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The effects of neoliberal capitalism have had a significant impact on the structure of the Canadian labour market and economy, but also on the employment opportunities for young workers in the early 21st century. And despite being the most educated generation ever, the millennials are faced with fewer full-time, secure jobs. Many have opted to embrace self-employment, sometimes not by choice but by necessity. This qualitative study embraced similar themes from the McMaster University/United Way of Toronto/PEPSO study, “The Precarity Penalty,” to determine how self employment affects their personal, work, social and community lives. One-on-one interviews were conducted with 10 Hamilton millennials (born 1981-1997), who were recruited through the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce’s affiliated organizations, Hamilton HIVE and Young Entrepreneurs and Professionals Hamilton. A total of 28 questions explored five topical areas: 1) their employment relationship; 2) how their employment relationship affected their life outside of work – i.e., family life, friends, community involvement; 3) physical and mental health; 4) their outlook on the future in terms of employment-related opportunities and potential barriers; and 5) their overall view on work and the current generation of workers. This research provided a glimpseinto the challenges that young, well-educated, self-employed millennials face, and their views on work and the labour market today. and their views on work and the labour market today. --From Executive Summary

The Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP) is a transnational labour agreement between Canada, Mexico, and various Caribbean countries that brings thousands of Jamaican migrant workers to Canada each year to work on farms. This thesis explores Jamaican SAWP workers’ experiences of stress in Ontario, and situates these experiences within a system of power and international inequality. When describing their experiences of stress and suffering in Ontario, many Jamaican workers drew analogies between historic and modern slavery under the SAWP. However, stress discourses also inspired workers to emphasise their resilience, and many workers gave equal attention to explaining their inherent strength as “Jamaicans”, which they associate with national independence and the history of slavery. In this way, I suggest stress discourses are sites of flexibility and resilience for Jamaican workers, and this thesis presents the foremost cultural, political, and historical factors that support Jamaican workers’ resilience in Ontario. Moreover, the predominant coping strategies workers employ in Ontario will be explored within the context of their restricted agency under the SAWP. This thesis concludes with a discussion of stress as an expression of subjectivity that is characterised by strength, faith, and the history of slavery.

This study, co-published by CCPA and Oxfam Canada, looks at how women in Canada and around the world are affected by rising inequality, including the burden of unpaid work, the undervaluing of work in

Nursing embodies the seemingly timeless characteristics of feminine healing, caring, and nurturing, yet this archetypally female vocation also boasts a distinctive and complex history. Bedside Matters traces four generations of Canadian nurses to explore changes in who became nurses, what work they performed, and how they organized to defend their occupational interests. Whether in the apprenticeship method of the early twentieth century or in the present day restructuring of hospital work, the position of nurses within the health-care system has been structured by class, gender, and ethnic and racial relations. Located between the doctors and untrained or subsidiary patient-care attendants, nurses have struggled to define the boundaries of their occupation vis à vis other members of the health-care hierarchy, even as tensions between bedside and administrative nurses created divisions within nursing itself. Focusing on the daily labours of 'ordinary nurses', McPherson argues that the persisting sex-typing of nursing as women's work has meant that gender consistently complicated nursing's easy categorization as either professional or proletariat. Combining archival records and oral histories, the author shows how nurses, in their work, activities, and social and sexual attitudes, sought recognition as skilled workers in the health-care system. --Publisher's description

The article reviews the book, "The Canadian Oral History Reader," edited by Kristina R. Llewellyn, Alexander Freund, and Nolan Reilly.

This study investigates the TPP's chapter on "temporary entry for business persons" to understand its potential consequences for Canadian immigration policy and the Canadian labour market. It examines the general provisions that apply to all TPP countries as well as Canada's specific commitments for different categories of workers under the TPP. The study finds that the TPP will give more leeway to employers to hire migrant workers and transfer employees across borders—even in industries and regions where unemployment is high and domestic workers are available—without offering mobility rights to workers themselves. Although the short-term impact on the Canadian labour market will likely be small, the potential long-term impact of the TPP's temporary entry provisions is significant. Like other aspects of the TPP, these provisions override Canada's existing immigration policy and cannot be changed by a future government.

