CANADIAN CENTRE FOR POLICY ALTERNATIVES MARCH/APRIL 2019 $6.95 Contributors

Jeremy Appel is an education Richard Girard is an Ottawa- Richard Girard is an Ottawa- and justice reporter for the based educator, activist and based educator, activist and Medicine Hat News. researcher with the Union of researcher with the Union of Safety and Justice Employees. Safety and Justice Employees. Zaee Deshpande is a master's Vol. 25, No. 6 ISSN 1198-497X student in the Institute of Paul Moist is a research Jon Weier is a historian Canada Post Publication 40009942 Political Economy at Carleton associate with the CCPA- of war and society who University and currently an Manitoba and past national also writes and lectures Monitor The is published six times intern at the CCPA’s national president of the Canadian on Canadian identity and a year by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. office in Ottawa. Union of Public Employees. the politics of history, commemoration and memory, Bruno Dobrusin is a labour Erika Shaker is a senior The opinions expressed in the public and active history, Monitor are those of the authors organizer based in Toronto. researcher with the CCPA and the history of the left in and do not necessarily reflect He is the co-ordinator of and director of the centre’s Canada. the views of the CCPA. the One Million Climate education project. Please send feedback to Jobs campaign at the Green Kathleen Ruff is a longtime [email protected]. Economy Network. human rights advocate, a Editor: Stuart Trew Gerald Dragon is a CCPA-BC research associate Senior Designer: Tim Scarth community worker and radio and founder of the website Layout: Susan Purtell Editorial Board: Alyssa O’Dell, show host grounded on www.rightoncanada.ca. unceded Algonquin terrritory. Shannon Daub, Katie Raso, Erika Jim Hodgson is the Latin Shaker, Rick Telfer The Graphic History America/Caribbean Program Contributing Writers: Collective is a group of Co-ordinator at the United HELP US SHED LIGHT ON THE Lynne Fernandez, artists, researchers and Church of Canada. Elaine Hughes, Asad Ismi writers interested in comics, Tom Sandborn lives and CCPA National Office: history and social justice. works on unceded Indigenous ISSUES THAT MATTER TO YOU. 141 Laurier Avenue W, Suite 1000 Their comics show that you land in Vancouver. He was Ottawa, ON K1P 5J3 don’t need a cape and a one of several hundred Tel: 613-563-1341 pair of tights to change the Fax: 613-233-1458 arrestees last spring (we’ve got some bright ideas) world. In January 2019, the [email protected] protesting the Trans Mountain collective released Direct www.policyalternatives.ca pipeline development. CCPA BC Office: Action Gets the Goods: A 520-700 West Pender Street Graphic History of the Strike in Vancouver, BC V6C 1G8 Canada and 1919: A Graphic Tel: 604-801-5121 History of the Winnipeg MAKE A DONATION Tax receipts are issued for contributions of $15 or more. Fax: 604-801-5122 General Strike, both published [email protected] by Between the Lines. CCPA Manitoba Office: I would like to make a monthly contribution of: I would like to make a one-time donation of: Unit 205-765 Main Street Winnipeg, MB R2W 3N5 $25 $15 $10 Other ____ OR $300 $100 $75 Other ____ Tel: 204-927-3200 Fax: 204-927-3201 [email protected] PAYMENT TYPE: CCPA Nova Scotia Office: I would like to receive my P.O. Box 8355 I’ve enclosed a cheque (made payable to CCPA, or void cheque for monthly donation) Halifax, NS B3K 5M1 subscription to The Monitor: Tel: 902-240-0926 I’d like to make my contribution by: VISA MASTERCARD [email protected] By e-mail CCPA Ontario Office: Mailed to my address 720 Bathurst Street, Room 307 CREDIT CARD NUMBER: Toronto, ON M5S 2R4 No Monitor, thanks Tel: 416-598-5985 EXPIRY DATE: SIGNATURE: [email protected] CCPA Saskatchewan Office: 2nd Floor, 2138 McIntyre Street Regina, SK S4P 2R7 CONTACT INFORMATION Tel: 306-924-3372 Fax: 306-586-5177 Kara Sievewright is an artist Return this form to: [email protected] Name Book reviews in the and writer who mainly creates poetic fiction comics 500-251 BANK ST. Monitor are co-ordinated Address OTTAWA, ON K2P 1X3 by Octopus Books, a and social justice–themed non-fiction comics and community-owned anti- illustrations. She lives on City Province Postal Code oppressive bookstore in Or donate online at: Haida Gwaii as a settler on The Monitor is a proud member Ottawa. WWW.POLICYALTERNATIVES.CA of Magazines Canada. unceded Haida territory. Telephone (Required) Email

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Perspectives on direct action from Paul Moist, Jon Weier, Julie Guard, Molly McCracken, Kevin Rebeck, Lynne Fernandez, the Graphic History Collective, Erika Shaker, Bruno Dobrusin and Zaee Deshpande. /12

UP FRONT FEATURES All you need to know South African labour launches about carbon pricing new challenge to the ANC Asad Ismi 34 Marc Lee 5 How we beat the asbestos lobby The new politics of eating Kathleen Ruff 36 Letisha Toop 8 Nicaragua’s complicated Canada needs a Green New Deal conversation about the Ortegas Hannah Muhajarine 9 Jim Hodgson 38

Editorial 2 | Letters 3 | New From the CCPA 4 | Index 7 | Good News Page 40 | Books 41 From the Editor

STUART TREW Direct action, then and now

N JANUARY, TENS of thousands of of the Graphic History Collective, we brutally suppressed Paris Commune Mexican factory workers in the north- spend a good part of the magazine of March to May 1871, and they would eastern border town of Matamoros talking about the strike—not only as a be the first onto the street during the Iwalked off the job to demand fair tool for improving wages and working Winnipeg General Strike. CCPA-Man- wages. The estimated 30,000 to 40,000 conditions, but also for building social itoba Director Molly McCracken maquiladora workers (out of a total lo- connections and solidarity, and achiev- interviews Julie Guard, panellist at cal workforce of 70,000) were incensed ing big-picture progressive change. the “Building a Better World: 1919-2019” that their employers—foreign-owned, “Workers can make great gains by conference happening this May, about export-oriented auto parts firms and withdrawing their labour power. But women’s continued subordination in other manufacturers—had cancelled they also risk a lot,” writes the collective Canadian workplaces and how the employee bonuses in response to a gov- in the intro to our cover feature. “The #metoo movement and smart union ernment-mandated doubling of the stakes in class struggle are high.” organizing might fix that (page 22). minimum wage in the border region That is as true for Mexico’s maqui- Perhaps no group of workers has effective January 1. ladora workers today as it was for the done more for the current North Amer- At 176.72 pesos (about $12) per day, 35,000 Winnipeg workers, only a third ican union movement than teachers. President Andrés Manuel López Ob- of them unionized, who walked off the “The teachers’ unions, I would say, have rador’s new minimum wage was close job on May 15, 1919 in sympathy with the almost singlehandedly led to resurgent to what the maquiladora workers building trades and metal trade coun- interest in unions,” says Anchor Brew- were already earning, but still far less cils, launching the globally significant ing worker Brace Belden, who is trying than what those workers would have Winnipeg General Strike. As Paul Moist to organize a union at San Francisco’s made in the 1980s. Factory owners’ recounts in his reflections on the legacy iconic craft beer factory, in a February decision to cancel important wage of 1919 (page 14), “the general strike was a interview with Jacobin magazine. “And top-ups was the last straw. Defying large and difficult defeat for the workers the teachers’ unions keep winning, their union leadership, workers went involved.” Thousands were sacked or re- which is encouraging. The teachers’ un- on strike and in early February won a hired under the same lousy conditions ions are probably our biggest influence, 20% wage increase and 32,000 pesos and pay; civic workers who joined the honestly.” Erika Shaker, who directs the bonus (about $2,200). strike were only allowed to return to CCPA’s education project, wonders if Inspired by the maquiladora victory, work after pledging their allegiance to Canada’s education community can’t other unions at the border with the U.S. the city and promising never to engage also seize the moment to bring educa- and across Mexico have organized wild- in sympathy action again. tors and education workers, parents and cat strikes to demand the same deal. But as Manitoba Federation of La- students together in a grand coalition “[T]he strike wave has spread beyond bour President Kevin Rebeck points for public education renewal (page 28). the factories to supermarkets and out (page 19), the direct action rever- As the One Big Union would say, di- other employers, with all the workers berated across the country. “Every rect action gets the goods, but it’s not a demanding ‘20/32,’” notes the AFL-CIO, existing government from Winnipeg guarantee of success. For every sympa- which is lending international support outward changed after that strike, and thetic honk for a striking teacher there to the strikers. While the U.S. labour fed- we saw action that benefited workers,” is someone sharing a racist post on Face- eration praised the wage hike as good he says. Though strikers were labelled book about immigrants or refugees. In news, they point out that the bosses are Bolsheviks by the business elite and that sense, and considering the gap be- already striking back with help from press, or denounced as immigrants tween rich and poor is wider now than the Confederation of Mexican Workers. out to steal local jobs, public opinion it was in 1919, the political and economic In the first week of February, “as many stayed on the workers’ side. Several realities facing workers are remarkably as 2,000 strike leaders have been fired union organizers were elected to office similar to what they were leading up to, and blacklisted, despite legal prohi- in Manitoba from their jail cells, others during and after the Winnipeg General bitions and non-reprisal agreements would take positions on city council Strike. A fully autonomous car is still signed by the employers.” and in the federal House of Commons. a car, after all; a precarious retail job The Mexican workers’ direct action The prominent role that women wouldn’t pay the bills 40 years ago and and the response to it from the coun- played in workers’ struggles in Canada certainly can’t in 2019. Our duty, today as try’s powerful offer about as good a and globally in the late-19th and ear- always, is to fight for fair pay and good prologue as any to this special issue ly-20th centuries cannot be overstated. jobs for everyone—or be prepared to of the Monitor. As you’ll have guessed Women were the last to leave the live in a world where neither exists for from the cover art by Kara Sievewright barricades during the short-lived and anyone. M 2 developments and use the That’s the turns out that the ticket public money saved to put ticket system pays only for its T people to work building our own existence, the transit new green, clean economy. As Canadian cities grow systems could continue and sprawl, transportation to operate on the existing Francis Blundell, and mobility become more subsidies, without any Victoria, B.C. and more vital and essen- ticket revenue or need for tial. The article by Michelle additional taxation. It’s not The Monitor’s coverage Perry in the January/ a “free ride”; it’s already paid of the Trans Mountain February issue, “Is transit for in different places. Leers pipeline perhaps caused a right?”, is a welcome, Even if a little tax revenue you to miss concerns about informed and thoughtful was still required, most the liquefied natural gas contribution to the citizens would be quite (LNG) pipeline in northern discussion. Much attention pleasantly surprised to B.C., which has split band is naturally focused on the have an immediate, very Neocolonialism councillors and traditional financial aspects of free useful, visible example of today chiefs over the use of the transit, but I feel there is personal benefit from such land. The pipeline company still one very important a charge. Let’s continue Colonialism is not negotiated the passage of consideration lacking: the the discussion that could dead. It has merely the pipeline with the bands total cost of the ticket get people to their jobs, been transformed and who claim they need to rid collection process in public schools, hospitals, shops, reorganized by and for the their reserves of poverty. transportation. families, etc. unburdened super-wealthy of the world, Traditional chiefs, with their The costs of vehicles, by the unnecessary cost of who work together through longer-range concerns for drivers, maintenance, an antiquated transit fare multinational corporations future generations, would fuel, etc. are obviously system. to control people, society prefer not to cut down the necessary and unavoidable Donald L. Roberts, and their governments, trees and dig the earth for in any transit system, but Kitchener, Ontario using international the pipeline’s path. can the same be said for trade agreements and According to society’s the sale, collection and regulations to maximize law the bands are right. enforcement of tickets? profit and wealth among But according to the It would be very helpful if Correction people who will never be hereditary chief’s concern someone would do a totally satisfied. This colonial for the children, the berry separate accounting of ALL A graph on page 10 of the capitalism is destroying pickers and the traditional the costs involved, starting January/February issue society, democracy and our medicine seekers, another with the machinery and showing household ex- world’s environment based law exists. It appears that equipment: to produce penditures on prescription on the neoliberal doctrine resource development tickets and passes; to drug costs mistakenly listed of Milton Friedman, who always impinges on collect and count them; out-of-pocket expenses as believed the only role of traditional lands. We to build the fences and workplace drug plan ex- business is to maximize know that burning LNG gates necessary to protect penses and vice versa. The profit with no social anywhere in the world will the system from cheaters, graph has been corrected responsibility for the public increase global warming along with the booths an in the online version of the or society. and, as Monitor articles offices devoted to ticket Monitor. Thank you to Mark We must change our goal have noted, emissions from sales; and to hire the staff Brown of Victoria, B.C. for from maximizing profit to the pipeline will use up to necessary to carry out all pointing out the mistake. taking care of the planet, two-thirds of B.C.’s 2050 the necessary security, its environment and all the emissions limit. Can we sales and other functions. wonderful people, societies wait this long to see if the Wouldn’t it be surprising and life that depend on it. use of fossil fuels will meet if ticket revenue barely We must stop the mining this limit? The traditional covered the cost of the fare and burning of fossil fuel chiefs don’t think so, yet the system? and transition to the renew- developers see no problem. All public transit systems able green energy economy depend on subsidies from Barry Hammond, of the future. To start this the existing tax base for Winnipeg, Manitoba transition, we must stop their operation. All citizens Send all letters to monitor@ the building of the Trans (and visitors) contribute to policyalternatives.ca. We Mountain pipeline project the revenue of the general will contact you if we plan and the massive B.C. civic financial base through on running your letter in a liquefied natural gas (LNG) many other ways. If it future issue. 3 and Charlottetown, PEI. mothers of children that support to B.C. Director Fees dropped by an average age go to work, and; Shannon Daub and Director (median) 13% in St. John’s, deprives low income of Operations and Finance NL, reflecting a government families of subsidies based Mariwan Jaaf. move to cap and subsidize on eligibility rates frozen in fees. They are also down the 1980s. in Edmonton for preschool At the end of January, Saving Canada’s spaces, according to the the CCPA’s Nova Scotia auto jobs CCPA survey. office released the New from Two more CCPA reports report “Unappreciated The announcement by GM the CCPA out this winter narrow in and Underpaid”: Early that it would be shuttering on the child care situations Childhood Educators in its Oshawa, Ontario in Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia. Authors assembly plant this year hit Nova Scotia. In the first, Christine Saulnier and hard. Not only is Canadian Child care: what goes up Saskatchewan’s Failing Lesley Frank interviewed auto production productive can come down Report Card on Child Care, child care sector workers and profitable for the authors Courtney Carlberg and their employers to find companies involved, but it For the fifth year running, and Jen Budney find the out what factors contribute comes with considerable the CCPA has studiously province’s child care model: to the latter’s ability to associated benefits for the gathered child care fees in continues to be based on recruit and retain ECEs. Canadian economy. In a 28 large Canadian cities to outdated and inaccurate Inadequate government new report for the CCPA, present a snapshot of the views of the family; can supports and a lack of The Future of the Canadian costs of raising children accommodate only 18% of replacement workers are Auto Industry, authors across the country. For children aged 5 and under leading to burnout, they John Holmes and Charlotte most of those years our while 70% of Saskatchewan find, but implementing Yates make the case for data showed that fees, higher wages within much more co-operation already excessive for most systemwide reforms between the federal and % CHANGE IN MEDIAN families, were trending PRESCHOOLER FEE focused on child health and provincial governments, upward and rising faster BETWEEN 2017 AND 2018 well-being would go a long and between the provinces than inflation. That is still (Inflation=3%) way to fixing the problem. and U.S. states, in the mostly the case, as the -12.5 St. John’s development of an integrat- graph here shows, but -6.0 Edmonton ed industrial strategy to there is also evidence that maintain the Great Lakes -5.1 Toronto CCPA-BC welcomes policy can provide relief for region as a major interna- -0.5 Richmond Emira Mears! parents. tional auto-producing hub. -0.2 Oawa “More provinces are The Canadian Centre As they explain in their Charloetown 0 using public policy to make for Policy Alternatives’ detailed analysis, simply Saint John 0 child care more affordable,” B.C. Office is pleased to inducing international Windsor 0 notes David Macdonald, welcome Emira Mears automakers to establish Winnipeg 0 senior economist at the as their new Associate or maintain production in Calgary 1.0 CCPA and a co-author, with Director. Emira is an accom- Ontario will not be enough Saskatoon 2.8 Martha Friendly, of the plished communications to ensure the viability London 3.3 new report Developmental professional and digital of Canadian auto R&D 3.6 Milestones: Child Care Quebec City strategist who has, through and manufacturing into Fees in Canada’s Big Cities. Longueuil 3.6 her former company the future given intense “But these bright spots are Laval 3.6 Raised Eyebrow, worked competitive pressures from overshadowed by the fact Gatineau 3.6 with many organizations other regions, including the that fees in Canada remain Regina 3.8 in the progressive sector, southern United States and astronomical, outpacing Montreal 3.9 including non-profits, Mexico. inflation in most cities.” Kitchener 4.5 unions and public institu- Child care remains most Hamilton 4.9 tions. A published author expensive in the General Vancouver 5.3 and a longtime feminist Toronto and Hamilton Area, Vaughan 5.3 community leader, Emira Halifax 5.3 where infant fees (children will lead the CCPA-BC’s For more reports, 6.0 under the age of 3) can Markham stellar communications commentary and top $1,600 a month, and Surrey 6.3 team, which includes Terra infographics from the least expensive in Quebec Burnaby 7.1 Poirier, Lindsey Bertrand CCPA’s national and (less than $200 a month) Mississauga 7.2 and Jean Kavanagh, and provincial offices, visit followed by Winnipeg, MB Brampton 9.1 provide organizational www.policyalternatives.ca. 4 Up Front

