Portal:Organized Labour

Introduction

Image created by Walter Crane to celebrate International Workers' Day (May Day, 1 May), 1889. The image depicts workers from the five populated continents (Africa, Asia, Americas, Australia and Europe) in unity underneath an angel representing freedom, fraternity and equality.

The labour movement is the collective organisation of working people to further their shared political and economic interests. It consists of the trade union or labour union movement, as well as political parties of labour. It can be considered an instance of class conflict.

In trade unions, workers campaign for higher wages, better working conditions and fair treatment from their employers, and through the implementation of labour laws, from their governments. They do this through collective bargaining, sectoral bargaining, and when needed, strike action. In some countries, co-determination gives representatives of workers seats on the board of directors of their employers.

Political parties representing the interests of workers campaign for labour rights, social security and the welfare state. They are usually called a labour party (in English-speaking countries), a social democratic party (in Germanic and Slavic countries), a socialist party (in Romance countries), or sometimes a workers' party.
Though historically less prominent, the cooperative movement campaigns to replace capitalist ownership of the economy with worker cooperatives, consumer cooperatives, and other types of cooperative ownership. This is related to the concept of economic democracy.

The labour movement developed as a response to capitalism and the Industrial Revolution of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, at about the same time as socialism. The early goals of the movement were the right to unionise, the right to vote, democracy, safe working conditions and the 40-hour week. As these were achieved in many of the advanced economies of Western Europe and North America in the early decades of the 20th century, the labour movement expanded to issues of welfare and social insurance, wealth distribution and income distribution, public services like health care and education, social housing and in some cases common ownership. (Full article...)

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The One Big Union is an idea originating in the late 19th and early 20th centuries amongst trade unionists to unite the interests of workers and offer solutions to all labour problems.

Unions initially organized as craft unions. Workers were organized by their skill: carpenters, plumbers, bricklayers, each into their respective unions. Capitalists could often divide craft unionists along these lines in demarcation disputes. As capitalist enterprises and state bureaucracies became more centralized and larger, some workers felt that their institutions needed to become similarly large. A simultaneous disenchantment with the perceived weakness of craft unions caused many unions to organize along industrial lines. The idea of the "one big union" is championed by anarchist syndicalists to organize effectively.

As envisioned by the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), which for many years prior to 1919 had been associated with the concept, One Big Union was not just the idea that all workers should be organized into one big union. In the 1911 pamphlet One Big Union, IWW supporters Thomas J. Hagerty and William Trautmann enumerated two goals: One Big Union needed to "combine the wage-workers in such a way that it can most successfully fight the battles and protect the interests of the workers of today in their struggles for fewer hours of toil, more wages and better conditions," and it also "must offer a final solution of the labor problem – an emancipation from strikes, injunctions, bull-pens, and scabbing of one against the other." (Full article...)

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November in Labor History

Significant dates in labour history.

November 01 - Malbone Street Wreck occurs on the first day of the BLE strike in 1918 in the U.S.; the first congress of the International Trade Union Confederation is held; the International Harvester strike of 1979–80 began
November 02 - Brian Behan died
November 03 - Nathan Feinsinger died; the U.S. Supreme Court decided Marquez v. Screen Actors Guild Inc.; Dennis McDermott was born
November 04 - Tomasz Arciszewski was born; James Green was born
November 05 - Eugene V. Debs was born; Nimrod Workman was born; Agustín Tosco died; the 2007 Writers Guild of America strike began
November 06 - Lloyd McBride died
November 08 - Ed Boyce was born; the 1892 New Orleans general strike began
November 09 - Congress of Industrial Organizations founded in the U.S.; Philip Murray died; Danny Greene was born; the Chicago Federation of Labor is founded
November 11 - Centralia massacre occurs in the U.S.
November 12 - Bituminous coal strike of 1974 begins in the U.S.; the Democratic Confederation of San Marino Workers is formed
November 13 - The UK firefighter dispute 2002–03 begins; Karen Silkwood died; the International Typographical Union begins publishing the Green Bay News-Chronicle during a strike
November 14 - The High Court of Australia issues its ruling in New South Wales v Commonwealth, upholding the validity of WorkChoices; Daniel J. Tobin died; the 2007 German national rail strike began
November 15 - Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions founded in the U.S.; Raymond McKay was born
November 16 - Jean Maitron died; the Jamaica Association of Local Government Officers is founded; Georges Marchais died
November 17 - Harold J. Gibbons died
November 18 - Chris Watson died
November 19 - William J. McCarthy died; Joe Hill is executed; the National Writers Union is formed
November 20 - Giles Hart was born; Richard Cordtz died
November 21 - William Green died; the Columbine Mine massacre occurred in 1927 in the U.S.
November 22 - David McDonald was born; Philip Murray is elected president of the CIO
November 23 - Harry Van Arsdale, Jr. died
November 24 - Charles Millard died
November 25 - George Mock died; the 2006 Progressive Enterprises dispute begins in New Zealand; Ted Saskin becomes executive director of the NHLPA in 2005
November 26 - The National Confederation of the Trade-Union Organizations of Ukraine is formed; Nimrod Workman died; Eliot V. Elliott died
November 27 - Donald Richberg died
November 28 - The U.S. Supreme Court decides Eastern Associated Coal Corp. v. United Mine Workers of America; André Morell died; William McFetridge was born
November 29 - John P. Frey died
November 30 - Mary Harris "Mother" Jones died; the General Federation of Trade Unions of Korea is formed

