Alberta's Red Democrats: the Challenge and Legacy of Blairmore
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The Challenge to the Trade Unions
The Conservative Government’s Proposed Strike Ballot Thresholds: The Challenge to the Trade Unions Salford Business School Research Working Paper August 2015 Professor Ralph Darlington Salford Business School, University of Salford, and Dr John Dobson Riga International College of Economics and Business Administration Corresponding author: Professor Ralph Darlington, Salford Business School, University of Salford, Salford M5 4WT; [email protected]; 0161-295-5456 Ralph Darlington is Professor of Employment Relations at the University of Salford. His research is concerned with the dynamics of trade union organisation, activity and consciousness in Britain and internationally within both contemporary and historical settings. He is author of The Dynamics of Workplace Unionism (Mansell, 1994) and Radical Unionism (Haymarket, 2013); co-author of Glorious Summer: Class Struggle in Britain, 1972, (Bookmarks, 2001); and editor of What’s the Point of Industrial Relations? In Defence of Critical Social Science (BUIRA, 2009). He is an executive member of the British Universities Industrial Relations Association and secretary of the Manchester Industrial Relations Society. John Dobson has published widely on the operation of labour markets in Central and Eastern Europe and is currently Associated Professor at Riga International College of Economics and Business Administration, Latvia. He was previously a senior lecturer in Industrial Relations at the University of Salford, where he was Head of the School of Management (2002-6) and President -
ARTICLES Rebel Or Revolutionary? Jack Kavanagh and the Early Years of the Communist Movement in Vancouver, 1920-1925
ARTICLES Rebel or Revolutionary? Jack Kavanagh and the Early Years of the Communist Movement in Vancouver, 1920-1925 David Akers DURINGTHE1919VANCOUVERGENERALSTRIKE, the guardians of conventional 'law and order' in the city, the middle-class Citizens League, bemoaned the evils of "Kavanagh Bolshevism" and its "red-eyed vision of Soviet control."1 Jack Kavanagh — a member of the general strike committee, prominent "platform speaker" for the Socialist Party of Canada (SPC), and the provincial chairman of the One Big Union (OBU) in British Columbia — was a prime target for the establishment backlash against labour militancy in Vancouver.2 Red Scare hysterics aside, Kavanagh did, from October 1917, openly embrace the Russian Revolution and its "proletarian dictatorship," as he labelled the Soviet 'Vancouver Citizen, 25 June 1919. "On Kavanagh's role in the 1919 Canadian labour revolt, see Paul A. Phillips, No Power Greater: A Century of Labour in British Columbia (Vancouver 1967), 66-84; Martin Robin, Radical Politics and Canadian Labour, J880-1930 (Kingston 1968), 138-98; A. Ross McCormack, Reformers, Rebels, and Revolutionaries: The Western Canadian Radical Movement, 1899-1919 (Toronto 1977), 145-54; David J. Bercuson, Fools and Wise Men: The Rise and Fall of the One Big Union (Toronto 1978), 57-170; Gerald Friesen, '"Yours in Revolt' : The Socialist Party of Canada and the Western Canadian Labour Movement," in Labour/Le Travail, 1 (1976), 139-55; Dave Adams, "The Canadian Labour Revolt of 1919: The West Coast Story," in Socialist Worker, 161 (November, 1990). David Akers, "Rebel or Revolutionary? Jack Kavanagh and the Early Years of the Com munist Movement in Vancouver, 1920-1925, Labour/Le Travail 30 (Fall 1992), 9-44. -
Women and the Communist Party of Canada, 1932-1941, with Specific Reference to the Activism of Dorothy Livesay and Jim Watts
Mother Russia and the Socialist Fatherland: Women and the Communist Party of Canada, 1932-1941, with specific reference to the activism of Dorothy Livesay and Jim Watts by Nancy Butler A thesis submitted to the Department of History in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Queen’s University Kingston, Ontario, Canada November 2010 Copyright © Nancy Butler, 2010 ii Abstract This dissertation traces a shift in the Communist Party of Canada, from the 1929 to 1935 period of militant class struggle (generally known as the ‘Third Period’) to the 1935-1939 Popular Front Against Fascism, a period in which Communists argued for unity and cooperation with social democrats. The CPC’s appropriation and redeployment of bourgeois gender norms facilitated this shift by bolstering the CPC’s claims to political authority and legitimacy. ‘Woman’ and the gendered interests associated with women—such as peace and prices—became important in the CPC’s war against capitalism. What women represented symbolically, more than who and what women were themselves, became a key element of CPC politics in the Depression decade. Through a close examination of the cultural work of two prominent middle-class female members, Dorothy Livesay, poet, journalist and sometime organizer, and Eugenia (‘Jean’ or ‘Jim’) Watts, reporter, founder of the Theatre of Action, and patron of the Popular Front magazine New Frontier, this thesis utilizes the insights of queer theory, notably those of Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick and Judith Butler, not only to reconstruct both the background and consequences of the CPC’s construction of ‘woman’ in the 1930s, but also to explore the significance of the CPC’s strategic deployment of heteronormative ideas and ideals for these two prominent members of the Party. -