PHOTO BY NICK FULLERTON, FLICKR CREATIVE COMMONS

MARC LEE | NATIONAL conversation. Second, we need to back away from a narrow carbon pricing ap- Carbon pricing proach and reconsider more politically acceptable regulations, marketplace Prospects and protests standards and public investments.

he federal government’s plan to credibility of a government’s climate How did we get here? put a price on carbon is set to be plan. A price on carbon, no matter The intuition for carbon pricing is that Ta top issue heading into October’s how small, is widely applauded for its the pollution associated with producing federal election. The carbon pricing efficient, market-friendly approach to goods and services causes damages backstop, which lets provinces and reducing emissions. that are not reflected in the sale price. territories implement their own plans Here’s the problem: existing and In the jargon of economics, pollution but imposes a minimum carbon tax on near-term carbon taxes are too small is an external cost of production, or those who do not, has drawn the ire to have much impact, while higher “externality.” Carbon pricing aims to of provincial governments in Ontario, carbon prices that would actually make “internalize the externality” by adding Manitoba, Saskatchewan and New a dent in behaviour seem to be political a tax or fee to reflect those costs. In Brunswick. non-starters. Even if there was no pro- doing so, the theory goes, prices more Carbon pricing has become some- vincial opposition to the federal carbon fully reflect the real costs of production, thing of an obsession—to a degree pricing plan, Canada would still miss products will be more expensive and unseen in any other area of public its greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction markets will allocate resources more policy. Advocates, including most of targets by a wide margin. efficiently. Canada’s environmental groups and To solve this conundrum we need Getting from the textbook ideal many policy analysts and academics, to do two things. First, bring notions to the real world, however, is more have made it the litmus test of the of equity and fairness back into the challenging. Putting a dollar value on 5 such damages is tricky. What’s the the federal level ($43 per tonne of CO2). B.C.’s current government increased value of a lost species? How do you Some urban areas like Metro Vancouver the carbon tax modestly in 2018 to $35 translate adverse health impacts into have an additional regional fuel tax (17 per tonne, with three more annual ($5)

dollars? How much damage is caused cents per litre or $72 per tonne of CO2). increases scheduled. These increases by one metre of sea level rise? Some put B.C. only slightly ahead of the fed- observers scoff at the entire notion of eral carbon price backstop, which will putting dollar values on impacts that Lessons from B.C. be $50 per tonne (11.6 cents per litre) cannot inherently be measured. Those These issues around fairness and ef- in 2022. who attempt to make estimates are fectiveness have played out for more On the other hand, low levels of a car- often restricted to measuring impacts than a decade in British Columbia, bon tax still generate a lot of revenue. At in terms of use-value to humans. North America’s poster child for carbon $35 per tonne, B.C.’s carbon tax will pull Thus, we have no idea how high a pricing. B.C.’s first phase of carbon in just shy of $1.5 billion in 2018-19. The carbon tax should be to “internalize pricing occurred between 2008 and potential of that revenue stream to fund the externality.” Since we don’t want 2012 under the Liberal government of climate action investments is significant to shock households and businesses Gordon Campbell; the current second and may be more important than the with a sudden spike in prices, the policy phase was initiated by the NDP minority “price signal” of the tax itself. Such rev- answer has been to start with a small government (backed by the BC Greens) enues can also be used to compensate tax and then increase it annually. in conjunction with the federal carbon low and moderate income households Where fairness comes into play is that pricing plan. to make the system more fair. carbon taxes are regressive, meaning B.C.’s carbon tax started out at $10 Instead, the previous government’s

low income households pay a greater per tonne of CO2 emitted in July 2008 policy was “revenue neutrality,” with share of their income to the tax than (2.3 cents per litre at the pump), and carbon tax revenue largely used to pay higher income households. To address then rose to $30 per tonne as of July for corporate income tax cuts, plus this regressive impact, a central design 2012 (7 cents per litre). The carbon tax smaller amounts to personal income issue is to ensure a share of carbon tax featured prominently in the 2009 pro- tax cuts and a low income climate revenues flows back to low and mod- vincial election, won by the BC Liberals action credit. Endorsed by economists, erate income households in the form in spite of a very negative “axe the tax” revenue neutrality was supposed to of credit. campaign from the opposition NDP. The make the carbon tax more palatable In addition, most households have BC Liberals later abandoned carbon to the public, but for most households relatively little ability to change their pricing increases when the tax hit $30 it is counterintuitive. People may not behaviour in the short run. We live in per tonne in 2012, and sidelined climate like paying taxes, but when they do, a society structured around the use of action altogether in favour of doubling they want to see results for their money. fossil fuels—there are limits to how down of fossil fuels by developing a Importantly, the current B.C. govern- much we can realistically change, liquefied natural gas (LNG) industry. ment broke with the policy of revenue on our own, in our everyday lives. We neutrality and has also increased the might be able to control how much we amount of the low-income credit. These drive (depending on the availability of are positive developments to improve public transit and how far we live from the fairness of B.C.’s carbon tax regime. our place of work) or whether to turn down the thermostat (depending on where we live and how well-insulated Households vs. industry our home is). Over a longer period of Another challenge with carbon pricing time, consumers make decisions about in practice is that it tends to predomi- what type of car they will buy or what nantly fall on households, not industry. furnace they will install—but at the Industrial emissions comprise the lion’s time a carbon tax is imposed they will It would make a share of emissions in Canada, but feel burdened, particularly if there are big difference if carbon pricing for industry has been no readily available alternatives. watered down due to concerns about Carbon tax proponents also tend to revenues collected “competitiveness.” ignore another “price on carbon” in the are tied to actions For large industrial emitters the fed- form of fuel taxes. From a consumer per- eral government will only be charging spective, fuel taxes amount to the same Canadians can a carbon price on the portion of their thing and they are larger than the fully see, like building emissions above an “output-based phased-in $50-per-tonne carbon price emissions limit.” And companies will backstop. They range from 13 cents per new infrastructure, also be able to buy credits from com- litre of gas in Alberta to 19.2 cents per building transit panies that beat their own thresholds litre in Quebec at the provincial level (in or, much worse, use carbon offsets carbon terms, $55 to $82 per tonne of lines or retrofitting that have a poor track record due to CO2), and another 10 cents per litre at homes. accounting tricks. 6 In its new CleanBC climate plan, the B.C. government 1000x has a slightly different take. It will rebate the incremental Factor by which BPA levels in carbon tax paid (that above $30 per tonne) to industrial receipts exceed the amount of performers who meet a GHG intensity benchmark. Some the chemical in food can lining. of the remaining carbon tax paid by industry will be used to support clean energy investments. 4 µg/kg bw/day The upshot: the notion of a carbon price signal rippling Tolerable daily intake of BPA through the economy and making markets work better as set by the European Food has been abandoned. Simon Fraser University energy Safety Authority in 2015. The economist Mark Jaccard, once a proponent of carbon Index EFSA is currently re-evaluating pricing, now argues instead for flexible regulations and Cheque this out BPA hazards. marketplace standards. If you look closely, B.C.’s new climate plan avoids being 67.14x more aggressive on carbon pricing in favour of regulations Average spike in the amount and standards, such as mandating a certain percentage 2010 of BPS in the bodies of of passenger vehicles be zero-emission by a certain date Canada becomes first country four participants in an and introducing tighter energy efficiency regulations for to ban the use of bisphenol Environmental Defence new buildings. A (BPA) in the production of experiment after handling In terms of public opinion, people seem much more baby bottles. BPA and the cash receipts for 17 minutes, willing to embrace regulations on companies rather than closely related chemical the average amount of time a visible carbon tax. While regulations may also lead to bisphenol S (BPS) are known a cashier handles receipts higher prices, their advantage is being hidden from view. for their hormone or endocrine over an eight-hour shift. Prior And in hindsight such regulations usually end up being disrupting effects in animals; to the experiment, the four much less costly than anticipated. BPA has been linked to participants had gone on a diabetes, obesity, ADHD in BPA/BPS detox by avoiding children and hormone-based all products and containers What’s next? cancers such as breast and known to include the The main takeaway from the federal-provincial skirmishes prostate cancer. chemicals. is that politics matter. The federal government’s carbon price backstop includes another form of revenue neu- 8 million 115x trality by rebating any carbon tax it collects back to the Number of tonnes of BPA used Spike in the level of one originating province. Recently it has been proposed that globally in 2016 to make hard participant who had used hand these revenues would flow directly to households in the plastic, epoxy resins to line sanitizer before handling the provinces that do not develop their own carbon pricing food cans, and thermal paper receipts for 17 minutes. plans and instead pay the federal backstop price, but it’s used globally in cash register not clear whether this will improve the plan’s popularity. receipts, train and airplane 250,000 The politics of carbon pricing from a decade ago linger boarding passes, etc. Number of women who worked today. In the 2008 federal election campaign then-Liberal as cashiers in 2016. Pregnant leader Stephan Dion proposed a tax shift modelled on 90% women and children are more B.C.’s carbon tax. It failed dismally. Then-prime minister Number of Canadians exposed susceptible to the estrogen Stephen Harper, for his part, derided the carbon tax as a to BPA every day. mimicking effects of both BPA “tax on everything.” Perhaps he saw correctly where public and BPS. opinion lay by calling instead for regulations on a sector-by 0.042 µg/kg bw/day sector basis (although his government never got around Probabilistic dietary exposure 2020 to implementing them). to BPA (not counting exposure Year the European Union Carbon pricing can be one part of the solution on cli- to receipts) for women in proposes to ban the use of mate change, but it may well be more effective to lean on the general population in BPA/BPS in all receipts. regulation and standards. It would also make a big differ- micrograms per kilogram ence if revenues collected are tied to actions Canadians of body weight per day, as can see, like building new infrastructure, building transit estimated by Canadian lines or retrofitting homes. Combined with a broad-based regulators in 2012. credit to address the regressive element of the tax, this could be a winning formula for Canada. M MARC LEE IS A SENIOR ECONOMIST WITH THE CCPA-BC.

