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The article reviews the book, "Blanc de plomb. Histoire d’un poison légal," by Judith Rainhorn.

Proposals for a just transition for labour have been largely restricted to debates about transitions in coal regions. Yet a just transition for labour should apply to all industries. Alongside these debates, planning guidelines are in place to encourage the adoption of circular economy practices to address questions relating to material sustainability, especially in the context of the encroaching climate crisis. Surprisingly, few people have considered the implications of such changes for work and employment relationships. Unless a just transition is pursued, current inequalities in the housing construction industry are likely to intensify and remain embedded. The argument is that moves toward a circular economy in Australian housing construction require a just transition for the workforce. Such a transition must be planned and inclusive.

The article reviews the book, "From Printing to Streaming: Cultural Production inder Capitalism," by Michael Chanan.

Partial-load college faculty simultaneously occupy insider/outsider positions in their respective higher education institutions. How do they perceive the relationship between their employment status and their work as educators? In recent scholarship, it has been argued that part-time faculty occupy liminal positions as simultaneous professionals and precarious labourers in higher education. None of the literature attends to how part-time college faculty (a cohort that makes up 70%+ of Ontario’s college faculty) who specifically aspire to full-time teaching positions think about their work and professional identities, much less in the context of the province of Ontario, Canada. Through semi-structured and open-ended interviews with ten partial-load college faculty who aspire to full-time teaching positions across three colleges in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), this study asks faculty to reflect upon the relationship between their conditions of employment and their work as educators. How partial-load college faculty think about their work and professional identities has direct import for what continues to be the foundational mission, purview, and day-to-day activities of colleges – teaching and learning. Holland, Lachicotte, Skinner, and Cain’s (1998) identity theory provides the framework for enabling a nuanced analyses as to how partial-load college faculty think about, make sense of, and narrate their experiences in the liminal space of precarious professionals. The results of this study show that partial-load faculty are largely excluded from the pedagogical communities of their departments and institutions and that every aspect of their work as educators (curriculum development, professional development, and relationships with colleagues) is negotiated and filtered through their precarious status. This research sheds light on the centrality of partial-load college faculty on the enactment of curriculum in colleges as well as explores how various stakeholders can make meaningful change to address the professional goals and curricular inclusion of this significant teaching cohort.

The article reviews the book, "Construire l'économie postcapitaliste," by Audrey Laurin Lamothe, Frédéric Legault, and Simon Tremblay-Pepin.

Cette étude s’intéresse à la capacité des organisations syndicales à améliorer les conditions de travail de leurs membres en contexte d’austérité économique. Pour ce faire, nous nous intéressons au cas de la négociation 2014-2015 au sein du secteur public québécois et plus particulièrement à la négociation dans le secteur de l’Éducation primaire-secondaire. Proposant une approche d’analyse multiniveau et multidimensionnelle et mobilisant un devis qualitatif, nous souhaitons engager une réflexion sur la capacité des syndicats du secteur de l’éducation à répondre à la précarité dans ce secteur. La position que nous avançons dans cet article est que les syndicats n’ont pas été en mesure de saisir certaines opportunités leur permettant de renforcer leur pouvoir de force aux tables de négociation. Nos principaux résultats nous amènent à faire le constat que les structures centralisées n’ont pas bien servi le front commun lors de la négociation de 2015; la négociation inter et intraorganisationnelle s’est avérée difficile et peu efficace compte tenu des multiples réalités et enjeux et de la stratégie fortement centralisée du gouvernement. Nous avons aussi constaté que la précarité vécue et perçue par les membres du secteur de l’éducation est très spécifique au contexte et aux caractéristiques de l’emploi; une spécificité qui semble plus difficile à faire reconnaitre au sein de structures centralisées. Partant de la thèse du « syndicalisme fantôme » proposé par Desbiens (2020) et du pragmatisme syndical de Lemieux (2021), nous engageons une réflexion et proposons des pistes d’action de manière à favoriser un rapprochement entre les différents paliers d’action syndicale et d’arrimer plus solidement la praxis syndicale aux attentes des membres.

