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For nearly fifty years, Professor Harry Glasbeek has been at the forefront of legal scholars and public intellectuals challenging assumptions and understandings about the injustices embedded in the economic, social, political and legal orders of Western capitalist democracies. His writings and teachings have influenced generations of law students, academics and activists. [This book] brings together eleven incisive contributions from pre-eminent scholars across several disciplines activated by the same desire for democracy and justice that Glasbeek advances, showing how capitalism shapes the law and how the law protects capitalism. This collection foregrounds a class analysis of the laws responses to corporate killing, workplace violence, surveillance, worker resistance and income inequality, among other issues. --Publisher's description

The Canadian Labour Bibliography was an initiative of the Committee on Canadian Labour History in the 1970s. The initial efforts to create an annual reading list of publications dealing with Canadian labour topics led to the creation of The Labour Companion: a bibliography of Canadian labour history based on materials printed from 1950 to 1975. ...The enthusiasm that greeted The Labour Companion prompted Greg Kealey, then teaching at Dalhousie University, to obtain a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council grant for a much larger product – a comprehensive reading list of books, pamphlets, articles and theses pertinent to the Canadian labour experience (the labour movement, trade unions, living conditions, key legislation, etc.). The intent was to build on the 1980 bibliography and to catalogue the published record on the Canadian working class from earliest times to 1985. Items of more recent vintage have crept in, but no effort was made to deal comprehensively with the entire published record from the late 1980’s forward. To locate that material, researchers should consult Michael Lonardo’s Canadian Labour History Bibliography, an electronic compilation covering 1976 to 2009, found at Memorial University Library https://www.library.mun.ca/qeii/labour/ --Introduction

In an original and striking study of migration management in operation, Disrupting Deportability highlights obstacles confronting temporary migrant workers in Canada seeking to exercise their labor rights. Leah F. Vosko explores the effects of deportability on Mexican nationals participating in Canada's Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP). Vosko follows the decade-long legal and political struggle of a group of Mexican SAWP migrants in British Columbia to establish and maintain meaningful collective representation. Her case study reveals how modalities of deportability—such as termination without cause, blacklisting, and attrition—destabilize legally authorized temporary migrant agricultural workers. Through this detailed exposé, Disrupting Deportability concludes that despite the formal commitments to human, social, and civil rights to which migration management ostensibly aspires, the design and administration of this "model" temporary migrant work program produces conditions of deportability, making the threat possibility of removal ever-present. --Publisher's description

Few occurrences in modern times have produced the social upheaval, fear, and hatred that were seen during the Red Scare of 1919. Few events have brought forth such a frenzy of mob action and intolerance, or can match the excitement and drama. One of life's coincidences led me to study one of the manifestations of the Red Scare: the trials that grew out of the Winnipeg General Strike of 1919. Their prominent place in Manitoba's legal history has made them deserving of the title "The Great Canadian Sedition Trials." --From author's prologue

When the "Kirkland Lake gals of 1941" begin to share their story with a present-day audience, a siren sounds and they soon find themselves pulled right back into the fateful winter of 1941-42. There, they gather again at the mine-head, waiting for word on the men trapped underground, as their fear and rage builds. When the husband of one of the women is badly injured, their desire to help her quickly leads them into a much larger campaign to help all the families they can. Before long, they've become the heart and soul of a large-scale union-organizing drive that is fuelled by their sheer will - and sometimes giddy enthusiasm - but that is also put to the test by their own inexperience, a bitter strike, and the brutal force of the powers-that-be. --Publisher's description

The inside story of how two important Canadian unions decided to create a new kind of union with new ways of fighting for worker's rights In the fall of 2011 the leaders of two of the biggest Canadian unions, Canadian Auto Workers union (CAW) President Ken Lewenza and Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada (CEP) President Dave Coles, found common ground. The labour movement was in crisis. They faced hostile governments, union busting corporations, and declining membership. Something drastic needed to be done. Fred Wilson was an insider in the process by which the leaders of these two large organizations found a way to create a new kind of union, one that was more democratic, more inclusive, and more powerful. Two years later, a new union with a new name was founded. From its inception, Unifor has been a source of optimism and inspiration that a fairer, more secure future can be won for working people, and that unions can adapt to changing times and remain a relevant voice for workplace and social justice. This book describes how this came about. --Publisher's description