SOURCES “The hidden cost of receipts: How BPA and BPS find their way into our bodies,” Environmental Defence, February 2019; European Food Safety Authority webpage on bisphenol A (accessed February 13, 2019); Health Canada's Updated Assessment of Bisphenol A (BPA) Exposure from Food Sources, September 2018 (accessed February 13, 2019). 7 FOOD FACTS LETISHA TOOP | NATIONAL Sustainable eating In the largest prospective study of vegetarian diets, Food for thought from the people following vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian or EAT-Lancet Commission semi-vegetarian diets had a 12% lower overall mortality risk than did omnivores; recent report published by the Lancet interference with global nitrogen and phos- the lowest risk was among found that in order to create a sus- phorus cycles, and land-system change. All of pescatarian (vegetarian plus Atainable planet there will need to be the EAT-Lancet Commission’s recommended fish) diets. unprecedented collaboration on a global scale strategies would address these dangerous and to transform how we produce and eat food. rapid environmental changes. Reaching the Paris This “Great Food Transformation,” as the report However, the report also makes it clear that Agreement to limit global calls it, is eminently achievable and should while implementing these changes in food pro- warming to well below happen sooner rather than later. duction practices would indeed have a positive 2 degrees Celsius, while The EAT-Lancet Commission is an in- environmental impact—reducing agricultural aiming for 1.5 degrees, dependent scientific body made up of 19 greenhouse gas emissions in 2050 by about is not possible by only commissioners and 18 co-authors of various 10%—the real key to reaching environmental decarbonizing the global backgrounds (e.g., health, agriculture, envi- goals lies in changing our diets. The increased energy system; food systems ronmental sustainability) from 16 countries. consumption of plant-based diets could reduce that can provide negative Their goal: develop global scientific targets for emissions by up to 80%, says the report. Much of emissions (i.e., function as a healthy diets and food production practices the power to create a sustainable future there- major carbon sink instead of that would allow countries to meet their UN fore lies with individuals, local communities a major carbon source) while Sustainable Development Goals while also and local governments whose environmental protecting carbon sinks in respecting the Paris Agreement. and health policy changes could have a huge natural ecosystems are both An important new reference diet in the impact globally. required to reach this goal. report aims to encourage the consumption There is some recent progress on sustainable Food production consumes of a sustainable diet with adequate intakes of food systems in Canada. The newly released por- more water than any other protein, carbohydrates, fruits, vegetables and tion of Canada’s Food Guide appears to follow industrial sector: 70% of all fat. Protein should come mainly, if not exclu- much of the research from the Lancet report. As global water withdrawals sively, from plants, says the report. Not only is widely reported in the media in early 2019, the are used for irrigation. meat production taking up too much high-value new guide suggests eating plant-based proteins agricultural land, but overconsumption of meat more often and limiting meat consumption, Water consumption for food in western diets “is a significant contributor to especially processed meats, as well as dairy production has more than poor health and increases a person’s risk of products. While the Canadian guide does not doubled between 1961 and becoming overweight, obese or developing directly speak to the detrimental environmental 2000. certain noncommunicable diseases.” impact of meat and dairy production (this could Based on the International The EAT-Lancet reference diet recognizes be included in the full version anticipated later Union for Conservation of that grains are the largest source of energy in this year), it does encourage Canadians to think Nature, 80% of extinction most diets around the world. It is recommended of plants as a completely adequate source of threats to mammal and that about 60% of daily energy should come protein. bird species are due to from carbohydrates, though a focus on whole Some parts of the new guide were mod- agriculture. grains is strongly emphasized. Vegetables and elled on Brazil’s 2014 national food guide, a fruits are an essential source of many micro- groundbreaking policy that highlights the Changes in food production nutrients and eating five servings per day is links between healthy diets and sustainable practices could reduce recommended to achieve the most benefits, food systems while advising users to make agricultural greenhouse gas one of which is prevention of cardiovascular naturally or minimally processed foods the emissions in 2050 by about disease. Saturated fats should be replaced basis of their diets. While Canada’s food guide 10%, whereas increased with unsaturated vegetable oils, especially does not explicitly make this link, its release consumption of plant-based those naturally high in omega-3 and omega-6. this January has furthered the national con- diets could reduce emissions According to the report’s estimates, following versation about the wider ramifications of how by up to 80%. the reference diet could avoid approximately we eat. And that may just get us closer to the Currently, almost two-thirds 11.1 million deaths per year in 2030 and reduce “Great Transformation” the world will need in of all soybeans, maize, barley premature mortality by 19%. the coming years. M and about a third of all grains Our food systems and the environment LETISHA TOOP IS A DATABASE AND ADMINISTRATIVE are used as feed for animals. are inextricably linked, the report finds. Food SERVICES OFFICER AT THE CCPA'S NATIONAL OFFICE. 8 production contributes to climate change, biodiversity loss, overuse of freshwater, HANNAH MUHAJARINE | NATIONAL students around the world to join her school strike for the climate. And in Ottawa this February, young Canadians Canada needs gathered for Powershift, a conference spearheaded by 350.org and centred a Green New Deal largely on building the movement for a Canadian Green New Deal. Much groundwork has already been irst it was 44 million, then 66 mil- completely government-funded and laid. In fact, a recent Fox News headline lion and now 78 million tonnes of administered. proclaims: “Green New Deal actually FCO2. Every year, Environment and The idea of a Green New Deal is being an old socialist plan from Canada.” Climate Change Canada increases the championed by grassroots movements That socialist plan in question is The amount by which Canada is projected on both sides of the Canada-U.S. border. Leap Manifesto, created in 2015 at a to miss its Paris Agreement target. These movements for climate action are gathering of environmental, Indige- “Transitions to a cleaner future are increasingly being led by young people, nous, labour, faith, and social and food hard,” said Environment Minister Cath- because it is our lives being discounted justice movements (and printed in the erine McKenna in a press conference in when politicians buy pipelines. November/December 2015 issue of the December. If the minister is in need of Back in December, young activists Monitor—Editor). Similar plans to the guidance, I would respectfully direct her from the Sunrise Movement occupied Green New Deal have been put forward southwards, to newly elected Congress- the office of Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of by Canadian organizations like Blue woman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s the U.S. House of Representative, in Green Canada, 350.org, the Canadian Green New Deal—legislation for which support of Ocasio-Cortez, herself only Labour Congress and Climate Action was released in early February. 29. Sixteen-year-old Greta Thunberg Network; these plans are supported by The essence of the Green New Deal is of Sweden has inspired thousands of research and policy analysis from the a swift transition to renewables that en- Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, sures equitable access to fair wages, full the Broadbent Institute and the Pembi- benefits and unionized livelihoods for na Institute. all Americans. It consists of seven goals U.S. Representative Alexandria Meanwhile, the federal government’s for drastically cutting carbon emissions. Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Senator current plan for tackling climate change These goals will be met through policies Ed Markey (D-MA) announce is the Pan-Canadian Framework, which that address historic inequalities based their Green New Deal at a news relies heavily on taxing carbon (see article on poverty, race and gender. And like conference in February. in this section by Marc Lee—Editor). This the original New Deal, the plan will be REUTERS/JONATHAN ERNST reliance on market-based policy is like 9 WORTH trying to bake a cake using only eggs. packages for community economic Under a Green New Deal, the government development, increased or easier REPEATING would exercise a much wider range of access to employment insurance (EI), policy tools to steer the economy away support for accessing education and from fossil fuels. apprenticeship opportunities, and early I’m a big fan of Robert Kagan’s What would a Canadian Green New retirement options. newish book called The Jungle Deal look like? These are important considerations, Grows Back. And he uses what I but a Green New Deal would also think is a brilliant metaphor for the include training opportunities in the rules-based international order. Jobs renewable energy sector, building He says there was this kind of end A Green New Deal would create green retrofitting and green infrastructure of history moment…after the fall jobs within all sectors of the economy. installation. It would include recruit- of the Berlin wall, the collapse The federal government has pledged ment and training programs targeted at of the Soviet Union, when we all to double investment in clean energy vulnerable groups such as people with thought that liberal democracy research, development and demon- low incomes, women, newcomers and in our own countries, and rules- stration. But this focus on technology Indigenous peoples. These jobs would based international order around development, mainly for global export, be unionized and come with full ben- the world—that was inevitable. is much too narrow. efits, a liveable wage and a minimum We were all just moving towards In Alberta, the Energy Diversifica- length of employment. it. And I will admit I was guilty of tion Advisory Committee identifies The Leap also calls for the expansion thinking that. I think that was sort value-adding opportunities for the oil of opportunities in low-carbon sectors of a sin of optimism and it was OK and gas sector; we need such bodies for such as caregiving, health care, educa- to think that. renewable energy, as well as strategies tion and the arts—sectors that have for developing entirely new sustainable suffered from a lack of government But Kagan’s point is there is industries. We need Canadian-manu- funding. A Green New Deal and the nothing inevitable or natural factured electric vehicles (buses, trains Leap both call for a basic income that about liberal democracy or the and personal vehicles), solar panels and could support the unpaid care work rules-based international order, deep-cycle batteries. Expanding local that is often done by women, as part and that what is natural, in fact, value chains by greening the manufac- of a comprehensive poverty reduction is the jungle, and that liberal turing sector will create more jobs for strategy. As a first step, Make Poverty democracy and the rules-based Canadians, as well as providing local History Manitoba is calling for a Livea- international order is like a garden. supply chains to drive Canada’s own ble Basic Needs Benefit, to bring all of Now my dad is a farmer, so I very transition. those on social assistance to Canada’s much understand how to keep This cannot happen without policy official poverty line. your garden fertile and growing is support, including the creation of new The American think-tank Data for a constant fight. It’s a fight against agencies and programs supported by Progress also suggests a “green job the weeds. It’s a fight against significant government investment; guarantee” as part of a Green New Deal. — CCPAʼS SIXTH ANNUAL — the pests. It’s a fight against the legislated targets for renewable energy The idea is that all those who want and animals of the forest. And I think expansion and strict plans for the phase are able to work are guaranteed access we kind of got complacent and we out of fossil fuels (beyond coal); new to employment. This can be accom- YOU’RE INVITED to a lively discussion thought the garden was inevitable. regulations and standards; and feed-in plished by the government, labour and TELEPHONE with CCPA economists and researchers. And I think now is a time that we, tariffs and public procurement systems industry together. As of yet we see little This event is open to all curr ent donors. who prefer to live in a garden, that help create a market for the new of this aspect of a just transition from rather than a jungle, need to start goods and services. These kinds of pol- our political leaders. TOWN HALL spending some time pulling up the icy tools have been exercised for years All you have to do is answer the phone on weeds and seeding some crops for in support of the fossil fuel industry and April 10, at 7 pm ET, and youʼll have the the fall. the corporations that drive it. Public ownership opportunity to ask questions live and share Federal investment is key to the Green Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister New Deal. These days, the role of your thoughts on key issues. Chrystia Freeland discusses the A just transition government is often conceptualized end of history, U.S. exceptionalism The concept of a “just transition” is as balancing the budget; this is a false If you donʼt want to miss out on your invitation and the delights of garden living at being used to describe policy measures understanding of political leadership, to our 2019 Telephone Town Hall, be sure to the January 2019 World Economic that protect workers whose livelihoods even in times when we are not facing Forum in Davos, Switzerland. will be hurt in the transition to renewa- existential crisis. make a donation today! bles. Examples of the concept at work In the U.S., Ocasio-Cortez proposes include Alberta’s Coal Community to finance the Green New Deal using Transition Fund and the federal Just a new public bank or system of banks Transition Taskforce for Coal-workers. as well as public venture funds, options VISIT WWW.POLICYALTERNATIVES.CA/GIVE TO DONATE