Jan•Feb•Mar•Apr•May•Jun•Jul•Aug•Sep•Oct•Nov•Dec

More Did you know (auto-generated)

... that Russian pianist Pavel Kushnir died on a hunger strike after his arrest for anti-war videos posted on a YouTube channel with five subscribers?
... that in 1977, Appalachian folk singer Phyllis Boyens performed at a Christmas benefit concert to support Kentucky coal miners who had been on strike for 17 months?
... that the communist trade unionist Ditto Pölzl was a member of all three provisional state governments of Styria in 1945?
... that Thames lightermen would pull their barges up to the Leaning Tower of Rotherhithe to collect their wages?
... that Ana Sigüenza was the first woman to be the general secretary of a national trade union center in Spain?
... that Bal Krishna Kaul, who served as the first Home and Finance minister of Ajmer State, undertook a 22-day hunger strike in Ajmer Jail?

Related Portals

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Image 1Members of the United Steelworkers in Ohio phone bank other union members to educate them about critical issues in the 2008 election in the U.S.
Image 2Union members picketing recent NLRB rulings outside the agency's Washington, D.C., headquarters in November 2007.
Image 3Shields used by striking workers at the Carnegie Steel Works during the Homestead Strike in 1892.
Image 4Protesters barricade the street on June 22 during the 2006 Oaxaca protests.
Image 5Empty Gare du Nord train station during the November 2007 strikes in France.
Image 6Barges set ablaze by steelworkers during the Homestead strike in 1892.
Image 7Armed vigilantes deport striking copper miners during the Bisbee Deportation in Bisbee, Arizona, July 12, 1917.
Image 8Memorial marker for the Bay View Tragedy.
Image 9Crowd gathered outside old City Hall during the Winnipeg general strike, June 21, 1919.
Image 10Breaker boys, child laborers, working in a U.S. coal mine in 1911.
Image 11Knights of Labor Grand Master Workman Terence V. Powderly.
Image 12Registered nurses on strike in 2006 outside Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital.
Image 13John L. Lewis (right, President of the United Mine Workers, confers with Thomas Kennedy (left), UMW Secretary-Treasurer of the UMW, and a UMW official at the War Labor Board in 1943 about a coal miners' strike.
Image 14Illustration from the Brisbane Worker newspaper condemning the brutality of the Queensland Police on Black Friday during the 1912 Brisbane General Strike.
Image 15Lewis Hine's 1920 image "Power house mechanic working on steam pump," which shows a working class young American man with wrench in hand, hunched over, surrounded by the machinery that defines his work.
Image 16Striking American Railway Union members confront Illinois National Guard troops in Chicago, Illinois, during the Pullman Strike in 1894.
Image 17The Western Federation of Miners' famous flyer entitled "Is Colorado in America?".
Image 18AFL–CIO unions protest outside Verizon headquarters in Philadelphia using a giant inflatable rat.
Image 19Strike sign used by the German Train Drivers' Union in the German national rail strike of 2007.
Image 20Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, and his wife, circa 1908.
Image 21Australian industrial relations legislation national day of protest, 2005.
Image 22National Federation of Federal Employees officials sign a collective bargaining agreement with the U.S. 8th Army in October 2002.
Image 23Mounted police chase demonstrators through Vancouver's East End during the Battle of Ballantyne Pier in 1935.
Image 24Big Bill Haywood, a founding member and leader of the Industrial Workers of the World.
Image 25Rally in Dhaka, organized by Jatiyo Nari Shramik Trade Union Kendra (National Women Workers Trade Union Centre), an organization affiliated with the Bangladesh Trade Union Kendra.
