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Every year, 30,000 agricultural migrant workers arrive in Canada as part of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP), the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program and the Low Skill Pilot Project. Although the TFWP is intended to address short-term labour demands, most of these workers return to the same communities year after year, sometimes for more than 25 years. As a result, growing numbers of migrant farm workers are permanently temporary. The increased presence of temporary workers will most certainly have an impact on Canadian communities and workplaces for years to come. Is there a way to conceptualize integration in the context of these migration patterns? How does the TFWP fit into Canada’s multicultural landscape and its goals of integration and social cohesion? In this study, Jenna Hennebry draws on experience with agricultural workers to address some of these questions. The author uses empirical data, interviews and research on the situation in Ontario, the province with the largest number of agricultural migrants, to examine the degree of integration of migrant farm workers. She finds that their inclusion in the communities where they live and work is poor, despite laudable efforts by nongovernmental organizations, community groups and unions – notably the United Food and Commercial Workers Canada union, which has sponsored some unique transnational initiatives.

[H]istorian Craig Heron tells the story of Canada's workers from the mid-nineteenth century through to today, painting a vivid picture of key developments such as the birth of craft unionism, the breakthroughs of the fifties and sixties, and the setbacks of the early twenty-first century. This new edition has been completely updated, including a substantial new chapter that covers the period from 1995 to 2011. In this chapter, Heron describes the rise of globalization and the restructuring of the private sector that began in the nineties and continues today. The results have been catastrophic for Canadian working people as plants closed and union activities were curtailed. As the political right succeeded in dominating public debate during this period, workers suffered ever greater losses: fewer and more precarious jobs, rising unemployment, stagnating wages, and increases in poverty. Only with the crash of 2008 and the Occupy Wall Street movement has space for the political left and labour begun to open up once again. [This] is the definitive book for anyone who is interested in understanding the origins, achievements, and challenges of labour and social justice movements in Canada.--Publisher's description

Subjective career success has beneficial consequences on several individual and organizational outcomes. It is closely related to what people value as important at work, but maybe more difficult to achieve when they experience workplace discrimination. Using a sample of 300 women employees working in a large French company, we thus investigated the relationship between perceived gender discrimination, subjective career success and career anchors. We found that perceived gender discrimination was negatively related to subjective career success overall. However, the relationship between the two variables was moderated by career anchors. Some anchors (i.e. managerial, technical and lifestyle) enhanced the impact of perceived gender discrimination, while other anchors (i.e. security and autonomy) lessened it. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of these findings.

The global financial crisis beginning in 2008 resulted in a ballooning public debt and government efforts to constrain public expenditures. Responses to the financial crisis and its impact on human services in Ontario demonstrate the complex interactions across key actors -- employers, government, unions, and family advocates. The case explores the role of end-users, including families and people with developmental disabilities, as actors in the industrial relations system. At the strategic level, end-users have precipitated significant public policy changes, including the closure of large, state-run institutions. End-users have displaced agency managers as employers at the organizational level. Finally, the case shows how end-users have changed the nature of the work process itself, shifting direct support from custodial care to a model of individual and community development.

The article reviews the book, "Canadian Immigration: Economic Evidence for a Dynamic Policy Environment," edited by Ted McDonald, Elizabeth Ruddick, Arthur Sweetman, and Christopher Worswick.

The future of worker health and safety as a fundamental human right is dependent upon revitalizing labor rights in the working environment. A new global direction is needed to move the international norms and in turn national labor policy models away from market voluntarism and towards models that protect human rights in the working environment as first principles. What is needed is a foundational dialog on the boundaries of labor rights as they relate to the working environment because the current international labor and human rights jurisprudence is lacking. --From author's conclusion

Background: This article introduces the idea of human rights to the topic of workers' compensation in the United States. It discusses what constitutes a human rights approach and explains how this approach conflicts with those policy ideas that have provided the foundation historically for workers' compensation in the United States. Methods: Using legal and historical research, key international labor and human rights standards on employment injury benefits and influential writings in the development of the U.S. workers' compensation system are cited. Results Workers' injury and illness compensation in the United States does not conform to basic international human rights norms. Conclusions: A comprehensive review of the U.S. workers' compensation system under international human rights standards is needed. Examples of policy changes are highlighted that would begin the process of moving workers' compensation into conformity with human rights standards.