Common measures include funding also available to our federal government. APRIL 10, 2019 10 In the Pan-Canadian Framework, the current exemptions (including for coal- At the 2016 NDP convention there government proposed the creation of fired power plants). Along the same was significant support for the party to the Canada Infrastructure Bank, which lines, massive savings could be gained adopt the Leap Manifesto as its plat- could support provinces and munici- by cutting subsidies to the fossil fuel form moving into the next election. But palities building green infrastructure sector, which have been estimated at we will not get our Canadian Alexandria projects. However, the initial mandate $350 million from the federal govern- Ocasio-Cortez unless we create the of the bank to provide low-cost financ- ment alone. space for her to emerge. ing has been sidelined in favour of Finally, the quicker the transition is The Green New Deal is backed by attracting private sector investors. funded, the more likely this work would a robust grassroots movement in the While governments can paint private be effective in staving off some of the U.S.—and here in Canada the move- investment as the cheaper financing (more than economically) costly effects ment is growing rapidly. Now is the option, private investors expect on of extreme weather and increased time to organize—nationally (through average three times the rate of return natural disasters caused by a changing organizations like 350.org) and locally compared to the federal government’s climate. A Green New Deal funded by (e.g., through the Manitoba Energy borrowing rate, which makes projects federal investment, with a focus on the Justice Coalition). Our politicians must much costlier to the public in the long public good, will ensure greater public know that this federal election, we will run. A preoccupation with avoiding ownership, public benefits, and a wide- vote for a Green New Deal. M deficits also increases the likelihood spread and rapid transition. The exact HANNAH MUHAJARINE IS A MASTER’S STUDENT that governments will end up privatiz- details of the plan can be sorted out as STUDYING NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MANITOBA, AND AN ORGANIZER ing public assets, again with long-term it moves forward, but the principles of WITH THE MANITOBA ENERGY JUSTICE COALITION. costs to the public. As an alternative, public ownership and a just transition Toby Sanger, a CCPA research asso- should be front and centre. ciate, suggests a public bank that is The only way we will solve the climate seeded by government funding and crisis is by creating an economy that borrows on financial markets at the is fair and just, in which everyone has lower public borrowing rate, backed by access to a means of sustainable liveli- a federal government guarantee. hood. The federal government has so far Another obvious source of funding failed to produce the kind of actionable, is carbon pricing, which could gener- far-reaching climate plan we need. ate even more revenue by tightening

— CCPAʼS SIXTH ANNUAL —

YOU’RE INVITED to a lively discussion TELEPHONE with CCPA economists and researchers. TOWN HALL This event is open to all curr ent donors. All you have to do is answer the phone on April 10, at 7 pm ET, and youʼll have the opportunity to ask questions live and share your thoughts on key issues.

If you donʼt want to miss out on your invitation to our 2019 Telephone Town Hall, be sure to make a donation today!

VISIT WWW.POLICYALTERNATIVES.CA/GIVE TO DONATE APRIL 10, 2019 11 OR SIX WEEKS in May and June 1919, approxi- company’s refusal to recognize female workers mately 35,000 workers in Winnipeg walked off as members of the union. In 1914, the Trades the job to voice their frustration with a range and Labour Council of Canada regularly passed of issues, from a lack of collective bargaining resolutions for a general strike to pressure the rights and union recognition to increasing federal government to oppose World War I. In inequality. Indeed, the strike was part of a 1938, in the midst of the Great Depression, relief broader wave of worker revolts that swept camp workers stopped work to protest conditions Facross Canada and the world in 1919, as working in government camps. people in numerous Canadian cities and countries The number of strikes increased dramatically used the strike—the withdrawal of labour power— during World War II, and workers continued to use to push for change. strikes as a tool of protest in the post-war period, Though bosses and government officials too. In 1957, more than 65,000 railway workers ultimately crushed the Winnipeg General Strike, walked off the job to support CP Rail firefighters it remains one of the largest and longest strikes who were to be phased out due to technological in Canadian history and an impressive display of change. In 1972, the Common Front (a group of the power of the strike as a tool of working-class unions bargaining together) staged a one-day protest. For as long as people have worked for general strike in Quebec as part of their dispute others, walking off the job—going on strike—has with the provincial government. That same been one of the most effective and direct methods year, miners in Ontario struck to protest unsafe of winning better wages and working conditions, working conditions and lax regulation of worker among other demands. Because employers and health and safety. governments rely on workers to produce goods Since the 1970s, the number of strikes has and services, when workers refuse to work decreased, but workers still use the strike to employers and governments are pressured to push for change. In 1981, postal workers struck address workers’ grievances. This is why members for maternity leave. In 1987, the labour council of the radical labour union the Industrial Workers in Elliot Lake, Ontario threatened a general of the World often say “Direct Action Gets strike if an anesthetist was not brought to Satisfaction,” or “Direct Action Gets the Goods!” the town. In the mid-1990s, workers across In recent years, we have come to view the strike Ontario participated in a series of one-day narrowly, as a tool of last resort for unionized demonstrations and general strikes known as the workers engaged in collective bargaining. But a Days of Action to protest the austerity policies closer look at the history of the strike shows us of the provincial government. In 2008, 2015 and that for over 200 years, diverse workers in what is 2018, graduate student workers and contract currently Canada have used the strike to fight for faculty employed by York University struck for a better world. better wages and working conditions. In 1829, Cree boatmen in Oxford House, Manitoba Workers can make great gains by withdrawing refused to work for the Hudson Bay Company their labour power. But they also risk a lot. The for only 10 pelts per season and demanded that stakes in class struggle are high. History shows us they receive the same pay (40 pelts) as their that employers and government officials will not counterparts at York Factory for the same work. hesitate to use all of the tools at their disposal to In the 1840s, Irish canal workers in Ontario walked end strikes, including violence. To be successful, off the job for adequate housing, health services, then, working people need to have a clear and better pay. In 1872, a general strike for the understanding of how strikes work, how workers nine-hour day and trade union recognition spread in the past have used the strike successfully as a across southern Ontario and to Montreal and tool of protest, and how solidarity—rather than Halifax. division, infighting or indifference—is the key to building a better world. In these tough times, Workers continued to use strikes to address a we need to remember: direct action gets the range of issues throughout the 20th century. goods! In 1902, members of the International Jewelry M THE GRAPHIC HISTORY COLLECTIVE IS A GROUP OF ARTISTS, Workers’ Union in Toronto struck for two and RESEARCHERS AND WRITERS INTERESTED IN COMICS, HISTORY AND a half months after their union officers were SOCIAL JUSTICE. IN JANUARY 2019, THEY RELEASED TWO BOOKS WITH BETWEEN THE LINES: DIRECT ACTION GETS THE GOODS AND fired. Meanwhile, in Winnipeg, bakers at Paulin 1919: A GRAPHIC HISTORY OF THE WINNIPEG GENERAL STRIKE.

WORKERS, STRIKESWORKERS, AND POLITICAL POWER THE GRAPHIC HISTORY COLLECTIVE Chambers walked off the job to protest the

