britain and Germany: Miners in the Ruhr and South Wales, 1890-1926," by Leighton S. James, and "Welsh Americans: A History of Assimilation in the Coalfields," by Ronald L. Lewis.

The article reviews the book, "The Crisis of the Twelfth Century: Power, Lordship, and the Origins of European Government," by Thomas N. Bisson.

Chartrand - Le Malcommode, c’est une biographie du syndicaliste Michel Chartrand. C’est l’histoire d’un homme qui a fait le vœu d’une vie : défendre la justice sociale et porter cette cause à l’agenda des priorités de notre société. Tout en traçant le portrait de Chartrand, Chartrand, Le Malcommode, rendra compte de son influence considérable sur des gens venus d'horizons aussi différents que Gilles Vigneault, Luc Picard, Francine Lalonde ou Françoise David. Chartrand, Le Malcommode, c’est aussi l’histoire d’amour d’un peuple avec la liberté d’expression. Au cœur de la vie de Chartrand, il y a les mots justice et indignation. L’injustice lui a donné la colère, et la colère lui a donné la parole. Le cynisme et la démagogie des boss lui inspirèrent les qualités oratoires de ses discours publics et lui assurèrent son succès populaire. Chartrand, Le Malcommode, c’est enfin une vision d’auteur, qui s’interroge sur ce qu’il reste aujourd’hui des mouvements ouvriers et des enjeux oubliés. C’est un réalisateur qui cherche à savoir ce qui reste de la gauche, des coups de matraques, des assemblées monstres et des coups de gueules des chefs malcommodes? Serait-ce que les revendications d’autrefois ont été si bien entendues qu’elles n’ont plus lieu d’être ou est-ce que les révolutionnaires ont perdu la bataille? Et toutes ces luttes, tous ces combats, c’était pour quoi faire au juste? --PVP Media

The article reviews the book, "Power in Coalition: Strategies for Strong Unions and Social Change," by Amanda Tattersall.

This paper reports on research into the attitudes of mainstream New Zealand employers to collective bargaining, and its union agents, in New Zealand. Despite a legislative environment supportive of collective bargaining the process has been in substantial decline in New Zealand for 20 years, notably in the private sector. A series of national surveys found that employers indicated a strong preference for individual and workplace based bargaining consistent with a shift toward more Unitarist perspectives established post-1990. Furthermore, employers consistently argued that collective bargaining and its union agents, offered little real benefit to workplaces or employment relationships. This was the case even where those employers were actively engaged in, and had a long history of, collective bargaining with unions. Overall, these results suggest that improvements in private sector collective bargaining density are unlikely.

This case study explores a union organizing drive that revolved in large part around a group of temporary foreign workers. The impact of this group of workers on the union’s organizing strategy and the implications of the workers’ limited residence and labour rights are examined. This article also considers the factors that appeared to make the Justice for Janitors organizing model effective in this case as well as the potential risks associated with this approach.

The long view of New Brunswick history over the past century shows us glimpses of a vigorous tradition of social reform, much of it driven by the activism of organized labour. The New Brunswick Federation of Labour, established in 1913, was a major force in this history. The Federation played a leading part in the achievement of labour standards such as workmen’s compensation (1918) and subsequently in the enactment of laws to protect the right to union membership and collective bargaining. In pursuing these and other objectives, the province’s labour organizations have contributed to traditions of social democracy that are too easily overlooked in contemporary debates in New Brunswick. This essay sheds light on that important history, and why organized labour still matters in the province.

[E]xplores the ways in which several of Canada’s women journalists, broadcasters, and other media workers reached well beyond the glory of their personal bylines to advocate for the most controversial women’s rights of their eras. To do so, some of them adopted conventional feminine identities, while others refused to conform altogether, openly and defiantly challenging the gender expectations of their day. The book consists of a series of case studies of the women in question as they grappled with the concerns close to their hearts: higher education for women, healthy dress reforms, the vote, equal opportunities at work, abortion, lesbianism, and Aboriginal women’s rights. Their media reflected their respective eras: intellectual magazines, daily and weekly newspapers, radio, feminist public relations, alternative women’s periodicals, and documentary film made for television. --Publisher's description

Globalization, Labor, and the Transformation of Work: Readings for Seeking a Competitive Advantage in an Increasingly Global Economy, edited by Jonathan H. Westover, is reviewed.

Working Bodies: Interactive Service Employment and Workplace Identities, by Linda McDowell, is reviewed.

Ce texte met en contexte l’usage du concept de précarité au Québec. Celui-ci a surtout été utilisé parmi beaucoup d’autres pour décrire la situation des jeunes au moment de la crise de l’emploi des décennies 1970 et 1980. Il a parfois contribué, par son attribution à l’ensemble des jeunes, à laisser les plus vulnérables dans l’ombre et à amplifier l’effet du travail atypique sur l’avenir de toute une génération. Un usage plus modéré du concept s’est imposé progressivement en présence de faits plus justement vérifiés. Sa force de persuasion a pu susciter des stratégies tant individuelles que collectives en faveur des jeunes. Ce retour dans le temps a permis de montrer que les jeunes sont sensibles à la conjoncture mais n’en restent pas pour autant les victimes. Est-ce à cause du type d’État (de Gøsta Esping-Anderson, évoqué par Mircea Vultur) que le concept n’a eu qu’une importance relative au Québec ? La question se pose-t-elle dans une approche pragmatique du changement ?

