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This paper examines the effect of Inuit and Innu women’s participation in environmental assessment (EA) processes on EA recommendations, impact benefit agreement (IBA) negotiations, and women’s employment experiences at Voisey’s Bay Mine, Labrador. The literature on Indigenous participation in EAs has been critiqued for being overly process oriented and for neglecting to examine how power influences EA decision making. In this regard, two issues have emerged as critical to participation in EAs: how EA processes are influenced by other institutions that may help or hinder participation and whether EAs enable marginalized groups within Indigenous communities to influence development outcomes. To address these issues we examine the case of the Voisey’s Bay Nickel Mine in Labrador, in which Indigenous women’s groups made several collective submissions pertaining to employment throughout the EA process. We compare the submissions that Inuit and Innu women’s groups made to the EA panel in the late 1990s to the final EA recommendations and then compare these recommendations to employment-related provisions in the IBA. Finally we compare IBA provisions to workers’ perceptions of gender relations at the mine in 2010. Semi-structured interviews revealed that, notwithstanding the recommendations by women’s groups concerning employment throughout the EA process, women working at the site experienced gendered employment barriers similar to those experienced by women in mining elsewhere. We suggest that the ineffective translation of EA submissions into EA regulations and the IBA, coupled with persistent masculinity within the mining industry, weakened the effect of women’s requests for a comprehensive program to hire and train Indigenous women.

Information technology implementation in health care settings is contributing to work intensification and overwork for social workers and nurses. But strong professional and personal values lead workers to endure these conditions and prop up an increasingly “efficient” and lean health care system. A study done in Ontario, Canada, examines these circumstances and forms the basis for this article’s contribution to the deskilling/upskilling debate in labour process theory.

The article discusses the research and scholarship of feminist scholars on family sociology in Canada from the 1960s through the mid 2010s, including the feminist sociology of families. The relationship between neoliberalism and gender, including the alleged indifference of neoliberal government policies to gender of income earners, is discussed. An overview of Canada's national statistics agency Statistics Canada's data on labor, including on domestic labor, gender divisions in labor, women's employment and unpaid household work, is provided.

The January 30, 2015 decision by the Supreme Court of Canada was a very significant one for the labour movement, and in fact for Canadian society. In their decision the Court once more reaffirmed that a strong base of fundamental rights for union members is a cornerstone of Canada’s democracy and is protected under our constitution. --Introduction

Research and advocacy group sponsored by McMaster University and United Way Toronto.

English/French abstracts of article published in the Fall 2015 volume.

English/French abstracts of articles in the Spring 2015 issue.

List of contributors to the Fall 2015 volume.

The article reviews the book, "Capital in the Twenty-First Century," by Thomas Pikkety.

In recognizing a constitutional right to strike in its Saskatchewan Federation of Labour decision, the Supreme Court of Canada reaffirmed that workers in Canada are entitled to freedom of association rights that are at least equivalent to those provided by international human rights instruments. This paper considers the implications of this principle for employees in the private sector, where unionization rates have been in continual decline for sev- eral decades, by focusing on the potential of "minority" unionism for realizing Canada's international law obligations. The author notes that the ILO's super- visory committees have approved three options as being consistent with ILO principles on freedom of association: minority worker associations, each of which has full rights to represent its own members; unions which, though not representing a majority of the workers in the bargaining unit, are recognized as being the "most representative," and as such have the right to conclude a col- lective agreement applicable to all the workers; and unions certified under the North American Wagner Act model, through a majoritarian procedure. Thus, while ILO member-states are permitted to adopt legislation based on majoritar- ian exclusivity, such legislation cannot have the effect of depriving non-majority unions of the right to bargain collectively on behalf of their members, in those workplaces where no exclusive agent has been certified. With a view to ensuring that labour law and practice in Canada conform to international standards, the author proposes that every Canadian jurisdiction revise its legislation to provide for certification of the "most representative" minority union in a work- place, while retaining the existing procedures for certification of an exclusive bargaining agent. Under this proposal, the most representative union (or coali- tion of unions) in a bargaining unit would have all the rights and duties of an exclusive agent, but not an exclusive right of representation. In this way, the author contends, Canada could live up to its international law commitment to "promote" collective bargaining.

This thesis explores the political experience of men in the Department of National Defence’s work relief camps in British Columbia from 1932 to 1935, when single, homeless, unemployed, and physically fit men accessed government unemployment relief living and working according to the administration’s policies. In these camps the men found a government administration eager to teach them work discipline, a collection of charities and private groups that promoted an ideal of the working class man in troubled economic times, and organizers with the Relief Camp Workers’ Union attempting to shape strikes that challenged government authority. In this thesis I argue that the unemployed vacillated between these different influences to challenge the government’s palliative relief while also ensuring that they maintained access to relief for as long as possible. This was accomplished by shaping multi-faceted relationships with the government, the union, private charities, and fellow campers.