12 13 Winnipeg 1 Causes9 and19 consequences

BY Paul Moist

HE CENTENARY OF the 1919 Winnipeg Winnipeg moved from the country’s support as citizens refused to ride General Strike offers a unique sixth largest city to its third largest. streetcars driven by replacement opportunity to revisit Canada’s The preponderance of British-born workers. The public support enabled a Tlargest and most significant sym- immigrants plus a massive influx of positive settlement for streetcar work- pathy strike. Eastern European citizens combined ers and it offered a glimpse of broad What was the context in which to create a very diverse and dynamic public support for labour’s goals. 35,000 workers, half of whom did city with a host of distinct ethnic Throughout the first two decades not belong to a union, struck for six communities, not to mention very of the century, beyond population weeks in support of the collective clear lines between the rich and the growth, Winnipeg displayed an ac- bargaining goals of building and metal poor. tivist culture in the presence of the trades workers? What local, national During this period the number of social gospel movement and an active and international events fueled this local unions tripled and demand for suffragist moment that saw Manitoba massive job action that saw one-half a better life for workers grew steadily. become the first province to extend of Winnipeg’s families stand together? So too did public support for labour’s the vote to some women in 1916. Much has been written about these aims and for other social justice Labour and other progressive forces questions and the confrontation itself pursuits. also united to support a progressive in the century since it all took place. single tax system. Each of these Understanding the Winnipeg General endeavours revealed an engaged and Strike requires understanding the 1906 activist citizenry. labour-management dynamic in Win- Two disputes in 1906 illustrate the fierce nipeg during the war years, and indeed contest over union recognition that in the period of significant population came to define the acrimony that per- 1913–1915 growth in the two decades preceding meated labour relations in Winnipeg. RECESSION the general strike. Both the Contract Shops dispute and The positive population and economic the strike by employees of the Winni- growth experienced by Winnipeg and peg Electric Street Railway Company the West in general came to an abrupt 1901–1920 saw employers resort to injunctions halt in 1913. An economic downturn Winnipeg’s status as a key hub-city and lawsuits, hence Winnipeg’s reputa- quickly turned depression-like. was cemented through urban growth tion as “injunction city.” The vigor with The most direct cause was a sharp during the first two decades of the which employers opposed unionization decline in British investment due to 20th century. The city’s population fuelled solidarity among workers. power struggles centred in the Bal- more than quadrupled between 1901 Of interest in the streetcar workers kans. British investment in Canadian and 1920 (from 40,000 to 179,000) and dispute was the near total public railways, towns, industries and grain 14 elevators was converted into domestic streetcar workers and others struck in U.K. defence investments. sympathy. Accounts vary, but at least The depression hit Winnipeg hard 6,800 workers from outside of the civic and lasted two full years. All workers service walked off the job. WINNIPEG felt it, particularly those employed Business interests formed the in the building trades. Wages fell Committee of 100, and the federal GENERAL and union membership declined as government, fearing the spread of unemployment rose. sympathy walkouts in five large STRIKE Canadian cities, dispatched Senator Gideon Robertson to Winnipeg. A MANITOBA 1914–1918 Robertson and representatives of THE GREAT WAR the Committee of 100 commenced FEDERATION OF The Great War helped pull the country direct negotiations with the striking OF LABOUR out of recession but the improved civic workers and a deal based upon economy did not spark wage increas- the previously rejected agreement was TIMELINE es. The federal government, through reached. The deal provided for wage order-in-council P.C. 1743, outlawed hikes, union recognition and a nego- strikes for the duration of war in all tiated return to work protocol. It was 1918 industries engaged in war production. a near total victory for the workers. This ordinance impacted all industries. The second important event of 1918 DECEMBER 22 In 1918, P.C. 2525 completely outlawed was the growing militancy and prom- Winnipeg Trades and Labor Council strikes or lockouts in industrial disputes; inence of the Winnipeg Trades and (WTLC) meeting at Walker Theater this too was by order-in-council. Two Labour Council. In May, the council sup- protests the anti-labour War Measures further ordinances outlawed immigrant ported the job action of civic workers. In Act. organizations and other “alien” organ- July it again voted for another general izations including the International sympathy strike, this time in support Workers of the World (IWW). of Winnipeg metal trades workers. 1919 All of these moves by the federal Senator Robertson was again sent to government combined to fuel worker Winnipeg and he assisted in achieving JANUARY 10 resentment and militancy. Real wages a settlement and averting a strike. Socialist Party of Canada meeting declined during this period of high The general strike option again sur- at Majestic Theatre calls for end of inflation. faced within the Trades and Labour capitalism. Union membership in Canada nearly Council in October 1918, this time in tripled between 1915 and 1919, and support of striking Canadian Pacific MARCH 13 strikes began occurring. In Winnipeg in freight handlers in Calgary. Specifi- At the Western Labour Conference 1917, more days were lost to strikes than cally, government plans to prosecute in Calgary, delegates vote to form the in the previous four years combined. five strike leaders for defying an an- revolutionary One Big Union. Estimates were that one in five workers ti-strike ordinance were shelved due to walked picket lines in Canada and the the outcry from labour. The utility of MAY 1 United States during this period. the general strike weapon was further After months of negotiations, all unions Three distinct events occurred in entrenched. belonging to the Building Trades Council Winnipeg in 1918 that help explain the Thirdly and finally, a series of key go on strike. conditions which gave rise to the 1919 events took place in December 1918. general strike. First, the Trades and Labour Council MAY 2 In May that year, four civic unions passed a resolution providing that Metal Trades Council workers call a strike. struck over the issues of union rec- general strike votes would require a ognition and wages. These included majority of the total membership to MAY 6 waterworks, power and light, and approve, thus shifting strike determin- In light of the refusal of employers to teamsters workers. A brokered tenta- ing authority to the council and away bargain with the Building Trades Council tive deal a few days into the dispute from local unions. Also that month, and the Metal Trades Council, the WTLC was surprisingly defeated by a narrow the fiery Machinist Union leader R. B. resolves to poll affiliates on a general vote of city council, which sought a Russell was defeated in his bid for the sympathetic strike. permanent no-strike clause for all council presidency by moderate James civic agreements. Winning. MAY 13 This move escalated things far On December 22, at a meeting called Results of the WTLC general strike beyond the four civic groups. City jointly by the Trades and Labour Coun- vote were overwhelmingly supportive: firemen struck in support of their cil and the Socialist Party of Canada, a 8,667 for, 645 against. A general strike civic coworkers. A week later, provin- packed house of 1,700 at the Walker The- committee is formed with representation cial telephone operators, railway and atre passed three resolutions. The first from every union. 15 MAY 15 denounced the federal government’s committee, which produced signs The Winnipeg General Strike begins. The repeated recourse to orders-in-council. authorizing fire and hospital laundry first to walk out were the “Hello Girls”— The Great War was over and labour and services, for example. Winnipeg’s telephone operators. By 11 other progressives called for the repeal a.m., 30,000 union and non-union workers of all anti-labour legislation enacted had walked off the job. during the war years. RETURNED SOLDIERS The second resolution called for the One new reality not present during MAY 16 release of all political prisoners incar- the 1918 civic workers strike was the Winnipeg’s business community forms the cerated during the war years. Finally, large numbers of returned soldiers, Citizens’ Committee of 1000 to oppose the the gathering called for the withdrawal home after the Great War. The soldiers strike. of all allied forces from Russia, and Win- returned to high levels of unemploy- nipeg workers offered congratulations ment. They also returned to hear some MAY 17 to the revolutionaries who had seized senior labour leaders critical of the war The strike committee requests a meeting control from the Russian Czar. itself and the wartime government in with the city to discuss maintenance of Federal authorities had undercover particular. essential services. The strike committee agents at the Walker Theatre that day These forces combined to create goes on to issue authorization cards for and their reports on the meeting spoke a new tension in Winnipeg, one not essential services such as milk deliveries. of a militant labour movement, one previously present. Shortly after the that was questioning the established Majestic Theatre meeting a group MAY 22 order. of veterans invaded the hall of the Arthur Meighen, acting minister of justice, Socialist Party of Canada, trashing and Senator Gideon Robertson, minster of it and burning books. Some returned labour, arrive in Winnipeg. JANUARY 10, 1919 soldiers resented immigrants (aliens) THE MAJESTIC who occupied what many believed to MAY 25 THEATRE MEETING be the jobs they held prior to the war. Senator Robertson orders postal The New Year began with a second It is important to note that not employees to return to work. The province major public meeting, this one called all returned soldiers displayed such and city issue similar orders to their by the Socialist Party of Canada and frustration or even held such beliefs. employees. A meeting of 5,000 strikers at held at the Majestic Theatre. It picked As it became clear, there were many Victoria Park rejects these ultimatums. up where the Walker Theatre meeting returned soldiers who actively sup- had left off. ported labour during the general strike. MAY 30 Speakers denounced the press for But we cannot overstate the role that City police are ordered to sign an anti- not telling the truth about events in returned soldiers played within the union pledge. They refuse but promise to Russia. Union leader Bob Russell, a heated labour-management debates uphold law and order. fiery speaker, rejected capitalism and that existed in Winnipeg in early 1919. the inequalities it produced, calling for MAY 31, JUNE 1, a new system in which workers would AND JUNE 3 have control. Again, undercover agents MARCH 13, 1919 Thousands of returned soldiers take part attending the meeting reported to their THE WESTERN LABOUR in a march in solidarity with the strike. federal authorities on the growing CONFERENCE, CALGARY militancy evident in Winnipeg. Western Canadian trade unionists had JUNE 3 The federal government and Winni- for some time been dissatisfied with The Citizens’ Committee of 1000 calls peg business leaders clearly felt that the Eastern Canadian union leader- for the deportation of “aliens,” claiming labour sought to replace capitalism ship, a group they felt embraced craft that the General Strike is the result of and these beliefs governed their unionism and was unwilling to chal- agitation from immigrants—ads are run actions going forward. lenge the system. Hence the Western in Winnipeg daily papers calling for “alien” Labour Conference held in Calgary, deportation. where delegates affirmed strong Sympathetic strikes are held in Brandon, FEBRUARY 6–11, 1919 support for industrial unionism and Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Montreal, THE SEATTLE workers organized industrywide, not Toronto and Amherst, Nova Scotia. GENERAL STRIKE by craft. The vehicle for this would be Workers throughout North America the One Big Union (OBU). JUNE 4 watched events unfold in Seattle Delegates in debate denounced AND 5 that were driven by wage demands capitalism and supported resolutions Anti-strike veterans parade. and labour’s efforts to secure wage calling for a five-day work week and increases for all workers, both skilled the six-hour day. The mood in Calgary and unskilled. The dispute was massive revealed a trade union leadership in scope. Essential services were pro- that was increasingly confident in vided only as determined by the strike the content of its new agenda and its 16 ability to realize this vision through Second, while history has dismissed JUNE 6 collective action. the charge that the general strike rep- The federal government amends That spring, the Trades and Labour resented a Bolshevik uprising intent the Immigration Act to allow for the Council in Winnipeg sent a couple upon overthrowing the established deportation, without trial, of anyone not of clear messages to the two senior order, it is important to understand born in Canada accused of sedition. levels of government. Provincially, how profoundly some held these views. the council refused to nominate la- The Committee of 1,000 are on re- JUNE 8 bour members to the government’s cord stating that “some of the leaders J.S. Woodsworth returns to Winnipeg and proposed Industrial Disputes Com- of the strike were more concerned in addresses 10,000 workers. mission. They also refused to testify setting up the Russian Soviet form of before the Mathers Commission set government in Canada than in settling JUNE 9 up by the Borden government to inves- any trades disputes, that an organized Winnipeg Mayor Charles Gray fires the tigate industrial relations in Canada. propaganda to incite Revolution in entire city police force for refusing the Winnipeg labour leaders were in Canada was stalking under cover of city’s demand to renounce the union and no mood to be told what the “rules this and other strikes.” strike, and hires “Specials” to replace of the game” were to be when it came Business, by way of private pros- them. The “Specials” were recruited and to achieving the legitimate economic ecutions funded, we now know, by paid for by the Citizens’ Committee of interests of workers. the federal government (from funds 1000 and were armed with baseball bats. earmarked for returned soldiers), silenced labour leadership by incar- JUNE 16–17 THE WINNIPEG GENERAL cerating them. The aggressiveness of Metal trades employers propose a STRIKE AND ITS AFTERMATH the business community response and settlement to the strike. At the same time, As the preceding history makes that of the federal government were the Royal Northwest Mounted Police clear, the six-week general strike designed to put labour in its place and (RNWMP) raid labour halls and strike that engulfed Winnipeg entirely, and to prevent further massive strikes. leaders’ homes, arresting 10 leaders of the was widely reported in the U.S. and In that goal they largely succeeded. central strike committee. throughout the Commonwealth, did In deputizing hundreds of so-called not occur in a vacuum. Nor was it a special constables who assumed the JUNE 18 spontaneous accident of sorts. The authority of the state, business was It’s announced that arrested strike leaders events leading up to the strike, both also able to silence elected officials and will be held for deportation proceedings locally and beyond, all combined to the justice system, which both opted and will also be denied bail. make such a clash understandable if to conduct an aggressive prosecution not predictable. of the strike’s proponents. JUNE 21 The events of the six-week struggle My third observation is that labour In what would come to be known as have been well documented and need did make achievements for all workers “Bloody Saturday,” a silent protest of the not be recounted here in detail. What through the general strike. They won arrest of the strike leaders is attacked by continues to spawn reflection and the hearts and minds of the vast ma- Mounted Police and “Specials”, resulting debate, however, are questions about jority of the general public and this in the wounding of 34 people, two deaths, the major lessons of the strike. What support was not diminished by the and 84 arrests. indeed is the legacy of this massive manner in which the strike ended. display of solidarity in Winnipeg? As Notwithstanding the vitriolic bash- JUNE 25 a lifelong unionist myself, I venture ing by mainstream media, the public The strike committee announces the to make five observations on this respected those who led the general end of strike and calls upon workers to question. strike. Three leaders were elected in continue the struggle in the political First and foremost, the general the 1920 provincial election from their arena. strike was a large and difficult defeat jail cells. The public did not view them for the workers involved. Thousands as criminals. Labour candidates in JUNE 26 lost their jobs, thousands more re- Winnipeg enjoyed similar electoral The Winnipeg General Strike ends at 11 turned to work and never did enjoy success at the federal and civic levels. a.m. either trade union membership or the Labour’s successful participation fruits of free collective bargaining. in the political process achieved two JULY AND Civic employees who were not important outcomes. Firstly, it put the AUGUST dismissed had to sign their allegiance lie to any notion that the leaders of the The strike committee reorganizes as the to the city and pledge to never engage general strike were out to overthrow defence committee to support the strike in sympathy strike action upon pain the system. People don’t run for office leaders facing trial. of instant dismissal. Civic workers in systems they want to destroy. came to refer to this requirement as The leaders of the 1919 general strike the “slave pact,” which stayed on the also established a political constant city’s books until 1931. that has survived for a century in 17 SEPTEMBER 2 Manitoba: labour is still a force polit- concluded at 11:00 a.m. on June 26, A parade of 8,000 workers walks in ically, and its vision for a more caring 1919. support of the arrested strike leaders. A and sharing society enjoys widespread In the years since the strike, the national campaign is launched to raise public support in the province. province of Manitoba has enacted funds for their defence. A fourth observation about the legislation which recognizes work- strike’s legacy has to do with how ers’ rights to participate in free DECEMBER 23 we organize as workers. Labour in collective bargaining, to organize R.B. Russell is sentenced to two years at 1919 Winnipeg had its own daily and to healthy and safe workplaces. Stony Mountain Penitentiary for seditious newspaper. It had open air meetings conspiracy. attended by thousands. The result was This plaque commemorates the 75th a citizenry that was conscious of its anniversary of the 1919 Winnipeg class and aware of the issues of the General Strike. A landmark in Ca- 1920 day. In today’s digital age of unlimited nadian History. information, one is left to wonder how JANUARY– it is that labour’s view of the world has oday, a century on from the general FEBRUARY so much less currency with the general strike, the issues that gave rise to Strike leader Fred Dixon is acquitted. public than it did 100 years ago. Tit remain both unresolved and Finally, there is something to be arguably more pressing than ever. JANUARY– gleaned from how we have commemo- The right to form unions and to APRIL rated the strike at different points over engage in free collective bargaining Strike leader A.A. Heaps is acquitted the past century. In 1969, Winnipeg city remains contested terrain in much of but leader R.E. Bray is sentenced to six council debated a motion to recognize the world, including Canada. There months in prison. Leaders John Queen, the general strike on its 50th anniver- continue to be many disputes centered Bill Pritchard, William Ivens, Richard sary. It was an acrimonious debate and around union recognition. Johns and George Armstrong all receive a small plaque ended up being placed Inequality—locally, nationally and one-year jail terms. in low-profile location at city hall. globally—is a dominant issue and the The events of 1919 were still too gap between the rich and the poor has SEPTEMBER raw, even a half-century after the fact. never been wider. One Big Union headquarters moved to Winnipeg was still too divided a city, at As was the case in the Winnipeg of Winnipeg from Vancouver, under attack the family level and within the broader 1919, the backlash against immigrants from governments, businesses and community itself, for any widespread and refugees is a global phenomena conservative trade unionists. discussion of this key event in the and these divisions hurt both commu- history of Manitoba. nities and economies. OCTOBER 5 By 1994, on the 75th anniversary of Many governments in many In the Manitoba provincial election, Fred the general strike, all the participants countries continue to spend more on Dixon, John Queen, George Armstrong were gone, which allowed for both weapons and defence than on services and William Ivens are elected to seats celebration of the event and, more for people such as health care and in the legislature on a united slate of importantly, public discussion on education. Independent Labour Party and Socialist this most significant of events in the In terms of class consciousness, how Party candidates. history of Winnipeg, and indeed of the we can better educate workers and Canadian labour movement. Another equip them to distinguish between NOVEMBER 20 plaque was erected in the Manitoba false or inaccurate reporting and valid, Winnipeg Civic Election: Three legislature that captures the difficult fact-based information remains a key Independent Labor Party members challenge of summarizing just what challenge. elected to city council and three to school the general strike meant and means. And fundamentally, what has come board. That plaque reads as follows: of the belief that true freedom and fairness means that none can truly On May 15, 1919 some 30,000 workers be free if even one is not? in the City of Winnipeg went on Winnipeg General Strike leader Bill 1921 strike in support of building and Pritchard, in his famous address to the J.S. Woodsworth is elected to the metal trades workers, who had jury, spoke to the workers he served, House of Commons as a member of the walked out seeking union recogni- challenging them as follows: Independent Labour Party. tion, collective bargaining, higher wages and a shorter working week. “The great appear great to us because we are on our knees. Let us rise!” The Winnipeg General Strike was 1925 widely reported throughout North It is a message worth remembering, A.A. Heaps is elected to the House America and the British Empire, and and repeating. of Commons as a member of the M was a watershed event in Canadian Independent Labour Party. labour history. The general strike 18 Workers’ rights at the crossroads

Winnipeg is hosting dozens of 1919 strike commemorations this year. From organizing parades, concerts and lunch-hour history lessons, to attending academic conferences and funding a new feature-length docudrama, organized labour has been busy making sure the 100th anniversary of the Winnipeg General Strike is a learning opportunity for a new generation. Monitor editor Stuart Trew spoke to Manitoba Federation of Labour President Kevin Rebeck about the lead-up to May 1919 (and 2019), the importance of solidarity then and now, and the need to push back against right-wing propaganda that is sowing hatred to divide workers.