In this profoundly troubling and incisive look at the state of work and welfare in Canada, Jason Foster reveals the long, often-hidden process that has left our jobs less secure, our livelihoods more uncertain, and the pockets of Canada’s wealthy fatter than ever. This phenomenon, the rise of “precarious work,” touches the entire economy and contributes to levels of income inequality unseen since the early 20th century. Our world is less secure than it has been in generations. Gigs, Hustles, and Temps describes how we got here, and why. Jobs across the economy are increasingly more precarious, and they share similar characteristics: impermanence, little to no benefits, and no union representation. Uber, Starbucks and Amazon have led the way. Governments are contracting out more labour than ever before. Tech companies hire workers on “flexible” contracts without the prospect of long-term employment. Migrant workers, too, are working without a safety net, figuratively and literally. No matter where you fall on the socio-economic ladder, your life is probably more precarious than your parents’ once was. Foster offers insights into the many consequences of our increasingly precarious world. He also details some of the less obvious repercussions of precarious work, including its contribution to the crisis of mental and public health across Canada. Foster argues that the rise of precarious work is more a “return to normal” for capitalist economies. But there is a flip side: advances in worker welfare have come through solidarity, struggle, and negotiation with the forces currently promoting precarious work across Canada's economy. Things don’t have to be the way they are. Gigs, Hustles, and Temps is a comprehensive, accessible, and essential guidebook on the road to a better world. --Publisher's description

Unions in North America have a long history of financial support for charities, non-profits and other community-based organisations. However, very little research has been conducted into how much, to whom and why this financial support is provided. This article reports on a survey examining the financial donation patterns of unions in the Canadian province of Alberta. Alberta is chosen as the jurisdiction for the study as the provincial government recently enacted legislation (commonly referred to as Bill 32) that may force unions to reduce community-based donations, which would negatively impact those organisations and interfere with a core union function. The survey also examines how union financial support changes due to the implementation of this legislation. The study finds that a small but not insignificant percentage of union expenditures are devoted to community giving and that unions tend to donate to a narrow range of causes and organisations. It also finds that union responses to donation-dampening legislation were mixed, in part due to the politically controversial nature of the legislation.

Dans un contexte d’affaiblissement du dialogue social en général et de la légitimité des syndicats en particulier, nous proposons dans cet article de renouveler notre regard sur le binôme managers et syndicats à travers un changement de perspective. Dans le cadre d’une recherche qualitative approfondie menée au sein de l’industrie aéronautique française, nous nous sommes intéressée au dialogue informel quotidien entre les middle-managers et délégués syndicaux à l’échelle de l’atelier (Kochan, Katz et McKersie, 1994). Nous avons cherché à identifier la nature et les conditions du dialogue entre managers et syndicats dans leur activité quotidienne. Pour ancrer ce changement de perspective, nous utiliserons le concept de dialogue relationnel (Cunliffe et Eriksen, 2011) permettant de dépasser l’approche traditionnelle de dialogue social et pour en éprouver autrement l’effet. Nous montrerons alors que le dialogue relationnel, qui est basé sur une qualité relationnelle, une approche processuelle du dialogue et sa dimension polyphonique, permet aux middle-managers d’anticiper les tensions dans les équipes et d’améliorer leurs décisions managériales. Or, ce dialogue relationnel n’est pas perçu de manière positive par toute l’organisation, notamment les responsables des ressources humaines, qui tentent d’en réduire l’impact grâce à la mise en place d’outils de gestion empêchant les arbitrages plus informels issus du dialogue entre les managers et les syndicats. S’inscrivant dans l’évolution récente des recherches en RI s’enrichissant de cadres conceptuels venant des organizations studies, cet article contribue à tester le concept de dialogue relationnel non pas entre le manager et ses collaborateurs, mais avec des responsables syndicaux. Nous avons ainsi pu identifier des conditions organisationnelles de ce dialogue, ce qui n’avait pas encore été fait. En effet miroir, l’application du concept de dialogue relationnel dans une situation de relations professionnelles permet d’enrichir l’approche pluraliste en soulignant à la fois ses potentialités et l’importance des conditions nécessaires à ce type de dialogue.