Pierre Elliott Trudeau – radical progressive or unavowed socialist? Christo Aivalis argues that although Trudeau found key influences and friendships on the left, he was in fact a consistently classic liberal, driven by individualist, capitalist principles. Trudeau’s legacy is still divisive. Most scholars portray Trudeau’s ties to unions and the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation as either evidence of communist affinities or as being at the root of his reputation as the champion of a progressive, modern Canada. The Constant Liberal traces the charismatic politician’s relationship with left and labour movements throughout his career. Trudeau worked with leftists in the 1950s to oppose right-wing Quebec premier Maurice Duplessis but against them as prime minister when workers and progressives were seen as obstacles to higher corporate profit margins. While numerous biographies have noted the impact of Trudeau’s engagement with the left on his intellectual and political development, this comprehensive analysis is the first to showcase the interplay between liberalism and democratic socialism that defined his world view – and shaped his effective use of power.The Constant Liberal suggests that Trudeau’s leftist activity was not so much a call for social democracy as a warning to fellow liberals that lack of reform could undermine liberal-capitalist social relations. Historians, political scientists, and political historians are the primary audience for this book, but it will also find readers among scholars of political economy, economics, industrial relations, and Canadian studies. It will appeal broadly to those interested in the life and thinking of Pierre Elliott Trudeau, the Canadian social democratic left, and liberalism/neo-liberalism. --Publisher's description

How does the current labour market training system function and whose interests does it serve? In this introductory textbook, Bob Barnetson wades into the debate between workers and employers, and governments and economists to investigate the ways in which labour power is produced and reproduced in Canadian society. After sifting through the facts and interpretations of social scientists and government policymakers, Barnetson interrogates the training system through analysis of the political and economic forces that constitute modern Canada. This book not only provides students of Canada’s division of labour with a general introduction to the main facets of labour-market training—including skills development, post-secondary and community education, and workplace training—but also encourages students to think critically about the relationship between training systems and the ideologies that support them. --Publisher's description.

Cet ouvrage réunit les actes du colloque tenu à Montréal le 11 mai 2017 dans le cadre du congrès de l'Association francophone pour le savoir (ACFAS) sous le thème «Régulation sociale et juridique : quel avenir pour le régime des décrets de convention collective au Québec ??». Il fait le point sur ce régime en vigueur depuis 1934 et régi par la Loi sur les décrets de convention collective. Le livre comprend deux parties. La première, qui porte sur les décrets et les acteurs sociaux, présente un état des lieux aussi bien au plan historique qu'en termes d'expériences très actuelles, éprouvées par les grandes organisations patronales et syndicales. La seconde partie propose un regard vers le futur et met en lumière certaines voies et hypothèses de changements susceptibles de bonifier le régime juridique. --Publisher's description

The labourers at the heart of this study built the canals and railways undertaken as public works by the colonial governments of British North America and the federal government of Canada between 1841 and 1882. Ruth Bleasdale's fascinating journey into the little-known lives of these labourers and their families reveals how capital, labour and the state came together to build the transportation infrastructure that linked colonies and united an emerging nation. Combining census and community records, government documents, and newspaper archives Bleasdale elucidates the ways in which successive governments and branches of the state intervened between labour and capital and in labourers' lives. Case studies capture the remarkable diversity across regions and time in a labour force drawn from local and international labour markets. The stories here illuminate the ways in which men and women experienced the emergence of industrial capitalism and the complex ties which bound them to local and transnational communities. Rough Work is an accessibly written yet rigorous study of the galvanization of a major segment of Canada's labour force over four decades of social and economic transformation. --Publisher's description