Stuart Trew: The commemorative levels. Every existing government ST: That breakdown was fairly severe MFL literature uses the word “catalyst” from Winnipeg outward changed in 1919, which isn’t really that long ago a lot to describe the Winnipeg General after that strike, and we saw action when you think about it. The employ- Strike. What were some of the ways that benefited workers. ers took extreme action to stifle the that was true? [Workers] saw the establishment of demonstrations. a first minimum wage in Canada. They Kevin Rebeck: Over two-thirds of the saw a national inquiry into living and KR: The business elite had govern- people who went out on strike didn’t working conditions for workers…. It was ment doing what they wanted them to belong to a union. We had a point that the beginning of greater recognition do. At one point, the [Winnipeg] police people were fed up with the inequality, for unions and voices in the workplace, force was fired because they wouldn’t lack of a living wage, lack of respect for improvements to health and safety, sign a pledge that they wouldn’t ever in the workplace. Union members cer- WCB (Workers Compensation Boards), go on strike. In fact, they wanted to be tainly were the ones who started that health care and other things. So it really on strike and the striking committee strike, but it supported and was part was a turning point, and we haven’t had asked them to continue to work be- of a community that said, “Enough is a breakdown between employers and cause they thought we needed a police enough.” labour to that extent since. force. Then the business community People seized political power and said, “We’ll provide one.” exercised what little of it they had by The Committee of 1,000 hired “the withdrawing their labour to deliver a specials,” [a private police force] they message to those who had power. We armed with arm bands, bats or wagon think that was an incredible piece of MFL President Kevin Rebeck speaks spokes, and put them into the streets history, and what it led to was the at a rally for public services in to enforce what they were describing defeat of governments at the federal, Winnipeg, May 2018. as law: breaking up public gatherings, at the provincial and at the civic PHOTO COURTESY OF MFL breaking up peaceful demonstrations. 19 In fact, they started changing the law regulations that are all too often being fairly. Certainly, being a Winnipeger, to deport people that they thought stripped away in the name of being there hasn’t been a winter when you were causing trouble by speaking up competitive…. But what that’s really don’t drive by someone who’s pulled about rights; [they] considered that an code for is to maximize profits on the into a ditch and you pull over and give affront and a challenge to the elite and backs of workers. them a boost. We help one another out. government and status quo. We want businesses to succeed as a I think that’s part of our values. And certainly it was…, as things labour movement. If they don’t, there’s But I think the right have done a bet- needed to change. But it was legally no good jobs. But there also needs to ter job in the media of saying look, if done, it was peacefully done, and it be good jobs, and there needs to be there were only less taxes that’s more was people exercising their rights. some fairness. People don’t need to money in your pocket. They ignore make billions of dollars while others the fact that taxes pay for important ST: Workers’ rights have come a don’t make a living wage. In the last services that we rely on; that pay for long way since then. But we’re also 100 years, the inequities have grown our roads to be cleared and paved; that refighting a lot the same battles, like greater than they have ever been in pay for our health care. They’ve (the back-to-work legislation at the federal our history. That’s something that right) done a good job of turning “tax” level and Manitoba legislation taking needs to change, and people shouldn’t into a dirty word. away public sector workers’ right to be afraid to talk about it. And I think they’ve been good at bargain their salaries. I’m hopeful with social media, and selling the pipe dream that you, too, the way people connect now, that can be a millionaire if you just worked KR: What we’ve been seeing in the last dialogue can grow rather than shrink. harder, and that if someone gets an in- decade is that people who don’t learn I’m fearful, though, that the far-right crease it takes away from what you’re from history are doomed to repeat are good at delivering a short, snappy getting. That if we gave a minimum it. Here in Canada, despite a Harper message that feels like it’s targeted to wage earner more and you only made a government that legislated people’s you, and that they’re making things dollar more than minimum wage that right to strike away losing that fight better for you when they aren’t. That’s means you’re worth less. in court several years later, now we’ve something we need to wrestle with…. That’s not true, but it resonates with got a Liberal government doing the People from the progressive movement people who buy into it all too quickly. exact same thing by taking away postal who want some more balance, more It’s time to challenge those ideas workers’ right to strike, giving the ben- fairness, need to find ways to generate we know are wrong. The reason gov- efit to a corporation, a profit-making that discussion and have it more often. ernment exists is because the free corporation, because they said they market alone, without any regulation, needed the help of government. ST: At the time of the Winnipeg strike, is not fair and equitable but a sur- We in Manitoba have a legal chal- it was normal for workers to talk about vival-of-the-fittest model. Canadian lenge against the Public Services mutual aid, as in the need to build our values don’t align with that model. Sustainability Act that legislates you collective social capacity outside or Certainly we want businesses to suc- cannot bargain any kind of cost item, beyond the state. Are those ideas or ceed. Certainly there’s room for some whether that be wages or benefits…. We values worth rekindling today? free-market aspects in our economy. But believe that violates our Charter rights there also needs to be a socialist aspect and have gone to court over that issue. KR: I would put forward that it (that that says let’s support one another, let’s It’s a sad statement that governments spirit of mutual aid) does exist today pay our fair share of taxes, let’s build a are exercising this authoritarian point in our values, but not in our actions. healthy education system and provide of view, ignoring law, ignoring our I think, as Canadians, we believe in healthy funds for our government to history, and people are getting fed up. our core that we deserve an equal deliver the services that we want. health care system that’s affordable ST: Labour’s fights in the courts are and accessible and treats everyone ST: You mentioned earlier how many producing results. But are there other of the striking workers didn’t belong avenues at our disposal, besides the to a union. Tell us more about some courts, to push back? of the organizing that went into the strike and the conditions that made KR: Well, we need to mobilize in larger it a successful mobilization. ways. We need to exercise our political strength and will and not be afraid to KR: Sure, and maybe I’ll roll things talk about politics. There’s a message We need to exercise back to 1918. The First World War is out there saying leave politics alone, starting to come to a close, people have but the reality is politics don’t leave our political seen the cost of living go up, I think workers alone. Politics and laws strength and will in Winnipeg, by 67% in the six years change on a regular basis that im- leading up to the strike. And wages pact the minimum wage, that impact and not be afraid to hadn’t kept pace. People were…being your health and safety, that impact talk about politics. told by the state and the elite that we 20 all have sacrifices to make, but they certainly weren’t the Every existing government ones making those sacrifices. People were struggling to get by, were having a really from Winnipeg outward tough time feeding their families and paying their rent. changed after that strike, and And then in 1919, soldiers are coming back to go back to the jobs they had when they went away, and those jobs have we saw action that benefited been filled as new immigrants and others have taken those workers. roles on. So, there’s high unemployment rates going on, people weren’t sure what to do and they were frustrated. Those who had made fast profits weren’t willing to lessen the profits they were making. They were giving unions a hard time and not willing to recognize them. There wasn’t a legal way to sign cards and belong to a union. If you wanted ST: The MFL frequently lends its strength to local and a union you either got recognized by it or you went on provincial fights for fairness and justice. We featured some strike for that right. of those Manitoba fights for housing, migrant rights and So, the metal workers, and building and trade workers better social programs in our January-February issue on were trying to do some co-ordinated bargaining, to be the Right to the City. Can you give us some examples of stronger by standing together. They’d seen from 1918 and where these fights have enhanced worker protections? previous years that if it was just them alone they were likely to lose. So, they went to the Winnipeg Trades and KR: We had some recent victories that changed the dialogue Labour Council and asked, would others come and stand on a few fronts. As our last [NDP] government had their with us. Would others strike and walk off the job to join final days, we passed a first-of-its-kind domestic violence us and fight for fairness, respect and union recognition. leave—first of its kind in North America—that has been Labour council took a couple of weeks to conduct a vote. copied in several provinces and at the federal level. As you can imagine, that would have been tougher to do That leave allows people who are suffering domestic back then. But everyone voted. There were 11,500 union violence to take paid days off to get a restraining order or members in Winnipeg at the time and 11,000 people voted find new child care arrangements or be safe, and if they need yes—we would go on strike with you. it, a longer time frame they can be away from work and not And on May 15, that famous day, one of the first groups lose their job. [These workers] may not get paid when they’re on the street (as often in the labour movement) were sisters: off, but if they have to leave to go somewhere else to get their the women of at MTS (Manitoba Telecom Services), the lives back in line then come back, they don’t suffer a loss. “Hello Girls,” unplugged their last phone call and walked Similarly, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is an- off the job, and they found the streets were crowded…. other serious workplace issue related to mental health. In Over 30,000 people walked off the job that day—three times some regions of the country they provide [workers com- the number of unionzed workers in the city. People left their pensation] support to first responders on a presumptive jobs not knowing if they would have a job to come back to. In basis. They agree it’s likely these people will be exposed fact, employers told them they might not have a job to come to horrific circumstances, and that the default should be back to. They left because the message of fairness, respect and that we will cover them on these kinds of [PTSD] injuries. a living wage resonated with them. It was something they’d In Manitoba we were successful to say absolutely those seen and experienced themselves, or their family members, workers are going to be experiencing tough situations, but and they had enough, something needs to change. so are the survivors of horrific situations in a workplace There were divides and lines being pushed. The business where someone dies. Yes, when the paramedic shows up elites were certainly trying to point and say look, it’s these they’re going to be on a scene that is awful, but the person immigrants who have come and are steeling your jobs— who went to work and stood beside their co-worker when that’s who you should be mad at—and there were efforts something terrible happened, who didn’t have a clue their job to draw huge racial divides. And some of them worked, as would expose them to that, they deserve to be covered. And these kinds of things do, even though the message is a lie. in Manitoba today there is presumptive coverage for PTSD. Really, what mattered here was that those who had So there are gains being made. Change can happen, but power, that those in government who made the rules, it requires people talking to one another, supporting each weren’t making rules that were fair, weren’t creating the job other and learning about each other’s issues, and not being opportunities people needed, weren’t paying a living wage. afraid to speak up. M They were trying to turn workers on workers, but it didn’t work in a big way and workers stayed solid with each other. They created networks of solidarity to help each For a full lineup of strike events other out. They created their own paper to let each other organized by MFL, visit mfl.ca/1919. know that we’ve got your back—we’re in this together and Information on the Winnipeg General we’re fighting for something bigger than all of us. And that Strike Centenary Conference, “Building kept the line very strong and kept the strike going for a a Better World (1919–2019),” can be found long period of time until Bloody Saturday. here: 1919-2019.com. 21 MOLLY MCCRACKEN THE “HELLO GIRLS” Women, rights and work— from 1919 to the #MeToo movement