“the 18 women and two men attending a course called History of Women in Canada” at the University of Toronto, wrote a Globe and Mail reporter in spring 1976,“could hardly wait to comment on their own experiences when instructor Sylvia Van Kirk introduced the subject of women’s rights in Canada.” The journalist, Constance Mungall, went on to describe the course—a new third-year seminar being offered by the (now defunct) interdisciplinary studies department at the University of Toronto—and the class (“After the vote: Did it make any difference?”) she had just observed. Sylvia had promoted discussion in the seminar by noting that “in the 1930s suffragette Nellie McClung had said the place of women in dating is ‘to wait… wait… wait’” and then asking if they thought it was still true today. Various students jumped in with their opinion and “the consensus was that it’s still the same and it’s hypocritical.” Mungall had attended the class as the course was nearing its end. By then, the seminar had covered a series of topics that would become standard fare for survey courses in Canadian women’s history, including Native women in the fur trade (a topic that, of course, Sylvia’s own research had helped make possible), white settler pioneers, and women in education, medicine, waged work, and moral and political reform movements. But these were also early days for women’s history and Sylvia was drawing on limited resources—still convincing people of the value of the field—and introducing little known historical female. --Introduction

This dissertation examines the intersection of gender, employment law and public health policies through an analysis of the federal government's efforts to regulate the work/leisure relationship. The study asks how and why, despite over 50 years of state interventions to regulate leisure and healthy lifestyle, concerns about 'work-life balance' have surfaced in labour policy arenas in recent years. The study builds a feminist political economy framework for understanding changes in policy developments over time. I use the concepts of social reproduction and time- and work-discipline as lenses with which to probe the relationship between the changing temporal dimensions of paid and unpaid work and efforts to manage the new realities of the labour market through the institutions of the state. The dissertation considers how the changes in the gendered organization of social reproduction, the nature and regulation of employment, and the power of organized labour to advocate on behalf of workers have influenced the types of policies used to manage the work/life interface. The empirical dimension of this study traces the emergence of a framework for regulating social reproduction through state-led management of the work/life relationship. Following the evolution of such frameworks through federal policy debates, policy papers and program materials, I trace the continuities and changes in dominant leisure discourses and policy mechanisms through four phases of federal policy development: early fitness policies (pre-1960); ParticipACTION (1960 to early 1970s); employee fitness experiments (mid-1970s to 1990); and the Work/Life Balance Strategy (1990s to mid-2000s). The central argument put forward in this dissertation is that the gender- neutral and individualized framework for regulating the healthy reproduction of workers, developed in Canadian law and policy since the 1950s, has produced highly gendered outcomes through its failure to address the changing dynamics of work and family life. By continuing to uphold the notion of a worker 'unencumbered' by familial and household responsibilities, 'new' work-life balance policies exacerbate the tensions between paid and unpaid work and contribute to the ongoing marginalization of women in the labour market.

The article reviews the book, "When the State Trembled: How A.J. Andrews and the Citizens' Committee Broke the Winnipeg General Strike," by Reinhold Kramer and Tom Mitchell.