Beginning in the eighteenth century, an increasing number of Irish people sought the better life that Ontario and Quebec offered. Set free from the stifling economic and social constraints that held them back in their homeland, they prospered. And yet, strangely enough, they continue to be mourned as victims. In the second book of the Irish in Canada series, Lucille Campey takes on the victim-ridden mythology of destitute Irish immigrants fleeing the famine of the 1840s. In fact, the Irish influx to Quebec and Ontario began a century earlier. Comprehensive and extensive research has been distilled to produce an informative and lively account of this great immigration saga, whose roots date back to the time of the British Conquest of New France in 1763. -- Publisher's description

David Chariandy's Brother is his intensely beautiful, searingly powerful, and tightly constructed second novel, exploring questions of masculinity, family, race, and identity as they are played out in a Scarborough housing complex during the sweltering heat and simmering violence of the summer of 1991. With shimmering prose and mesmerizing precision, David Chariandy takes us inside the lives of Michael and Francis. They are the sons of Trinidadian immigrants, their father has disappeared and their mother works double, sometimes triple shifts so her boys might fulfill the elusive promise of their adopted home. Coming of age in The Park, a cluster of town houses and leaning concrete towers in the disparaged outskirts of a sprawling city, Michael and Francis battle against the careless prejudices and low expectations that confront them as young men of black and brown ancestry--teachers stream them into general classes; shopkeepers see them only as thieves; and strangers quicken their pace when the brothers are behind them. Always Michael and Francis escape into the cool air of the Rouge Valley, a scar of green wilderness that cuts through their neighbourhood, where they are free to imagine better lives for themselves. Propelled by the pulsing beats and styles of hip hop, Francis, the older of the two brothers, dreams of a future in music. Michael's dreams are of Aisha, the smartest girl in their high school whose own eyes are firmly set on a life elsewhere. But the bright hopes of all three are violently, irrevocably thwarted by a tragic shooting, and the police crackdown and suffocating suspicion that follow. With devastating emotional force David Chariandy, a unique and exciting voice in Canadian literature, crafts a heartbreaking and timely story about the profound love that exists between brothers and the senseless loss of lives cut short with the shot of a gun. --Publisher's description

La reconnaissance du travail ménager occupe les féministes depuis des décennies. Mais qu’ont à dire celles qui en ont fait leur gagne-pain, les travailleuses de l’ombre par excellence? Dans ce livre, Catherine Charron examine le travail domestique rémunéré au Québec entre les années 1950 et 2000. Elle expose les parcours d’une trentaine de femmes de la région de Québec et leur donne la parole. Dans un contexte où le marché du travail subit de profondes transformations, les boulots domestiques, loin de disparaître, se reconfigurent et continuent d’occuper une part non négligeable de la main-d’œuvre féminine. Tandis qu’une proportion croissante de femmes ont un meilleur accès à la scolarisation et au salariat, de nombreuses autres se trouvent refoulées dans diverses filières d’emplois domestiques: la garde d’enfants, l’aide à domicile pour les personnes âgées, les travaux d’entretien ménager. Les trajectoires des femmes interrogées par Catherine Charron, nées entre 1914 et 1958, illustrent le rapport changeant des femmes à l’emploi et à la famille à partir des années d’après-guerre ainsi que leurs réalités hétérogènes. À l’intersection du public et du privé, le travail domestique rémunéré s’exerce dans la continuité du travail gratuit assigné aux femmes au sein de la famille et de la communauté, ce qui contribue à le rendre invisible. Aux marges de l’emploi révèle cette face cachée de l’économie marchande et domestique, incontournable dans toute réflexion sur le travail, et rend justice à celles qui l’incarnent. -- Publisher's description