This dissertation examines Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s relationship with labour unions and the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation-New Democratic Party of Canada from 1945 to 2000. Trudeau was an extremely influential historical figure, both as prime minister (1968-1984), but also before his entry into formal politics, when he traveled and studied around the world, became deeply influenced by leftist movements and intellectuals, and sought to modernize Quebec, which in his view was falling behind English Canada in terms of technological, social, and democratic development. In essence, Trudeau sought to forge a liberal democracy he thought absent in Quebec, and found his staunchest allies to be trade unionists and socialists. In the end, however, Trudeau largely abandoned those movements because he felt winning liberal freedoms required the shelving of socialist objectives. This would, in turn, be his justification for joining the Liberal Party in 1965. As Prime Minister, Trudeau opposed the objectives and philosophies of his former left allies, even as he maintained his image as a progressive. So while many saw his Just Society, his approach to public and Canadian ownership of energy, his New Society, and his Charter of Rights and Freedoms as left-wing initiatives, I argue that Trudeau’s actions were undertaken not to challenge capitalism, but to strengthen it, primarily through the empowerment of business and the disempowerment of unions and the economically-disenfranchised. Ultimately, this dissertation asserts that Trudeau cannot be classified as a socialist, but must be seen as a liberal preoccupied, not with liberty and equality, but with the continued pre-eminence of capitalist property relations.

This article reviews the book, "Frank Underhill and the Politics of Ideas," by Kenneth C. Dewar.

The article reviews the book, "Teardown: Memoir of a Vanishing City," by Gordon Young.

In the framework of the so-called “on-demand/gig economy,” the number of on-demand companies matching labor supply and demand is on the rise. These schemes may enlarge opportunities for people willing to find a job or to top up their salaries. Despite the upside of creating new “peer marketplaces,” these platforms may also be used to circumvent employment regulation, by operating informally in traditionally regulated markets. The literature showed how, by 2009, millions of worker accounts have been generated within these frameworks. Productivity may be fostered but, at the same time, a new version of Taylorism is disseminated (i.e., the fragmentation of labor into hyper-temporary jobs – called microtasks – on a virtual or local assembly line), strengthened by globalization and computerization. All these intermediaries recruit freelance or casual workers who are labelled as independent contractors even though many indicators seem to reveal a disguised employment relationship. Uncertainty and insecurity are the price for extreme flexibility. A bulk of business risk is shifted to workers, and potential costs such as benefits or unemployment insurance are avoided. Minimum wages are often far from being reached.

This essay looks at the ways Frederick Winslow Taylor's distinctly modern theories of scientific management (i.e. Taylorism) transformed Canadian workplaces in the early 20thcentury. In particular, it shows how Taylorism negatively impacted Canadian workers' lives, and examines the various ways that workers consequently resisted Taylorist methods. The essay argues that though workers were unable to stop the widespread implementation of Taylorism and its normalization in Canadian workplaces, their resistance to Taylorism still played an important role in unionist and radical political movements which gradually gained important concessions and rights for Canadian workers during the first half of the 20thcentury. Additionally, the essay argues that resistance was significant as an outlet for workers to retain bodily autonomy in work environments which increasingly aimed to make workers more machine-like. Ultimately, the essay highlights important ways that the Canadian working class has exercised historical agency via solidarity and perseverance.

This article reviews the book, "Darcus Howe: A Political Biography," by Robin Bunce and Paul Field.

In order to advance an argument addressing whether or not ethical and empowering care work is possible within the context of neoliberalism and managerialism, this article draws on international comparative, qualitative case-study data to ask whether processes and practices of radical care and emancipation already exist in nonprofit long-term care and social service work. If so, what do they look like, and what factors hinder or nurture social justice-based care practices? Given that paid and unpaid care continues to be a highly gendered and increasingly racialized realm of feminized struggle, it warrants further theorization and greater centrality within emancipatory projects and strategies.

The overarching theme of this paper is whether future retirees are likely to have an adequate standard of living in retirement, and related policy issues. The author begins by outlining Canada's three-pillared retirement income sys- tem, and by identifying the similarities and differences between defined benefit (DB) pension plans and defined contribution (DC) pension plans. Given the relative imprecision of these terms, the author cautions against treating pension plan design as a binary choice between DB and DC. The dimensions of the ongoing shift from DB to DC plans are measured by reference to information from Statistics Canada. The paper goes on to consider the capacity of DB and DC plans to generate pension income, through an examination of comparative data on contributions, rates of return and expenses. The paper also asks whether participants in DB plans enjoy an advantage over participants in other types of plans, in terms of accumulation of retirement wealth. As a corollary to this question, the author reviews several studies that attempt to map the range of benefit outcomes in DC plans. In sum, the author concludes that the switch from DB to DC increases the unpredictability of retirement income, manifested as both unpredictable retirement ages and unpredictable levels of income. Recent attempts have been made to enhance the predictability of contributions and benefits by creating plan designs which incorporate elements of both DB and DC, i.e. target benefit plans. However, the author points out, of almost equal importance to the issue of plan design is the issue of identifying appropriate organizational platforms for the delivery of pension benefits.