« La grève d’Amoco de 1980, lors de laquelle s’est soulevée la population ouvrière de Hawkesbury, marque un temps fort de revendication franco-ontarienne, aujourd’hui pratiquement tombé dans l’oubli. Trois personnes qui ont, chacune à sa façon, pris part à la grève – Serge Denis, politologue, Richard Hudon, animateur social, et Jean Marc Dalpé, dramaturge et écrivain – replongent ici dans leurs souvenirs pour mettre en lumière la conjoncture sociopolitique qui a mené à la mobilisation des travailleurs et travailleuses de la région.Fruit d’un travail de terrain engagé, cet ouvrage, nourri par les témoignages et par de nombreux documents d’archives, démontre que la grève d’Amoco n’était pas une grève comme les autres. Microcosme du contexte sociohistorique dans lequel il s’inscrit, et bien qu’il consiste avant tout en une lutte ouvrière, le mouvement a permis à une communauté minoritaire doublement défavorisée, économiquement et politiquement, de s’affirmer en s’appropriant une nouvelle plateforme pour s’exprimer : le syndicalisme.Les combats de l’Ontario français pour la défense de ses droits se sont depuis déplacés vers les tribunaux, mais cette étude rappelle que sa culture politique s’est d’abord construite dans la rue et qu’il faut, à ce titre, assurer la transmission de ce pan de l’histoire populaire. »-- Résumé de l'éditeur

Community unionism is still contested in the literature, and its presence across various industries and union formations is often not concretely described. This thesis engages in an examination of community unionism within the literature and assesses its potential presence in Toronto’s Labour Community Services, an organization which provides administrative and organizational support to labour unions and community groups in the Greater Toronto Area. Interviews with LCS organizers and staff members and other Toronto labour activists are assessed against common depictions of community unionism within the literature to determine if LCS is engaged in community unionism, or perhaps some other organizational strategies or philosophies. Interviews demonstrated a clear commitment to community building and deepened ties between the labour movement and various formations of community across Toronto and surrounding regions. Interviews also reveal the state of union-community resources, the barriers commonly experienced in this form of organizing, and how organizers and staff members perceive their role in the broader labour movement. Interviews with key informants reveal a series of strategies and choices which shape how Labour Community Services operates. Ultimately, Labour Community Services does not engage in community unionism as a whole practice, but rather utilizes several strategies and operative choices that share common ground with community unionism. A byproduct of these strategic choices is the creation of forms of community unionism between both the labour unions and community groups that LCS frequently works with.

The article reviews the book, "The Origin and Dynamics of Inequality: Sex, Politics and Ideology," by Jon Wisman.

Une meilleure pollinisation croisée entre l’économie du travail et les relations industrielles conduirait à des gains mutuels. Le présent article s’articule autour de critiques courantes de l’économie du travail qui sont illustrées par des exemples tirés des relations industrielles. Ces critiques, ainsi que leurs principes sous-jacents, expliquent souvent d’importants concepts des relations industrielles et apportent par le fait- même des connaissances susceptibles d’enrichir les réflexions en économie du travail. L’intention de cet article est d’avoir un regard prospectif pour faire avancer la réflexion théorique et empirique sur les aspects actuels et futurs du travail et de l’emploi.

Mutual gains can be made through greater cross-pollination between labour economics and industrial relations. The paper is organized around common criticisms of labour economics, with examples from industrial relations. Such criticisms, and their underlying principles, often explain important concepts in industrial relations, which can provide insights that may enhance labour economics. The intent here is to apply a forward-looking lens to advance theoretical and empirical reflection on current and future aspects of work and employment.

The article reviews the book, "Making and Breaking Settler Space: Five Centuries of Colonization in North America," by Adam J. Barker.

This article traces the definition and treatment of “vulnerable workers” within the province of Ontario’s regulation of employment standards over a fourteen-year period. An examination of the government’s discourse and its enforcement and legislative history reveals significant shifts and inconsistencies between the government’s claims and its enforcement practices. These shifts and inconsistencies are understood within a political economic analysis of “Third Way” employment policies, competing liberal ideologies, shifting political-economic conditions and institutional legacies. The analysis contributes to a cross-national literature exploring the inadequacies of employment standards enforcement in liberal market economies while at the same time identifying opportunities for change within the different “varieties of liberalism” exhibited within Third Way regimes.