Image 26Joe Hill.
Image 27Striking workers march moments before the Swedish military opened fire, killing five workers during the Ådalen shootings.
Image 28Political cartoon about the Coal Strike of 1902 from the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Image 29Union elections with an illegal firing, 1951 to 2007.
Image 30Public and Commercial Services Union members on strike in Manchester 2006.
Image 31Exaggerated 19th century engraving showing flames and smoke following the Haymarket riot.
Image 32William Green, president of the AFL–CIO from 1924 to 1952.
Image 33Wilma B. Liebman, chair, NLRB.
Image 34An AFL–CIO protest of Rite Aid, with Rev. Mark Reisinger (Pastor of Grace United Methodist Church in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania), Bill George, and Richard Bloomingdale.
Image 35Metropolitan Transportation Authority (New York) notice of subway closure during the 2005 New York City transit strike.
Image 36Striking I.W.W. members confront Massachusetts National Guard troops in Boston, during the Lawrence textile strike in 1912.
Image 37Richard Trumka.
Image 38Detail of monument to the Reesor Siding Strike of 1963.
Image 39The Ludlow massacre monument located in Ludlow, Colorado, United States.
Image 40A. Philip Randolph.
Image 41Samuel Gompers.
Image 42During World War II, a female aircraft worker checks electrical assemblies at the Vega Aircraft Corporation in Burbank, California.
Image 43Great Railroad Strike of 1877.
Image 44Picket signs at the 2007 Writers Guild of America strike.
Image 45Cripple Creek, Colo., under martial law, during the 1894 strike.
Image 46Union members march in Argentina on Human Rights Day in December 2005. The signs read "Worker rights are human rights..
Image 47American Federation of Teachers (AFT) president Albert Shanker.
Image 48The Place de la Sorbonne in Paris is closed by police during the 2006 labour protests in France.
Image 49George Meany, former leader of the AFL–CIO.
Image 50Striking teamsters armed with pipes battle police in the streets during the Minneapolis Teamsters Strike of 1934.
Image 51J. Warren Madden, the first Chair of the National Labor Relations Board.
Image 52Former headquarters of the United Mine Workers of America and the Congress of Industrial Organizations, 900 15th Street NW, Washington, D.C., in 200.
Image 53United Mine Workers of America poster circa 1902.
Image 54Camp put up by striking Pepsi-Cola workers, in Guatemala City, Guatemala, 2008.
Image 55Strike leaders at the Paterson silk strike of 1913. From left, Patrick Quinlan, Carlo Tresca, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Adolph Lessig, and Bill Haywood.
Image 56The front page of the Union Record on the Seattle General Strike of 1919.
Image 57May Day Rally in Mumbai, India, 2004.
Image 58Mary Harris "Mother" Jones.

Selected Quote

The strike is the weapon of the oppressed, of men capable of appreciating justice and having the courage to resist wrong and contend for principle. The nation had for its cornerstone a strike, and while arrogant injustice throws down the gauntlet and challenges the right to conflict, strikes will come, come by virtue of irrevocable laws, destined to have a wider sweep and greater power as men advance in intelligence and independence."

— Eugene V. Debs.

Did you know

...that the Sheet Metal Workers International Association Local 28 in New York City negotiated the first pension plan in the construction industry?
...that George Hardy, who headed the Service Employees International Union from 1971 to 1980, did his first union organizing among janitors in San Francisco?
... that after the Avondale Mine disaster, legislation was passed by the Pennsylvania General Assembly that made Pennsylvania the first U.S. state to have laws regarding mine safety?

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