Why are unions weaker in the US than in Canada, two otherwise similar countries? This difference has shaped politics, policy, and levels of inequality. Conventional wisdom points to differences in political cultures, party systems, and labor laws. But Barry Eidlin’s systematic analysis of archival and statistical data shows the limits of conventional wisdom, and presents a novel explanation for the cross-border difference. He shows that it resulted from different ruling party responses to worker upsurge during the Great Depression and World War II. Paradoxically, US labor’s long-term decline resulted from what was initially a more pro-labor ruling party response, while Canadian labor’s relative long-term strength resulted from a more hostile ruling party response. These struggles embedded ‘the class idea’ more deeply in policies, institutions, and practices than in the US. In an age of growing economic inequality and broken systems of political representation, Eidlin’s analysis offers insight for those seeking to understand these trends, as well as those seeking to change them. --Publisher's description

Following the 2008 global financial crisis, Canada appeared to escape the austerity implemented elsewhere, but this was spin hiding the reality. A closer look reveals that the provinces--responsible for delivering essential public and social services such as education and healthcare--shouldered the burden. The Public Sector in an Age of Austerity examines public-sector austerity in the provinces and territories, specifically addressing how austerity was implemented, what forms austerity agendas took (from regressive taxes and new user fees to public-sector layoffs and privatization schemes), and what, if any, political responses resulted. Contributors focus on the period from 2007 to 2015, the global financial crisis and the period of fiscal consolidation that followed, while also providing a longer historical context--austerity is not a new phenomenon. A granular examination of each jurisdiction identifies how changing fiscal conditions have affected the delivery of public services and restructured public finances, highlighting the consequences such changes have had for public-sector workers and users of public services. The first book of its kind in Canada, The Public Sector in an Age of Austerity challenges conventional wisdom by showing that Canada did not escape post-crisis austerity, and that its recovery has been vastly overstated. -- Publisher's description

In October 2005, Jason Foster, then a staff member of the Alberta Federation of Labour, was walking a picket line outside Lakeside Packers in Brooks, Alberta with the members of local 401. It was a first contract strike. And although the employees of the meat-packing plant—many of whom were immigrants and refugees—had chosen an unlikely partner in the United Food and Commercial Workers local, the newly formed alliance allowed the workers to stand their ground for a three-week strike that ended in the defeat of the notoriously anti-union company, Tyson Foods. It was but one example of a wide range of industries and occupations that local 401 organized over the last twenty years. In this study of UFCW 401, Foster investigates a union that has had remarkable success organizing a group of workers that North American unions often struggle to reach: immigrants, women, and youth. By examining not only the actions and behaviour of the local’s leadership and its members but also the narrative that accompanied the renewal of the union, Foster shows that both were essential components to legitimizing the leadership’s exercise of power and its unconventional organizing forces. -- Publisher's description

For decades, emancipatory struggles have been deeply influenced by the slogan “Change the world without taking power.” Amid growing social inequalities and the return of right-wing authoritarianism, however, many now recognize the limits of disengaging from government and the state. From the Streets to the State chronicles many diverse and exciting projects to not only take state power but to fundamentally change it. A blend of scholars and activists explore issues like the nonsectarian relationships between new radical left parties, egalitarian social movements, and labor movements in Greece, Germany, Spain, Portugal, and Turkey. Contributors discuss municipal campaigns based in popular assemblies, solidarity economies, and independent political organizations fighting for racial, gender, and economic justice in cities such as Jackson, Vancouver, and Newcastle. This volume also studies the lessons learned from the Pink Tide in Latin America as well as the social movements of racialized and gendered workers transforming human rights across the United States. Finally, the book offers case studies from around the world surveying the role of state workers and public sector unions in radically democratizing public administration through coalitions between the providers and users of public services. -- Publisher's description. Contents: Part 1: Changing the World...and Ourselves: The Radical Left and the Problems of State Power. From the streets to the state : a critical introduction / Paul Christopher Gray -- Democratizing the party and the state : transcending the limits of the left / Leo Panitch. Part 2: Confronting Leviathan: Parties, Social Movements, and the Capitalist State. Building "parties of a new type" : a comparative analysis of new radical left parties In Western Europe / Xavier Lafrance and Catarina Príncipe -- Watching over the right to turn left : the limits of state autonomy in pink tide Venezuela and Ecuador / Thomas Chiasson-LeBel -- Casting shadows : Chokwe Lumumba and the struggle for racial justice and economic democracy in Jackson, Mississippi / Kali Akuno -- The radical democracy of the People's Democratic Party : transforming the Turkish state / Erdem Yörük -- Toward a radical politics of rights : lessons about legal leveraging and its limitations / Michael McCann and George I. Lovell. Part 3: In, against, and beyond the Behemoth: Projects for “Democratic Administration.” Market failures, failing states : challenges for democratization projects / Greg Albo -- Forging a "social knowledge economy" : transformative collaborations between radical left governments, state workers, and solidarity economies / Hilary Wainwright -- Femocratic administration and the politics of transformation / Tammy Findlay -- Beyond service, beyond coercion? : prisoner co-ops and the path to democratic administration / Greg McElligott.