La théorie de l’action raisonnée et les modèles du roulement volontaire ont toujours considéré l’intention de quitter son emploi pour un autre employeur comme le meilleur prédicteur du roulement de personnel. Cependant, dans les faits, les employés disposent de deux autres options, à savoir progresser vers un autre emploi au sein de leur entreprise (roulement interne) ou encore rester dans leur emploi actuel pour une certaine période. Dans une perspective de prévention du roulement, la recherche aurait avantage à identifier des profils d’intentions en fonction de ces trois options. La présente étude vise à vérifier si les employés présentent des profils d’intentions différents et si leur satisfaction au travail, leurs comportements de recherche d’emploi et les taux de roulement volontaire et interne diffèrent selon ces profils.L’analyse des résultats recueillis auprès de 434 agents issus de trois centres d’appels suggère l’existence de quatre profils d’intentions à peu près équivalents en nombre : (1) rester dans l’emploi actuel (forte intention de rester dans l’emploi actuel, faible intention de progresser à l’interne et faible intention de quitter à l’externe); (2) rester en attendant de progresser (forte intention de rester dans l’emploi actuel, mais forte intention de progresser à l’interne et faible intention de quitter à l’externe); (3) priorité à la progression (faible intention de rester dans l’emploi actuel, forte intention de progresser à l’interne et faible intention de quitter à l’externe); (4) priorité à la mobilité (faible intention de rester dans l’emploi actuel, forte intention de progresser à l’interne et de quitter à l’externe).Les résultats de l’étude montrent que ces quatre profils d’intentions présentent des niveaux de satisfaction au travail et des comportements de recherche d’emploi différents. De même, les taux de roulement volontaire du personnel et le taux de roulement interne, mesurés un an plus tard, diffèrent selon les profils d’intentions. // Studies of public administration question more and more the idea of convergence toward a single model of reform and many challenge the existence of a coherent set of policies and practices subsumed under the label New Public Management. There does exist, however, a growing consensus that reform has generally meant a degradation of working conditions for public sector employees. The study contributes to this body of knowledge by demonstrating the variability of restructuring practices within a single public administration and the variability of outcomes for employees within the same reform framework. Observations and analysis are drawn from a study of the implementation of a Modernization Plan set in motion in 2004 by the provincial liberal government. First, the results allow the researchers to identify six configurations ranging from a quasi status quo. Second, their research shows also that these diverse configurations led to differentiated results for public sector workers.

The article reviews the book, "Histoire des relations du travail dans la construction au Québec," by Louis Delagrave.

Contemporary research on immigrant economic integration identifies growing economic disadvantages faced by immigrants and probes sources of the disadvantages by focusing on immigrants' pre-migration and ascriptive characteristics. However, little empirical evaluation exists on how immigrants overcome their initial economic disadvantages over time. This dissertation departs from previous research by studying the roles of two post-migration factors - schooling (formal education and language training) and the employment of female spouses - in the exits from low wages and low family income (poverty) among recent immigrants. The analysis of the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC) - a three-wave survey of immigrants who arrived in Canada in 2000-2001 - produces three main findings. First, investing in host country formal education is beneficial for the economic advancement of new immigrants - especially highly educated ones. This finding confirms the role of skill upgrading programs for adult immigrants as an effective immigrant settlement policy, given that the majority of recent immigrants have postsecondary education but that their initial economic hardships are growing. Second, the benefits of English/French language lessons are real. This finding counters a common criticism that language lessons for adult new immigrants, which are often funded by the governments, are not helpful. Indeed, standard logistic regression analysis of the LSIC data shows that immigrants who enrolled in language lessons have no advantage in exiting poverty or low wages. However, the bivariate probit model demonstrates that this is because unmeasured characteristics of the language lesson participants confound the true benefit of language lessons. Third, this dissertation research highlights the role immigrant women play in lifting their families out of poverty when they work. This finding has an implication particularly for women of Arab and Middle Eastern origins as their notably lower labour force participation rates explain much of their high poverty rates.

The rise of the New Economy has restructured work, necessitated changing skills requirements, as well as spurred new training needs amongst employees. Such new skills and training needs are prerequisites to survive and thrive in the New Economy. Importantly, these skills and training are also prerequisites for upward mobility in a system of inequality. This paper illustrates the case of Malaysian tellers as the Malaysian banking industry operates in the New Economy. Although the New Economy and the emergence of the sales culture requires Malaysian tellers to be more knowledgeable, this paper argues that due to their unionised status and given their positions at the bottom rung of the occupational hierarchy, tellers in Malaysia are disadvantaged and often excluded in the process of training and knowledge acquisition.