This report calls on the provincial government to work with school divisions, unions, and the ministry of education to equalize wages for educational support staff across the province. Pay disparities are not present for teachers across the province. The Manitoba government, which controls all significant funding sources in our school system, must play an active role in ensuring that these wage gaps are eliminated and ensure that rural school divisions operations are no longer subsidized by substandard wages paid to a predominately female workforce. Equal pay for equal work and work of equal value should be a priority for the new Manitoba government. --Website summary

Recent years have seen massive waves of migration from the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa to Europe and North America and a corresponding rise in anti-immigrant, far-right populism in host countries, placing the question of migration at the forefront of politics and social movements. Henaway seeks to understand these patterns through contextualizing global migration within a history of global capitalism, class formation, and the financialization of migration. As globalization intensifies, a neoliberal labour market forces workers around an unevenly developed world to compete for wages--not through foreign investment and outsourcing, but through an increasingly mobile working class. Henaway rejects the right-wing response of restricting or "managing" immigration through temporary worker programs and instead suggests that stopping a race to the bottom for all working people involves building solidarity with the struggles of these migrants for decent work and justice. Through examining the organizing strategies of migrant workers at giants like Amazon and Wal-Mart as well as discount retailers like Dollarama and Sports Direct, the immense power and agency of precarious workers in global companies like UBER or Airbnb, the successful resistance of taxi drivers or fast food workers around the world, and the contemporary mass labour movement organized by new unions and workers' centres, Henaway shows how migrant demands and strategies can help shape radical working class politics in North America and Europe. --Publisher's description

The arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020 triggered the introduction of public health measures that would close large sectors of the economy and send millions of workers home. In two short months, the unemployment rate reached 14.1 per cent—the highest level since 1936, in the midst of the Great Depression. In all, 2.7 million workers lost their job outright, while another 2.2 million lost all or half of their working hours. Many more would be affected in the months ahead as the economy recovered in fits and starts. Canada, like countries around the world, quickly responded with a raft of income security tools and strategies to cope with the economic fallout. Programs such as the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) and its successor programs. There are few sources of information that document people’s experiences while on CERB. This research project has been designed to help fill this gap. Working with Abacus Data, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives conducted focus groups and an online survey of 1,500 Canadians to help better understand the program’s impact on recipients and to explore the role CERB played in shaping their decisions with respect to skills, education or training and the pursuit of new work opportunities during this period. The focus groupswere hosted in mid-September 2022 and the survey was fielded between Nov. 18 and 25, 2022. The focus groups surfaced and explored key issues for CERB recipients, information which, in turn, informed the content and design of our larger survey. CERB and other emergency benefit programs have ended, but there is still much to learn about the experience and its impact given current economic stresses and the pressing imperative to ensure public programs are recession ready. The introduction of emergency pandemic benefits offers a unique opportunity to examine important questions about Canada’s current income security safety net and how it works (or does not) to support individuals in their efforts to achieve greater economic security and enhanced well-being. --Website description

Four working-class Vancouver sisters, still reeling from the impact of World War I and the pandemic that stole their only brother, are scraping by but attempting to make the most of the exciting 1920s. Gin, Turpentine, Pennyroyal, Rue is a love story — but like all love stories, it’s complicated … Morag is pregnant; she loves her husband. Georgina can’t bear hers and dreams of getting an education. Harriet-Jean, still at home with her opium-addicted mother, is in love with a woman. Isla’s pregnant too — and in love with her sister’s husband. Only one soul knows about Isla’s pregnancy, and it isn’t the father. When Isla resorts to a back-street abortion and nearly dies, Llewellyn becomes hellbent on revenge. But can revenge lead to anything but disaster for a man like Llew — a policeman tangled up in running rum to Prohibition America? Gin, Turpentine, Pennyroyal, Rue is immersed in the complex political and social realities of the 1920s and, not-so ironically, of the 2020s: love, sex, desire, police corruption, abortion, addiction, and women wanting more. Beautifully written, with a loveable cast of characters, this novel is a tender account of love that cannot be acknowledged, of loss and regret, risk and defiance, abiding friendship, and the powerful bonds of chosen family. --Publisher's description