The article reviews the book, "Reform or Repression: Organizing America's Anti-Union Movement," by Chad Pearson.

This article reviews the book, "Refonder le système de protection sociale. Pour une nouvelle génération de droits sociaux," by Bernard Gazier, Bruno Palier and Hélène Périvier.

The article reviews the book, "The Italians Who Built Toronto: Italian Workers and Contractors in the City’s Housebuilding Industry, 1950-1980," by Stefano Agnoletto.

This paper analyzes the contemporary global anti-trafficking regime and discusses the destructive influence this regime has had on the lives of migrant sex workers. Through the use of public documents and academic literature, I deconstruct the global anti-trafficking discourses and argue in favour of more viable rights-based solutions (e.g., labour rights, immigration rights, and sexual rights) for combating human trafficking. Within this analysis, I explore the Canadian government’s gradual commitment to combat human trafficking through the gradual discontinuation of the exotic dancer visa, and eventual implementation of the migrant sex worker ban. In formalizing its commitment to combating trafficking, the Canadian government has implemented restrictive policy measures terminating migrant women’s ability to legally access the Canadian sex industry. While this type of employment was problematic in many ways, the Canadian government should have addressed these issues through rights-based policy initiatives instead of prohibiting access as part of its anti-trafficking campaign

Les débats sur les inégalités dans l’emploi adoptent habituellement un point de vue économique en se concentrant sur la distribution des revenus plutôt que sur les processus de différenciation sociale. Pourtant, avant d’être un facteur de production, le travail est foncièrement un rapport social, essentiel à l’intégration des individus. La question des inégalités dans l’emploi doit donc être approchée d’un point de vue sociologique. C’est ce que propose cet ouvrage qui, tout en s’inscrivant dans les débats en cours sur la justice sociale, offre une synthèse remarquable des perspectives théoriques, historiques et comparatives sur les inégalités dans les relations d’emploi. Se fondant sur un ensemble de données statistiques récentes, l’auteur décrit les forces qui animent le champ de l’emploi et qui contribuent à définir le statut social au Canada, et dégage ainsi le rôle décisif des politiques publiques dans ce domaine.

The article reviews the book, "The Rising Tide of Color: Race, State Violence, and Radical Movements across the Pacific," edited by Moon-Ho Jung.

The accounts of three men who are presented here were members of the left in Canada between the first decade of the twentieth century until the late 1970s, when their stories were compiled. --Preface. Contents: Harvey Murphy's account, 1918 to 1943 -- John Smith's account, 1920 to 1970s -- Arnt Arntzen's account, 1890s to 1970s.

The article reviews the book, "Beyond Brutal Passions: Prostitution in Early Nineteenth-Century Montréal," by Mary Anne Poutanen.