A leading textbook in industrial relations at the university level, this book is valuable both as a primary and as a supplementary text for students of industrial relations, sociology, labour studies, economics and management programs. The book contains highly accessible coverage of conventional topic areas, including the history of industrial relations, contemporary employer practices, labour unions, labour law, collective bargaining, and contract administration. Yet it also includes coverage of broader economic and social issues relevant to the study of labour and employment relations in both the union and non-union sectors. Readers are thus able not only to develop a strong practical knowledge of Canadian industrial relations, but also to ground this knowledge in a deeper understanding of these relations and the broader issues and debates that surround them. This latest edition incorporates up-to-date statistics relevant to the study of industrial relations (e.g., strike activity, union membership, income inequality) as well as recent developments in the literature. It also streamlines the previous edition. The chapters on management practices and the effects of high performance practices have been merged and edited down, as have the chapters on contemporary developments and contemporary alternatives. --Publisher's description. Contents: Foundations: concepts, issues, and debates -- The broader debate: three theses on the nature and development of industrial relations, the economy, and society -- Understanding labour-management relations -- Work and industrial relations in historical perspective -- Contemporary management practices -- Understanding and explaining management -- Labour unions as institutions -- Labour unions as organizations -- The role of the state -- Understanding the state -- Labour law: the regulation of labour-management relations -- Collective bargaining: structure, process, and outcomes -- Strikes and dispute resolution -- The grievance and grievance arbitration processes -- The collective agreement: content and issues -- Contemporary problems, challenges, and alternatives. Includes bibliographical references (p. [431]-452) and index.

Many Canadians believe that immigrants steal jobs away from qualified Canadians, abuse the healthcare system and refuse to participate in Canadian culture. In About Canada: Immigration, Gogia and Slade challenge these myths with a thorough investigation of the realities of immigrating to Canada. Examining historical immigration policies, the authors note that these policies were always fundamentally racist, favouring whites, unless hard labourers were needed. Although current policies are no longer explicitly racist, they do continue to favour certain kinds of applicants. Many recent immigrants to Canada are highly trained and educated professionals, and yet few of them, contrary to the myth, find work in their area of expertise. Despite the fact that these experts could contribute significantly to Canadian society, deeply ingrained racism, suspicion and fear keep immigrants out of these jobs. On the other hand, Canada also requires construction workers, nannies and agricultural workers — but few immigrants who do this work qualify for citizenship. About Canada: Immigration argues that we need to move beyond the myths and build an immigration policy that meets the needs of Canadian society. --Publisher's description. Contents: Introduction -- Immigration: a critical analysis -- Evolution of immigration policy: learning about the past to understand the present -- Immigration policy and practices: the mechanics of migration -- Immigrants and the labour market: devaluation, frustration and downward mobility -- Reception party: the settlement process for immigrants -- Revolving door: temporary workers in Canada -- Under the surface: Canada's hidden labour force -- Coming to a better place? Not always a happy ending.

This article explores the relationship between precarious employment and precarious migrant legal status. Original research on immigrant workers' employment experiences in Toronto examines the effects of several measures including human capital, network, labor market variables, and a change in legal status variable on job precarity as measured by an eight-indicator Index of Precarious Work (IPW). Precarious legal status has a long-lasting, negative effect on job precarity; both respondents who entered and remained in a precarious migratory status and those who shifted to secure status were more likely to remain in precarious work compared to respondents who entered with and remained in a secure status. This leaves no doubt that migrant-worker insecurity and vulnerability stem not only from having ‘irregular’ status. We introduce the notion of a work–citizenship matrix to capture the ways in which the precariousness of legal status and work intersect in the new economy. People and entire groups transition through intersecting work–citizenship insecurities, where prior locations have the potential to exert long-term effects, transitions continue to occur indefinitely over the life-course, and gains on one front are not always matched on others.

The State of Working America 2008/2009, by Jared Bernstein, Lawrence Mishel and Heidi Shierholz, is reviewed.

This article brings further historical and international perspective to the “labor rights as human rights” debate. It particularly contends that these perspectives need to be explored further in order to appreciate the extent to which the definitions and political implications of key ideologies behind labor and human rights activism are flexible and dependent on their context. It explores Canada in the 1940s and early 1950s, when there was major activity on the labor and human rights fronts. Although many Canadian organizations, legal systems, and campaigns were modeled on—or formally affiliated with—American ones in these years, the progress of labor and human rights activism followed a distinct path, and particularly unfolded at a distinct pace. This distinct pace, the relatively small size of ethnic and racialized minority populations, the basic political and legal structure, and rise of a leftist third party in the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation all helped labor and human rights activism fit together comfortably to a notable extent in Canada. This article will particularly show why the relationship between human rights and labor was significantly less fraught with potential downsides for Canadian labor leaders. It also highlights another important impact of context: the particular combination of conditions and forces in Canada produced a number of unexpected results.

The article reviews the book, "In the Province of History: The Making of the Public Past in 20th-Century Nova Scotia," by Ian McKay and Robin Bates.

The article reviews the book "Global Cities at Work: New Migrant Divisions of Labour," by Jane Will, Kavita Datta, Yarra Evans, Joanna Herbert, Jon May, and Cathy McIlwaine.

The article reviews the book, "Those Who Work, Those Who Don't: Poverty, Morality and Family in Rural America," by Jennifer Sherman.