During the process Lo has seen by working on the directive, the uncertainty surrounding the impact of how it will effect norwegian labour standard has increased. It has been important to ensure broad support in the unions of our position, Roar Flåthen, president of LO says.

LO Secretariat issued 07/12/2010 a response on the EU directive.

In response the Secretariat suggested a number of requirements to be able to recommend an implementation of the Directive.

The…

http://iww.org.uk/node/613

Peter sez:

A challenging piece by a veteran UK-based socialist. I would be inclined to endorse what he says about Occupy procedures since the same set of problems arise with the World Social Forum. As for his positive presentation of union activity in relation to the Occupy and other protest movements of 2011, I would be inclined to ask whether this means unions are capable of escaping the social-liberal institutions and discourses with which they have been so long and so heavily…

Tunisia: Left gains in trade union election

By Nizar Amami

January 12, 2012 -- International Viewpoint -- The 22nd congress of Tunisia’s UGTT trade union federation (Union Générale des Travailleurs Tunisiens, General Union of Tunisian Workers)…

Peter sez:

Wow! I thought that China was the one - fairly large - country, building up a Marx-type industrial proletariat. But according to veteran Martin H-L, it seems to building up a similar kind of precariat to the rest of the world.

On my previous assumption I had also presumed that the coming thing is China would be a movement toward ILO standards and even affiliation of the ACFTU to the ITUC! But even if this somewhat starry-eyed vision…

George Soros on the Coming US Class War

George Soros, in an interview with Newsweek magazine titled “George Soros on the Coming US Class War”:

“I am not here to cheer you up. The situation is about as serious and difficult…

Peter sez:

I am sure I posted access to this paper as a draft:

'An Emancipatory Global Labour Studies is Necessary!

On Rethinking the Global Labour Movement in the Hour of Furnaces'

But here it is as a Working Paper of the…

hi, glad to join this community

like to be part of it

Unions are necessary for the preservation of workers’ rights and for worker representation, whether those workers are labeled professionals or laborers, .and whether the religious or ethnic or cultural groups or gender groups that claim those workers as members form majorities or minorities in any given area.  And the sooner they all organize under the banner of the same union, the stronger they will be.…

In China, Human Costs Are Built Into an iPad

   Inbox  …

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Find out what it means to me

R-E-S-P-E-C-T

Take care, TCB---- from the song €œ"Respect"€ by Otis Redding

If you drive down I-55 or I-80 out of Chicago toward Joliet, they are hard to miss. Sprawling boxy-looking buildings, often windowless, but with constant activity as semi's pull up to disgorge their contents. These are the warehouses of Will County, where goods meant mostly for North America's big box stores are routed…

Lorenzo P. Torrez

(April 18, 1927 – January 1, 2012)Salt of the Earth MinerLabor, Civil Rights, & Peace Activist Great Dies at 84

Today we mourn the passing of a Grant County working-class hero and know within our hearts that he is not gone forever from our lives.  Lorenzo P. Torrez, a born and raised Gila, N.M. native who attended Cliff High School, lives on in the…

“Barbara Hutton’s got the dough, parlez vous.
We know where she got it, too, parlez vous.
We slave at Woolworth’s five and dime,
The pay we get is sure a crime.
Hinky dinky parlez vous”

Left Wing Organisations and Libertarian Grassroots Unions Call for an International Day of Action

May 2012 - #1M12 #12M12 #15M12 – INDIGNADOS/OCCUPY/ANONYMOUS {+LABOUR} JOIN THE GLOBAL SWARM

peter waterman <peterwaterman1936@gmail.com>

[WSF-Labor and Globalization] international campaign for freedom of association in Fiat

1 message

In temperatures that barely rose above -10 C, except when the wind dropped, up to 15,000 supporters, students, residents and workers, unionized and non-unionized, public and private sector, employed and unemployed, gathered to show their support for the 421 workers of Canadian Auto Workers Union (CAW) Local 27.

More than 3,000,000 workers were there 'in spirit', Ken Georgetti, President of the Canadian Labour Congress, told the protestors.

For the first time in a long while,…

Peter sez:

Tried to post this on Global Labour Column but word-restriction prevented me doing so in full. Let's hope I haven't exceeded the UB limit. You can find Eric's piece either on GLC or on my page here earlier in January.

Now read on...

The comments so far are rather less aware of the problems of online union solidarity campaigning than Eric himself:



'The ITUC, for…

Peter sez:

This online journal, shortly to do a special issue on New Worker Movements, is now available both on its own site and on that of a more general e-publisher, into-ebooks-com, in Finland.

Below I have placed the URL of a past special issue on Alternative Media. In addition to my own contribution on international labour communication by computer after two decades, there are numerous other items (as well as an excellent editorial, dealing with the pleasures and pitfalls…

Peter sez:

Is there not here something of a recurring pattern? It is my impression that every 10-15 years the Nigerian unions gather up their courage for a general strike only to settle it later in disappointing terms?  I do  not, however, feel that a Left posing the alternative as socialist revolution is more than a traditional kneejerk reaction. And unlikely to have any impact on either unions, 'civil society' or the poor on the streets more generally. It seems to me that the shabby…