Within the broad debates about neoliberalism, neoliberal globalization and the declining power of unions in the Global North, there has been renewed interest in the possibilities of international and transnational labour solidarity, coordination and action. Drawing from Rebecca Johns (1998) distinction between transformative and accommodationist forms of international labour solidarity I argue that we need to critically assess how these practices challenge or reinforce global divisions of labour born of the historical development of capitalism. To this end, this study provides an analysis of the dialectical relationship between the dominant practices of labour internationalism that emerged within the organized labour movement in Canada during the Cold War. I examine both the challenges to and possibilities for building transformative forms of international labour solidarity today. Challenges include the philosophies of social partnership, racism, white supremacy and nationalism that informed the labour imperialism and accommodationist solidarities of the institutionalized internationalism in this period. I argue that the brand of social democratic anti-communism that characterized this institutionalized labour internationalism was shaped by the wars of position over worker justice happening on the national level and internationally between unions, but also by ideas of race and nation. I outline the lessons from these practices by focusing on four cases: Kenya, Southeast Asia, The Caribbean and Palestine. Finally, I assess the grassroots labour solidarity that re-emerged inside the labour movement with the rise of the New Left. I argue that the model of international solidarity they built, called worker-to-worker, arose from the goals and strategies of class struggle unionism and constitutes an example of transformative solidarity that can inform discussions about organizing international soldiarity today. Rooted in anti-racist Marxist feminist theory, my historical sociological analysis draws from both archival research and interviews with union leaders, activists and staff. I make sense of the solidarities that determined these practices by exploring the terrain of class consciousness in which they were formed. Situating my analysis within the social and political contours of class formation in Canada and internationally, I pay particular attention to how these practices of labour internationalism intersect with issues of race, gender, nation and class struggle, and how racialized and gendered class formation in Canada has influenced ideas of worker justice and responses to imperialism, colonialism and national borders.

Almost a century before the New Democratic Party rode the first "orange wave," their predecessors imagined a movement that could rally Canadians against economic insecurity, win access to necessary services such as health care, and confront the threat of war. The party they built during the Great Depression, the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF), permanently transformed the country's politics. Past histories have described the CCF as social democrats guided by middle-class intellectuals, a party which shied away from labour radicalism and communist agitation. James Naylor's assiduous research tells a very different story: a CCF created by working-class activists steeped in Marxist ideology who sought to create a movement that would be both loyal to its socialist principles and appealing to the wider electorate. The Fate of Labour Socialism is a fundamental reexamination of the CCF and Canadian working-class politics in the 1930s, one that will help historians better understand Canada's political, intellectual, and labour history. --Publisher's description.

Examines the exodus of Quebeckers to the US and what was written about them, ranging from literary works to racialized science.

Biographical account of lawyer Joseph Edward Bird (1868-1948) who, after his arrival in Vancouver from Ontario in 1902, became involved some of the leading labour and civil rights' cases of the day, including the Komagata Maru case (1914), where 376 Indian passengers were blocked from entry into Canada.

Depuis le milieu des années 1960, le gouvernement canadien organise la migration temporaire de travailleurs agricoles originaires principalement des Caraïbes et d'Amérique centrale, via deux principaux programmes, soit le Programme des travailleurs agricoles saisonniers (PTAS) et le Volet agricole du Programme des travailleurs étrangers temporaires. Ces programmes ont permis de faire venir au Canada près de 42 530 travailleurs agricoles temporaires en 2013, dont 9760 au Québec seulement. Le PTAS et le Volet agricole soulèvent toutefois les critiques de plusieurs organisations et chercheurs. Une caractéristique commune centrale de ces programmes est particulièrement décriée, à savoir l'assignation des travailleurs à un employeur unique et à un emploi spécifique, puisque celle-ci aurait pour effet de priver les travailleurs de leur mobilité sur le marché du travail. En ce sens, il est notamment reproché à ces programmes de perpétuer des formes de travail non libre, alors que les travailleurs ne peuvent circuler librement sur le marché du travail. Dans la continuité de ces travaux critiques, ce projet de recherche se propose d'examiner le rôle de cette disposition juridique comme mécanisme de privation de la mobilité des travailleurs. Plus précisément, l'objectif de ce mémoire est d'analyser le rôle double du droit, d'une part, dans la production et l'encadrement de ces formes de travail non libre, et d'autre part, dans la possible contestation de celles-ci. Pour ce faire, nous nous appuierons tant sur analyse à la fois théorique et historique, que sur une vaste enquête de terrain. Cette enquête s'inscrit dans un projet de recherche plus large - dirigé par le professeur Martin Gallié - ayant permis de réaliser près de cent entretiens avec des travailleurs du PTAS et du Volet agricole de la région de Saint-Rémi, au Québec.