Above the entrance to the Finnish Labour Temple, in what was once Port Arthur in northern Ontario, is the motto labor omnia vincit – “hard work conquers all.” Since 1910, these words have reflected the dedication of the Finnish community in Canada. This book is a social history of Finnish immigration and community building in Canada during the twentieth century. The first Finns to arrive ranged from conservative churchgoers to radical socialists, reflecting the ideologies that divided their homeland. After the First World War, left-wing Finns fled persecution; following the Second World War, Finns sought the economic security that Canada offered. Each new wave of immigration imbued the relationship between people, homeland, and host country with the politics, ideologies, and cultural expressions of its time. The story of Finns in Canada dovetails with the larger literature on immigration and enriches the history of socialism and ethnic repression in this country. The insightful essays in Hard Work Conquers All explore the nuanced cultural identities of Finnish Canadians, their continued ties to Finland, intergenerational cultural transfer, and the community’s connections with socialism and labour movements. This is a fresh interpretation of the successive waves of Finnish immigration and their influence on Canadian politics and society. --Publisher's description

Craig Heron is one of Canada's leading labour historians. Drawing together fifteen of Heron's new and previously published essays on working-class life in Canada, Working Lives covers a wide range of issues, including politics, culture, gender, wage-earning, and union organization. A timely contribution to the evolving field of labour studies in Canada, this cohesive collection of essays analyzes the daily experiences of people working across Canada over more than two hundred years. Honest in its depictions of the historical complexities of daily life, Working Lives raises issues in the writing of Canadian working-class history, especially "working-class realism" and how it is eventually inscribed into Canada's public history. Thoughtfully reflecting on the ways in which workers interact with the past, Heron discusses the important role historians and museums play in remembering the adversity and milestones experienced by Canada's working class. -- Publisher's description. Table of contents: Part 1: On the job. On the job in Canada -- Ontario’s first factory workers -- Work and struggle in the Canadian steel industry, 1900-50. Part 2. Workers’ Cultures. Arguing about idleness -- Labour and liquor -- Into the streets. Part 3: Getting organized. Labourism and the working class -- The Great War, the state, and working-class Canada -- Contours of a workers’ revolt. Part 4: A gendered world. Working girls -- Boys will be boys -- Male wage-earners and the Canadian state. Part 5: Doing history. Workers in the camera’s eye -- The labour historian and public history -- The relevance of class.

There's a pervasive sense of betrayal in areas scarred by mine, mill and factory closures. [This book] delves into the long history of deindustrialization in the paper-making town of Sturgeon Falls, Ontario, located on Canada's resource periphery. Much like hundreds of other towns and cities across North America and Europe, Sturgeon Falls has lost their primary source of industry, resulting in the displacement of workers and their families. One Job Town takes us into the making of a culture of industrialism and the significance of industrial work for mill-working families. One Job Town approaches deindustrialization as a long term, economic, political, and cultural process, which did not begin and simply end with the closure of the local mill in 2002. High examines the work-life histories of fifty paper mill workers and managers, as well as city officials, to gain an in-depth understanding of the impact of the formation and dissolution of a culture of industrialism. Oral history and memory are at the heart of One Job Town, challenging us to rethink the relationship between the past and the present in what was formerly known as the industrialized world. --Publisher's description.