East Germany: for Workers Political Revolution! DECEMBER 19-A Political Revolution Is Unfolding in the German Democratic Republic (DDR)
'11111111111111111111111111 i 111111!lll . 111111 SPARTACIST Winter 1989/90 No. 77 25¢ For Lenin's Communism! East Germany: For Workers Political Revolution! DECEMBER 19-A political revolution is unfolding in the German Democratic Republic (DDR). The leadership of the ruling Stalinist party is in retreat. Plans are afoot to "dissolve" the Stasi, the hated secret police. Within the army, soldiers councils are beginning to form. Meanwhile, the West German financiers and industrialists are on a hard course toward capitalist reunification of Ger many, with the Socialist Party (SPD) acting as their "left" lieutenants, and outright fascists increasingly active in the DDR as the shock troops of capitalist reaction. An East German workers state under thc democratic, internationalist rule of workers councils-soviets-could be the springboard for a united red Germany and a Socialist United States of Europe, Reunification of Germany on a capital ist basis under Helmut Kohl's Fourth Reich means bloody counterrevolution, a resurgence of fascism and the danger Der Spiegel of a third world war. The stakes are Mass demonstration in Leipzig, October 9. No to capitalist reunification! (continued on page 4) For workers councils, now! How Stalinism Wrecked The Communist Party of Canada ......... 12 2 SPARTACIST/Canada Parti§au Defeu!ie tComRmRit~e--------------------- Save Mumia Abu-Jamal! The State of Pennsylvania wants to kill Mumia Abu-Jamal. A former Black Panther Party spokesman, popular Philadel phia journalist and prominent defender of the black radical MOVE organization, Mumia has fought racist oppression since he was 14. And so he was framed up on charges of killing a cop in 1981 and sentenced to die in the electric chair. -
Canada's Location in the World System: Reworking
CANADA’S LOCATION IN THE WORLD SYSTEM: REWORKING THE DEBATE IN CANADIAN POLITICAL ECONOMY by WILLIAM BURGESS BA (Hon.), Queens University, 1978 MA (Plan.), University of British Columbia, 1995 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES Department of Geography We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ __ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA January 2002 © William Burgess, 2002 Abstract Canada is more accurately described as an independent imperialist country than a relatively dependent or foreign-dominated country. This conclusion is reached by examining recent empirical evidence on the extent of inward and outward foreign investment, ownership links between large financial corporations and large industrial corporations, and the size and composition of manufacturing production and trade. -
Haiti's New Dictatorship Justin Podur 20
Haiti's New Dictatorship Justin Podur 20 December 2012 What constitutes a dictatorship? Haiti had an election in 2006, which the popular candidate won. It had an election in 2011, which had one of the lowest turnouts in recent history and which was subject to all kinds of external manipulation. Given these elections, is it unfair to call Haiti, a country that suffered 30 years of classic dictatorship under the Duvaliers from the 1950s to the 1980s, a dictatorship today? When the institutions that govern Haiti today are examined, it is clear that the label ‘dictatorship’ applies. Haitians have no effective say over their own economic and political affairs. Their right to assemble and organize politically is sharply limited. Human rights violations are routine and go unpunished. Popular political parties are effectively banned from running. How is Haiti Governed? Since 2004, the armed force in Haiti has been controlled by the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti, MINUSTAH. Haiti's police are trained, and effectively supervised, by a subset of MINUSTAH, a mission called CIVPOL (usually commanded by Canadians). The current president of Haiti, Michel Martelly, wants to bring back the Haitian Army, but when that army existed, it was also an instrument of another country (the U.S.) and its foreign policy – bringing back the Haitian Army would be no boost to sovereignty or democracy in Haiti. Force is controlled from outside. What about finance? MINUSTAH has a budget of about $676-million. Since the 2010 earthquake, the big charities have spent about the same (around $600-million) in 2010 and 2011. -
Communist Party of Canada