OMEN WORKERS HAVE always been than 50 panellists at a May 8–11 strike owners would respond to the forthcom- integral to the labour movement. conference in Winnipeg called “Building ing collective bargaining process. On May 15, 1919, it was the tele- a Better World: 1919–2019.” She is also Unfortunately, as Guard comments, Wphone operators, the “Hello Girls” one of the conference organizers, Stella’s is the tip of the iceberg. “Sex- (pictured), who were the first to walk off who collectively note in the program ual harassment is endemic in the the job, starting the Winnipeg General how they “can’t help but be struck by hospitality and restaurant industry,” Strike. A workers’ kitchen operated by continuities” between then and now: “so she tells me. Thankfully, the #MeToo Helen Jury Armstrong of the Women’s many of the themes of 1919 continue to movement is changing this. Labour League, who had led Woolworth’s confront us today.” “The #MeToo ‘eruption’ is probably clerks on strike two years earlier, kept the most amazing thing that’s hap- 1,500 strikers, most of them women, pened in the last century for women from starving. meet Guard at the Tallest Poppy, an since the vote. It gives women new Yet 100 years after the Winnipeg artsy restaurant dedicated to a $15 permission to object to being treated General Strike, women workers still Iminimum wage, rare in the restaurant as sexual objects,” says Guard. “I don’t struggle to be recognized as equal to industry. The Tallest Poppy is directly think the #MeToo movement has men. Workplace harassment remains across the street from Stella’s, a popular solved the problem of sexual harass- prevalent, in particular in the restaurant local restaurant chain where workers, ment, but there’s a new legitimacy for and hospitality sector among other most of them women, recently organ- women to be able to object—and to services industries. So are gender pay ized a union drive in response to sexual get some credibility for saying things gaps and other forms of discrimination harassment and rights violations. The that have been happening for decades that are experienced at double or triple #notmystellas campaign is using social or years or weeks at their workplace.” strength by women of colour, differently media to draw attention to a toxic Guard and I discuss what justice abled women, young and older women, workplace culture. looks like for the #MeToo movement. not to mention those who do not con- The pressure is working. In Decem- Obviously, it would mean an end to sex- form to the gender binary or are trans. ber, workers at two of the Stella’s nine ual assault and sexual harassment, and I sat down at the end of January to locations voted to become certified to workplaces and a wider culture that discuss these and other realities faced by the United Food and Commercial are frequently toxic to women. But this by women with Julie Guard, labour Workers Union’s (UFCW) local 832. In re- requires consequences for perpetrators history professor at the University of sponse to the allegations, two managers who would be brought to account. And Manitoba and a CCPA Manitoba re- were fired, though it was unclear, as the for that to happen our laws and human search associate. Guard is one of more Monitor went to print, how restaurant resources policies need to catch up. 22 “There are going to be a lot of cases [of harassment against elping people join a union is still almost exclusively women]. Some are going to be pursued in court. So there the job of the labour movement in Canada. It’s a job are going to be cases that fall apart because nobody can Hmade much more difficult by the changing nature of really decide what was unwanted and what was considered the workforce. acceptable. Nonetheless, I think that better legislation, “Private sector union density has declined significantly penalties and policies would be a huge improvement in and that’s like the death knell being sounded for the labour most of our working lives.” movement,” says Guard, who points out that the growth The recent unionization at Stella’s shows how organized in the labor force is in retail, hospitality and other service labour must play a key role in answering the call of the sectors where women dominate. “Unions are really strug- #MeToo movement. For example, the pay gap is smaller gling to organizing those workers. Stella’s restaurant’s two where unionization rates are higher and there are more locations in Winnipeg are the exception.” women workers. That gap is smallest in the highly unionized The workers at Stella’s epitomize the kinds of jobs that public sector, where female university-educated workers need unionization today: part-time, temporary, and precari- make 82 cents for every dollar their male co-workers make, ous in the sense that people usually need to hold down more according to the CCPA’s 2014 report, Canada’s Pay Gap. than one job to make ends meet. These workers do not have “The pay gap is definitely smaller for almost all workers time to get involved in unionization drives that could just as who are unionized regardless of whether they are in the easily result in a pink slip as a more stable work environment. public or private sector,” explains Guard. “By law, pay has to “Unions need to become relevant to those workers,” says be covered in the collective agreement. So it’s very unusual Guard. “So when you’re negotiating for whatever you’re to have different categories of workers who are doing the going to confront the employer with, you need to think same work as other workers within a unionized workplace about more than just wages and benefits. You need to think who are making different rates of pay. about things that are really important to those workers. “That automatically eliminates the possibility of employ- Things like flexible job schedules or advance notice of your ers paying workers of colour, women, disabled workers, work schedule, or time off to care for sick children.” aging workers or LGBTQ workers different rates of pay It’s not that unions aren’t already doing this, Guard adds. than fully-abled white male workers. Right off the bat just They are just not always responding effectively to the needs being unionized helps.” of this “new precarious, very female, very ethnically and But across North America, labour legislation is under racially diverse workforce.” Some union efforts to put more attack. Manitoba recently amended the Labour Relations women into leadership positions look like tokenism, she says. Act to eliminate the card-check certification system, requir- “Women’s committees…that have been pushing for [their] ing instead that workers hold a secret ballot to unionize. unions to diversify, to recognize women’s qualifications… Guard says this is bound to lower unionization rates, which seem to meet a lot of resistance. Unions really need to take is almost certainly why the current government proposed this more seriously and some leaders need to be prepared it. to give up control,” Guard says. “Statistically, union certification rates go down when “It’s not that all women are feminists or progressive. secret ballot votes are required. The suggestion here is that But if you are still dominated by ‘the man’ and you don’t employers have an opportunity, despite the illegality of it, create mechanisms to have gender equity on all bodies, to intimidate workers or at least to suggest, even without then it’s pretty clear that you’re sending a message to your intimidation, that if there’s a union in this workplace it membership that gender equity is not really a priority.” will be a worse place to work.” I agree with Guard that, especially in light of the #MeToo Guard adds that governments across North America are moment and the prevalence of precarious forms of work, doing this in violation of International Labour Organiza- women’s leadership is needed more than ever in the labour tion agreements and despite the fact that unionization movement. So how do we make that happen? shrinks the pay gap. “Women could definitely be groomed for success in “It’s a little-known fact that our government, in 1949, unions more actively,” she says. “There should be more signed on to the ILO Convention to promote free collective mentorship programs. That’s really how unions cultivate bargaining, and the only way you can bargain collectively new activists. effectively is in a union. So they basically agreed to encour- “One of the problems, perhaps, is that the process is always age, not just be neutral about, but encourage unionization,” informal. One solution might be a formalized mentorship she tells me. program where women were actively promoted, and the What is so infuriating about the Manitoba government’s union was accountable to its membership. Mentorship, in about-face is that not only will it put downward pressure other words, would be more visible.” on wages and likely increase the gender pay gap, but it Today in Winnipeg, as it was 100 years ago, women are on bucks popular opinion about the good that unions do. the frontlines of organizing to improve working conditions, “About 70% of people in a recent study indicated they expand rights and demand respect. As capitalism changes, thought unions make things fair and workplace unions so to do their efforts to respond to the needs of workers make things better,” Guard says. “Yet only about 30% of and those most often left behind. Women are leading in people in Canada are in a union, so this suggests that if it movements like #MeToo and #notmystellas that have was easier to join a union, more people would do it.” potential to grow and inspire others to action. M 23 JONATHAN WEIER The year we make history Labour’s victories and losses have enriched Canada’s social democracy. We should remember and learn from them in 2019.

VER THE PAST seven years Canadi- opportunity to build on this resistance premier. While the NDP and the labour ans have been bombarded with a and begin constructing new historical movement have experienced great steady stream of nationalist com- narratives. This will be a momentous success in the past few years, notably Omemorative projects. In 2012, the year for reminding Canadians of forming governments in British Co- Conservative Harper government did our common history of struggle and lumbia and Alberta, workers are also its best to convince us that the War of activism. From May to June we will stuck in too many rearguard battles to 1812 was a proto-national conflict in mark the 100th anniversary of the protect their rights, refighting battles which a Canadian identity was forged Winnipeg General Strike, in many won long ago. on the field of battle. Commemorations ways the birth of the modern labour The social contract between labour of the centenary of the First World War union movement in Canada and one and employers that was established in followed the same format—the war of the most important moments in the much of the western world, including was all bravery and nation building political awakening of the Canadian Canada, after the Second World War has without any of the futility, let alone working class. A conference and meet- been gradually chipped away at over the class conflict, which defined public de- ing in Winnipeg organized by labour last 20 years by austerity-driven govern- bate at the time. This continued even historians Rhonda Hinther and Jim ments and their business backers. Since after the Liberals took office in 2015. Naylor will celebrate the militancy his election last year, Ontario Premier Two years later, in the Trudeau gov- and solidarity behind the strike, and Doug Ford has rolled back important, if ernment’s handling of Canada 150, we there are plans to create a monument modest, labour reforms introduced by were mostly encouraged to celebrate in honour of the strikers. the previous government. Federally, the John A. MacDonald and other settler The summer of 2019 will also mark Trudeau government has shown itself statesmen; stories of colonization, gen- the 75th anniversary of the election of just as committed as the Conservatives ocide and repression were treated as Tommy Douglas in Saskatchewan as were to corporate tax cuts, private footnotes to official history. leader of Canada’s first Co-operative sector–financed infrastructure and Canada’s sesquicentennial year also Commonwealth Federation (CCF) back-to-work legislation. saw numerous radical commemorative provincial government, and the Commemorating and embracing the projects that sought to disrupt and 50th anniversary of the election of bright spots in radical labour history, undermine the colonialist narrative. Ed Schreyer as Manitoba’s first NDP while reflecting on our failures, can The Graphic History Collective give us hope and provide lessons for distributed posters telling stories of how we might renew the movement resistance—opposition to the Ukrain- for worker protections and social ian internment in the First World War, Successful union democracy at this critical moment. Chloe Cooley’s anti-slavery activism drives and Sometimes these lessons are direct and the Tsilhqot’in War of 1864, for and unfortunately repetitive, as mine example—as part of their Remember, mobilizations workers in Kirkland Lake, Ontario have Resist, Redraw project. Historians along with political discovered over long years of struggle. Crystal Fraser and Sarah Komarnisky In the spirit of reflection and renewal, launched a call for 150 Acts of Reconcili- pressure from CCF we consider that struggle here. ation, exposing the seeming reluctance politicians…resulted of the federal government and others etween 1941 and 1942, workers at to implement the recommendations in the creation of a the Macassa goldmine in Kirkland of the Truth and Reconciliation Com- new labour regime BLake fought a long, drawn-out mission. The Colonialism 150 meme, strike over the right to organize with which visually subverted the Canada that would come to the Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers. 150 brand, appeared on t-shirts, posters define the postwar Their struggle would eventually force and social media. the Liberal government of Mackenzie In 2019, we workers, radicals and pro- labour-employer King to pass an order-in-council (P.C. gressives of all backgrounds have an social contract. 1003) protecting the right of workers to 24 organize and requiring employers to respect that choice. But at that point Macassa held all the cards and chose to ignore the wishes of its workers, who were not able to unionize. Laurel Sefton MacDowell describes the lead-up, events and aftermath of the strike in her seminal 1983 monograph, Remembering Kirkland Lake: The Gold Miners Strike of 1941- 1942. Even at that point, she writes, Eastern Ontario miners were not strangers to workplace resistance. For as long as mining and exploration had occurred in the province, workers had resisted unfair working conditions. The big departure for Kirkland Lake gold miners in the 1940s was their embrace of industrial unionism. The Mine, Mill and Smelter Workers were affiliated to the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO), an international workers organization that aimed to unite all workers across industries. For miners atuned to craft unionism, this was a radical new idea. But it was exceedingly difficult for workers to form this new kind of association. Single-industry towns offered little social mobility and it was a very real struggle for workers and their children to gather the resources they needed to educate themselves so they could leave the mines. With the local economy beholden to the price of gold, families experienced constant insecurity over whether the mine would remain open. Mine operators were coercive, spread rumours about imminent shutdowns and layoffs, and de- ployed public or private police forces against unionists. Above all, without adequate labour regulations, employers were not compelled to recognize a union even after a ma- jority of membership cards were collected. In the 1940s, Canada’s labour legislation was outdated, failed to respond to industrial unionism and was tilted heavily in favour of employers. Unfair labour laws coupled with worker insecurity undermined the strength of union- ization campaigns. In 1941, over 4,000 workers walked off the job in their fight to have their union recognized. They fell short. The Kirkland Lake gold miners were forced to return to work, and many of the leaders of the unionization movement were not hired back. Bitter defeat was a typical result for the labour movement at the time. Laws and eco- nomic conditions made unionization a virtual impossibility. The big push for labour law reform in the 1930s and 1940s focused on the need for recognizing industrial unionism. The struggle was about building worker power to rectify an existing imbalance that favoured industrial capitalism. Each major union recognition loss validated the labour movement’s campaign to call for labour law reform. Union- ists made their efforts very public, inviting reporters and CCF politicians to become involved in union recognition drives, which were successful as often as they failed. “Re- member Kirkland Lake” became a rallying cry among trade unionists. Successful union drives and mobilizations along Frosting over Canadian history: Some of dozens of with political pressure from CCF politicians in the federal tacky Canada 150 consumables collected by the Twitter and provincial governments resulted in the creation of a account @Canada1504sale. new labour regime that would come to define the postwar labour-employer social contract.

ut even with the passing of updated labour laws in the last 70 years, unionization remains exceedingly difficult. BIn 2002, Kirkland Lake Gold reopened the Macassa mine. 25 designed—asIn they a repeat always of past have history, been goldor minersstrictly internalWe should prescriptions look of withthe land. Notto radicaljust how changes we’ve in been labour laws. Nor since the firstagain missionaries fought toarrived organize and manywith the critical Indigenous writers, dispossessedis of it itlikely or how to move to exercise public opinion in through theUnited residential Steelworkers, school expe with- whomManuel the is refreshinglypride on pro-active, a history jurisdiction oversupport it, but of our pro-worker obligations legislative re- rience and theMine, fitful Mill andLiberal Smelter bursts Workers creative, Union and characterized importantly, persuasive byto it. While Manuelforms, at advocates least not onfor its the own. So what into nothingnesshad merged like the in 1967.Kelowna The issues—the(not to mention witty). rebuilding ofthen Indigenous are we building economies toward? accord—to fixprecariousness Indigenous peoples.” of mine employment,Or When askedresilience, by non-Indigenous struggle (as well as non-IndigenousWe need to remember economies that through- put another decentway, to helppay, ussafety, assimilate. and the naturepeoples of how and to get pasthope, colonialism, often forin that matter),out labour’s he insists long they history must of organizing For Canadiansthe company today, this town recon in the- neoliberalManuel would say the answer is sim- be rooted inthere a deference are far moreto the failures land to record ciliation framework’sera—are strikingly discourse similar has ple: to those“Canada the needs face to fully of recognize seemingly and includes than a section successes. of the For book every successful reached dangerouswhich characterized levels of satura the- early-1940sour Aboriginal insurmountable and treaty rights and reminding usunion of our drive near or apocalyptic political victory there tion. Manuelstruggle. writes: The“Everything outcome is of theour drive, absolute right to self-determi- circumstancesare to multiple drive the Kirkland point. Lakes or Win- reconciliation.however, When they was joina huge a round disappointment: nation. At thebarriers. same time, we will Despite thisnipeg foreboding, general strikes. the tone But we need dance, they oncall May that 25, reconciliation. 2018, mine workers recognize found the fundamental human is generallyto hopeful. remember In thatthat spirit,those failures also When their eyesout theirtear up vote in discussing to unionize rightwith ofthe Canadians, after hundreds of the writing contributeis accessible. to Thethe strengtheningRecon- of a our poverty,Steelworkers that is reconciliation. was defeated. At years of settlement,The effects to live ofhere.” the employer’sciliation inter- Manifestomovement can that be will read continue as to build the same time, Thewhen result they arewas denying not so surprisingBut he alsoventions knew werethat obviousCanadians when thean ballotsintroductory toward text the for changes Canadians that will make our constitutionalwhen rights, we account they call forthat the (and signifi it should- were be counted. noted thatOrganizers this witnessedwho have littletrue worker understanding democracy possible. of reconciliationcant of Aboriginal financial titleand withsocial bookresources is addressed a drop inin supportlarge part for to unionization colonialism, orThese as an wins, intervention though they may not al- Crown title. mobilizedIn fact, every by new Kirlkand plan to Lake Canadians) Gold to wouldconsistent prefer with the what difficult unions haveinto seencounterhegemonic ways be apparent, theorizing. continue to happen. steal from uscounter is called the reconciliation.” unionization drive.path, Work because- elsewhere ultimately after our interests similar hard-nosedFor me, having Progressive studied governmentsand taught are elected While otherers academics at Kirkland debate Lake theGold soughtdiverge. to So, Indigenouscampaigns by people employers. must TheseIndigenous kinds politicsfairly regularly for a decade in Canada,now, at least meaning andjoin scope a union of reconciliation, for the same reason cultivate most a sophisticatedof anti-union and campaigns commit are- Manuelcurrently reframes provincially my thinking and always on with labour Manuel showspeople how today its already look to been unionize: ted grassroots they legal movement in Ontario with and those across issues Canada, I long support, considered and straightfor they continue- to make co-opted andfelt weaponized. they were being treatedin unfairly solidarity—environmentalists and the structure as itand exists ward. favours While positive there are changes elements to thatlabour laws and In a reviewby of their Unsettling employer. Canada Online, racialized workers Canadiansemployers in and particular— their ability torequire mobilize elaboration other worker here and protections. nuance Workers I wrote thatshared Manuel stories is like of a favouritism,tall old to healthforce justice. resources Now, in there order is to much combat unionthere, cer this- iscontinue nonetheless to organize, a tremen negotiate- and cedar. He seemsand tosafety have concerns,a view of theand expressedmore: strategies tification for investorcampaigns. risk At a timedously when important strike whenbook forneeded. multiple landscape infears its entirety, of unannounced and before cutbacks analyses, to land unions management should be plans, focused the on extendingaudiences. And as we go back and remember the rest of us.earnings His analysis and frombenefits. above Usingdeployment tactics rightsof international and protections legal in to- all workers,While Art over Manuel 100 is years irreplaceable, of labour political effectively pulledputs the straight current from conver the 1941-42- struments, battle, pipelinethey are subversion stuck fighting plans, laws designedhe does toleave activism an inheritance. in Canada, Among as we remember sation aroundemployer-friendly reconciliation into disinformation the even a six-step allow program employers for decoloni to spend- an unlimitedthose gifts istheThe tens Reconciliation of thousands Man of workers- who rightful context.spread quickly in the twozation. weeks These amount myriad of moneyof tactics in efforts are ifestoto prevent, in which went Manuel on strike finds in Winnipeg a path hoping to More thanbefore that, and the the vote. focus reallyWorkers designed feared to fundamentallyunionization. challenge for us. Now it’screate our atask better to clear world, it. Mwe should look of the latterdisciplinary half of the book, action, is whatjob lossesthe legitimacy and of the settler state and THIS REVIEW FIRSTwith RAN ON pride INDIAN on & COWBOYa history, characterized we’re going tomine do about closure, it all. andBypassing the fierce force debate an alternative he struggle arrangement. at KirklandA MEMBER-SUPPORTEDLake in by resilience, INDIGENOUS struggle MEDIA and hope, often PLATFORM. IT IS REPRINTED HERE WITH PERMISSION the nihilism underminedof much of the the settler-co social bonds- Central of the to this2018 new did arrangement,not make many newspaperFROM THE AUTHOR. in the face of seemingly insurmount- lonial frameworkscommunity. and the structural and a latentT themeheadlines throughout, outside the is region or lead able barriers. M