The article reviews the book, "The New Mole: Paths of the Latin American Left," by Emir Sader.

The article reviews the book, "Derelict Paradise: Homelessness and Urban Development in Cleveland, Ohio," by Daniel R. Kerr.

The article reviews the book, "The Way of the Bachelor: Early Chinese Settlement in Manitoba," by Alison Marshall.

Cette thèse propose une analyse de la production de munitions au Canada durant la Deuxième Guerre mondiale dans le but d'exposer les politiques mises de l'avant par le gouvernement canadien pour répondre aux exigences matérielles de la guerre. Afin de combler les besoins du ministère de la Défense et de ses alliés, le ministère des Munitions et Approvisionnements réussit un tour de force en transformant une industrie munitionnaire insignifiante en un vaste programme qui employait plus de 103 000 personnes à son apogée. L'analyse des politiques à l'origine de cette production montre que le gouvernement fédéral géra autant que possible sa contribution matérielle de manière à fournir une aide considérable à ses alliés tout en poursuivant ses objectifs de relance économique à long terme. Le Comité de guerre du Cabinet tenta également de limiter l'impact négatif de ses décisions sur la vie des Canadiens. La participation matérielle du Canada prit forme graduellement, restreinte par la volonté de limiter les dépenses militaires. Les projectiles ne figuraient pas parmi les priorités avant la chute de la France. À partir de l'automne 1940, les principaux ministères se montrèrent plus ouverts à la mise en place et au financement d'un vaste programme. Ils consolidèrent leur collaboration avec les gouvernements britannique et américain afin d'obtenir le soutien technique et financier nécessaire pour surpasser les faiblesses industrielles du pays, de manière à permettre une collaboration qui ne nuirait pas à long terme aux finances publiques. Ensuite, l'interventionnisme sans précédent pour stimuler ce secteur non traditionnel s'effectua, malgré l'ampleur des investissements, dans un esprit d'économie et mené par une volonté de ne pas disloquer inutilement les structures de l'économie civile. Le gouvernement misa sur une collaboration avec les entreprises compétentes qui dominaient déjà le marché. Les entrepreneurs jouèrent un rôle clé dans la stratégie fédérale de gestion des ressources humaines. L'élaboration d'une solution à la pénurie de travailleurs s'effectua autant que possible sans l'imposition de mesures coercitives, de manière à ne pas nuire à la relance de l'économie dans l'après-guerre et à ne pas saper le moral des citoyens. Le ministère des Munitions et Approvisionnements opta plutôt pour la mise en place d'un État-providence de guerre et d'un paternalisme industriel. Le secteur privé, appuyé par diverses initiatives du gouvernement fédéral, se devait d'imposer un encadrement strict du milieu de travail afin de maximiser la productivité, de diminuer l'absentéisme et de lutter contre les interruptions de production.

The article focuses on discrepancies between institutional stipulations for apprenticeship placement conditions in the Quebec Training for a Semiskilled Trade (TST) program in contrast to socio-environmental realities encountered by students in the workplace. An intervention research study was held in order to integrate Occupational Health and Safety concerns into the training program. The methodological frame used data triangulation, including document analysis, teacher and student interviews and workplace observation. Contrary to program stipulations, most students were guided by several coworkers during apprenticeships. Insufficient access to resources, however, has led to young workers encountering difficulties in getting assistance when needed. The traditional supervisor-apprentice partnership would be best revised to maximize the use of all valuable on-site resources and ensure students develop skills to stay healthy at work.

The article reviews the book, "Les nouvelles dimensions du politique : relations professionnelles et régulations sociales," edited by Laurent Duclos, Guy Groux and Olivier Mériaux.