Communist Party of Canada From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search Communist Party of Canada Active Federal Party Founded May 1921 Leader Miguel Figueroa President Miguel Figueroa Headquarters 300 - 279 Laurier Avenue West Ottawa, Ontario K1P 5J9 Political ideology Communism International alignment Solidarity Network Colours Red, Yellow Website http://www.communist-party.ca/ The Communist Party of Canada is a communist political party in Canada. It is a minor political party without elected representation at present in either the federal Parliament or in any provincial legislature. Contents [hide] • 1 History o 1.1 Origins o 1.2 Expulsion of factions o 1.3 Great Depression o 1.4 Labour-Progressive Party o 1.5 Collapse of the Soviet bloc and party split o 1.6 Reconstituted party o 1.7 2005 split • 2 General Secretaries of the CPC • 3 Central Executive Committee • 4 Election results o 4.1 By-elections • 5 See also • 6 External links [edit] History [edit] Origins The Communist Party was organized with great secrecy in a barn near the city of Guelph, Ontario, in May 1921. Many of its founding members had belonged to groups such as the Socialist Party of Canada, One Big Union, the Socialist Labor Party, the Industrial Workers of the World, and other socialist, Marxist or Labour parties or clubs. The party was founded as the Canadian section of the Comintern, and was thus similar to Communist parties around the world. The party alternated between legality and illegality during the 1920s and 1930s. It was initially illegal, and created the Workers' Party of Canada in 1922 as its public face. -
THE FIGHT AGAINST PLATFORM CAPITALISM JAMIE WOODCOCK Uwestminsterpress.Co.Uk (2019) and the Gig Economy (2019), Marx at the Arcade
THE FIGHT AGAINST PLATFORM CAPITALISM PLATFORM AGAINST FIGHT THE THE FIGHT AGAINST PLATFORM CAPITALISM CDSMS o far, platform work has been an important laboratory for capital. Management techniques, like the use of algorithms, are being tested Swith a view to exporting across the global economy and it is argued that automation is undermining workers’ agency. Although the contractual trick of self-employment has allowed platforms to grow quickly and keep JAMIE WOODCOCK their costs down, yet it has also been the case also that workers have also found they can strike without following the existing regulations. This book develops a critique of platforms and platform capitalism from the perspective of workers and contributes to the ongoing debates about the future of work and worker organising. It presents an alternative portrait THE FIGHT AGAINST returning to a focus on workers’ experience, focusing on solidarity, drawing out a global picture of new forms of agency. In particular, the book focuses on three dynamics that are driving struggles in the platform economy: PLATFORM CAPITALISM the increasing connections between workers who are no longer isolated; the lack of communication and negotiation from platforms, leading to escalating worker action around shared issues; and the internationalisation of platforms, which has laid the basis for new transnational solidarity. An Inquiry into the Global Focusing on transport and courier workers, online workers and freelancers, author Jamie Woodcock concludes by considering how Struggles of the Gig Economy workers build power in different situations. Rather than undermining worker agency, platforms have instead provided the technical basis for the emergence of new global struggles against capitalism. -
The Limits Upon a Labor Union's Duty to Control Wildcat Strikes
Volume 84 Issue 4 Article 8 June 1982 The Limits upon a Labor Union's Duty to Control Wildcat Strikes James Bryan Zimarowski West Virginia University College of Law Follow this and additional works at: https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/wvlr Part of the Labor and Employment Law Commons Recommended Citation James B. Zimarowski, The Limits upon a Labor Union's Duty to Control Wildcat Strikes, 84 W. Va. L. Rev. (1982). Available at: https://researchrepository.wvu.edu/wvlr/vol84/iss4/8 This Student Note is brought to you for free and open access by the WVU College of Law at The Research Repository @ WVU. It has been accepted for inclusion in West Virginia Law Review by an authorized editor of The Research Repository @ WVU. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Zimarowski: The Limits upon a Labor Union's Duty to Control Wildcat Strikes THE LIMITS UPON A LABOR UNION'S "DUTY" TO CONTROL WILDCAT STRIKES OVERVIEW Industrial relations and collective bargaining have come a long way since the violent industrial and economic warfare of the pre-1940's period. But as labor unions and business organizations became more facially "professional" in their relationship, some union rank and file members have viewed this professionalism as being both restrictive and conservative and have chosen to resolve certain industrial grievances through the use of wildcat work stop- pages.1 This discordant practice has created strains in the collective bargaining relationship of the negotiating union and the employer, in legal actions to enforce the collective bargaining argeement, in- the relationship between the union and its membership, and often in the employer-employee relationship, all of which are disruptive to the scope and purpose of collective bargaining under the federal labor laws. -
Employment Security and Job Loss: Lessons from Canada's National Railways, 1956-1995
Employment Security and Job Loss: Lessons from Canada's National Railways, 1956-1995 Leslie Ehrlich and Bob Russell Introduction TRADE UNIONS have generally been viewed as an apparatus of employment regula tion that gives workers a voice and some power over determining the conditions of the employment contract. Among other things, unions have been identified with representation and industrial democracy in a pluralist society, interest aggregation in the exercise of collective bargaining, the integration of workers into a dominant system of production, and the carriers of an alternative social vision. ' All of this as sumes an employment relationship that is relatively stable and continuous. What do unions do when this is not the case? Although the role of job control unionism is well understood, and with it the regulation of internal labour markets through such principles as seniority and bumping rights, less is known about how unions respond to large scale permanent employment loss.2 Examples of these differing positions on trade unions may be found in Sidney and Beatrice Webb, Industrial Democracy (London 1920); Selig Perlman, A Theory of the Labor Move ment (New York 1966); Claus Offe, Disorganized Capitalism: Contemporary Transforma tions of Work and Politics (Cambridge 1985), Chapter 7; Colin Crouch, Trade Unions: The Logic of Collective Action (Glasgow 1982); Richard Hyman, Industrial Relations: A Marx ist Introduction (London 1975); and Gregory S. Kealey and Bryan D. Palmer, Dreaming of What Might Be: The Knights of Labor in Ontario, 1880-1900 (Cambridge 1982), respec tively. 2 A thorough account of job control unionism is provided by Thomas Kochan et al., The Transformation of American Industrial Relations (New York 1986). -
By BEN ISITT B.A. (Honours), University of Victoria, 2001 a THESIS
THE SEARCH FOR SOLIDARITY: THE INDUSTRIAL AND POLITICAL ROOTS OF THE COOPERATIVE COMMONWEALTH FEDERATION IN BRITISH COLUMBIA, 1913-1928 by BEN ISITT B.A. (Honours), University of Victoria, 2001 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS OF THE DEGREE MASTER OF ARTS in the Department of History We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard _____________________________________________________ Eric W. Sager, Supervisor (Department of History) _____________________________________________________ Patricia Roy, Department Member (Department of History) _____________________________________________________ Ian MacPherson, Department Member (Department of History) _____________________________________________________ Gordon Hak, External Examiner (Malaspina University-College) © Ben Isitt, 2003 University of Victoria All rights reserved. This thesis may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy or other means, without the permission of the author. ii Supervisor: Eric W. Sager Abstract Born out of the industrial and political struggles of organized labour at the end of the First World War, the BC CCF was a product of organizational and ideological conflict in the 1910s and 1920s. This study explores the shift of BC socialism towards industrial action, which culminated in the One Big Union and the sympathetic strikes of 1919. It then examines the emergence of anti-Communism on the Left, shaped by the experience of political unity and disunity during the 1920s. These two factors fundamentally influenced the ideology and strategy adopted by the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) in British Columbia. The ideological and tactical divisions of the 1930s were contested during the 1910s and 1920s. The collapse of the One Big Union, combined with deteriorating relations with the Communist Party, shifted BC socialists away from industrial militancy and toward parliamentary forms of struggle. -
The Fight Against Platform Capitalism: an Inquiry Into the Global Struggles of the Gig Economy
CHAPTER 1 Introduction This book is about the struggles of platform workers. The ideas for it began in London in June 2016 when I met a Deliveroo rider. I had heard the name Deliveroo before, but did not know much about it. As is often the case with these things, I then started to see riders across the city. I saw them waiting at traffic lights or outside restaurants. The green and silver uniform became a common sight across the city. At the time, I had just finished writing a book about call centres. These Deliveroo riders seemed to be another category of so-called ‘unorganisable’ workers. There were arguments from universities and the labour movement that many workers could not be ‘organisable’. For example, the Labour MP Siobhain McDonagh argued that Deliveroo workers ‘are not in the same workplace and there is not the same unity of cause. There is always somebody who will do it if you don’t want to’ (quoted in Osborne and Butler 2016). In a similar vein, Alex Wood, who studies the gig economy, argued that ‘there’s a high turnover of people and there’s low market bargain- ing power. If they go on strike it’s not going to bring the economy to a halt, unlike coal miners or rail workers’ (quoted in Osborne and Butler 2016). Commentators blamed precarity, youth, the nature of the work, technology, or a combination of these factors. These were all arguments I had come across with high-volume sales call centres in London. This was not the first – and would not be the last – time I would hear that platform workers such as those at Deliveroo could not organise.