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If you’d like to learn more, our Development Officer Katie Loftus would be happy to assist you with your gift 26 planning. Katie can be reached at 613-563-1341 ext. 31857 or at [email protected]. media as fuelled by “typical black block anarchists.” In fact, Work as Sylvain Cypel wrote in the New York Review of Books late last year, most of the 2,000 gilets jaune arrested to that Life point were older than your typical anarchist or far-right LYNNE FERNANDEZ provocateur and had come out to protest for the first time in their lives. The French have a long history of shaking up the status quo by literally taking control of the streets. The inspiring Quebec student protests of 2012 probably provide the clos- est contemporary Canadian parallel, but there was a time Canada’s “yellow vest” when our mass protests made international news as well. In a Canadian Dimension article in October, H.C. Pent- movement needs land referred to the Winnipeg General Strike as “among the great class-confrontations of capitalist history.” It more gilets jaunes inspired similar strikes in other Canadian cities, and the eventual defeat of the strikers spurred the formation of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation. Although the INCE LATE LAST year, tens of thousands of French have 35,000 strikers were overpowered by Winnipeg’s capitalist hit the streets in protest of the country’s rising cost class, the action left an important legacy for Manitoba’s of living and shrinking opportunities. Many of these labour movement. gilets jaunes protesters, named after the yellow safety As with the gilets jaunes, 1919 strikers were characterized jackets they wear in public, rely on their vehicles to get as dangerous and radical. They were referred to (even by Sto work, or to do their work. President Emmanuel Macron’s the New York Times) as Bolshevik revolutionaries who were proposed carbon tax, which would have added painfully to hell bent on bringing a soviet-style economy to Canada. the cost of working in France, was the final straw. Pentland writes that there “was much calculated deceit But the gilets jaunes are also sick of the French presi- in this image.” Nonetheless, 35,000 strikers—a huge part dent’s neoliberal austerity measures: cuts to public services, of Winnipeg’s working population—continued fighting higher taxes on ordinary citizens, lower taxes for the rich for their rights. and for corporations. These injustices, combined with The atmosphere in 1919 was much more volatile than Macron’s arrogance, pushed workers to don their vests today. The Bolsheviks’ success in overturning the despotic and hit the streets en masse. Russian tsar inspired Canadian workers who had returned The movement was quickly appropriated by right-wing from the horrors of the First World War only to face high groups in other parts of Europe and even Canada. However, unemployment, falling wages and a highly precarious these groups have focused their anger on different issues labour market. There were no employment standards in from the gilets jaunes. In Canada people are protesting Canada at that time; no labour legislation; no public health everything from immigration to the lack of action on care; no Canada Pension Plan. building the Trans Mountain pipeline. These grievances Many of the worker protections and social services we are very different in spirit from those of the gilets jaunes. take for granted today exist because workers took to the As reported by Richard Greeman in The Bullet, the streets in Winnipeg and elsewhere to demand fair wages French movement’s demands include that no one be left and better working conditions. Unfortunately, in a case of homeless; the end of austerity; no taxation on the poor; a history repeating itself, a lot of the 1919 grievances have better integration policy for immigrants; a minimum salary arisen a century later under the cloak of an intensified, ma- of 1,500 euros/month (about $2,250); and more progressive ture capitalism. Western societies are more unequal today income taxes that would force big corporations and the than they were 100 years ago. Productivity continues to rich to pay their fair share. increase while wages stagnate. Employment is precarious. Yellow jackets in Canada also want the Liberal govern- How do we respond? ment to reverse the carbon tax, but their complaint is based French protesters have peered under the cloak; they see on kneejerk anti-tax sentiment and not increases to the where to focus their anger. Most wear their gilets jaunes cost of living, which will be mitigated and in most cases in the spirit of worker solidarity, decent wages, immigrant fully rebated under the federal plan. In contrast, the French rights and fair taxation. Likewise, Winnipeg strikers 100 gilets jaunes are demanding fair taxation and decent wages years ago responded by banding together, locally and in for ordinary workers. And they have had a modest degree league with workers around the world, against an unfair of success. system. Macron has agreed to rescind some of the new taxes and If Canada’s “yellow vests” can’t see the value in that raise wages for some workers. Even if Greeman is right kind of solidarity, they shouldn’t be appropriating the that these claims are mainly “smoke and mirrors,” Macron’s symbol of the French movement. Hopefully Canadians public acknowledgment that many French are suffering is can distinguish between their message and that of the an accomplishment in itself. Especially considering that gilets jaunes. M the movement has been misrepresented by mainstream 27 ERIKA SHAKER Frontlines of the class We all win when teachers strike, but parents, children and communities need to see themselves in the struggle.

NTARIO’S BACK-TO-SCHOOL SEASON is of the government’s goal to cut 4% dissolving them and centralizing the going to be especially disruptive from the cost of public education. power.” Nova Scotia is not alone in this for families later this year. Those Thompson has refused to commit to regard. Quebec has committed to abol- Oof us with an interest in the state full-day kindergarten past the next ishing school boards and replacing of our schools, and the well-being of school year, out of respect for the “con- them with service centres (the Nova children and the people who help sup- sultation process,” though she adds, Scotia model in the English system). port them, need to get ready—and get again quite vaguely, the government Manitoba is also looking at reducing to work. will be maintaining “full day learning.” or eliminating boards in the province. Doug Ford’s government has given us Thompson’s government is also Placing limits on local democracy some sense of what to expect, though talking about revisiting the process by isn’t new to Doug Ford. Fresh into the plans are strategically vague. For which school boards deal with staffing his current mandate, the premier example, teachers have been threat- and seniority for occasional teachers. promised he would use the Charter’s ened with discipline if they stray too Rather than directly funding services notwithstanding clause if needed, in far from the 1998 sex-ed curriculum, for children with autism—let alone the middle of a municipal election but a provincial lawyer has suggested increasing the inadequate funding campaign, to forcibly reduce the the lauded 2015 revision was fine as a currently provided—the government number of wards in Toronto from 47 “supplemental” resource. The message: will simply give money to parents in to 25—a decision that impacted both teach the new stuff, if you dare. what resembles a “vouchers by stealth” the public and Catholic Toronto school Other Conservative changes have initiative. boards even if it didn’t reduce the been easier to tabulate. Cancelling the And last fall, after a meeting of number of trustees in either system. province’s cap-and-trade program cre- provincial education ministers, Al- ated a $100-million hole in the budget berta’s David Eggen claimed he heard hat’s been laid out for public edu- for fixing school infrastructure. Fur- his Nova Scotia counterpart, Zach cation in Ontario is a roadmap to ther “strategic” cuts have been made to Churchill, “bragging” about “how he Wsocial and economic regression. funding for rewriting the curriculum was taking it to school boards and The best, and I would argue only op- to accommodate Indigenous educa- tion—if our goal is not just to brace tion, the Truth and Reconciliation for impact, but to demand long-term Commission, and American sign improvements to the provincial language, as well as for additional education system—is massive and math training for teachers. Parents sustained mobilization. That’s going to Reaching Out grants, which helped take a lot of work, outreach, listening, school boards engage more effectively and the ability to suspend our under- with parents from marginalized com- standable defensiveness after being munities, were also cut. under attack for so long. Collectively, these decisions repre- Teachers and education workers are sent fairly small sums of money. But a perennial and predictable target of they will have a disproportionate those in positions of power—in On- impact on how classroom content Parents and tario, B.C., Quebec, Nova Scotia and and the institutional structures of everywhere in between. Education education can respond to and reflect education workers workers are invariably right there on the educational, societal and socio- have one very the frontlines, or rather their unions economic needs of kids, families and are, defending their collective rights communities. important thing in and the quality of our provincial More recently, Education Minister common: the desire school systems. Lisa Thompson has floated the idea In Ontario, that fight will be waged of “revisiting” the class-size cap for to help care for and fiercely at the bargaining table in the kindergarten and grades 1–3 as part support kids. lead-up to the expiration of collective 28 agreements on August 31. But in addition to this work, solidarity we need to create the conditions for sustained alliances need to be forged with other groups whose momentum. support undercuts the government’s narrative instead of reinforcing it. These alliances must be ready, well in n Ontario in the lead up to August 31, self-declared advance, for picket lines, work to rule, preemptive back- progressives need to reach out to and enlist an increas- to-work legislation and whatever else the government Iingly fractured populace in ways we haven’t had to do might throw at our teachers after the start of bargaining. in decades. This involves the tried and tested method of By “other groups” I mean high school and middle school talking to people—communicating with each other face students, who showed their impressive mobilization skills to face rather than, or as well as, through the screen of a in cross-province rallies protesting the rollback of the sex- computer or mobile. ed curriculum. But I’m also talking about parents, even Organizing ourselves will also require physical spaces for grandparents, given that these are the people the Ford people to gather. While austerity has severely undermined government keeps saying it’s out to protect and support. much of the remaining community-based infrastructure Within these two groups, though, we need more than just from which to (as my dad would say) plan the revolution, the usual public education advocates coming out. we do have schools. And this is where this fall’s teacher Single parents and parents who work shifts. Parents of bargaining bonanza could have benefits far beyond the colour and Indigenous parents. LGBTQ2 parents and ESL securing of another collective agreement. parents. If we don’t know how to listen to each other and Organizing around schools can help us build communi- work together, particularly with those who have been tra- ties that are immunized from political campaigns that keep ditionally marginalized or left out of the debate—by design us divided by amplifying our anxieties and emphasizing or by neglect—people run the risk of feeling increasingly what separates us from each other (without, of course, isolated. Our numbers suffer and those in power win. identifying the systemic forces behind these divisions). Recent events show us that isolation can make people Local organizing puts kids and communities at the heart particularly susceptible to arguments that bureaucracies of the conversation, but this can and should also be a segue can’t be trusted; that schools don’t listen to parents, taxes to discussions about taxation, inequality, spending, justice, are too high and money is wasted. The powers that be want racism, colonialism, health and well-being, food security, people to feel they can go it alone because, they claim, housing, etc. All topics that some people don’t feel equipped public sector workers including educators have their own to jump right into, but who might be able to find their way agenda and it has something to do with more money and into through discussions about the local school. more benefits. Most parents, students, and pretty much anyone you run This is the narrative we need to push back against if we’re into on the street will tell you it makes obvious sense to cap to reverse the damage being done every day. That task is all class sizes so that kids get the best education they can. As the more difficult with the Ford government tapping into the Ford government threatens to lift those caps yet again, real populist disillusionment and anger at the nameless, we all need to remember that they were not put in place faceless elites allegedly ruining this province. out of kindness. Classroom caps were won by educators The good news is that when it comes to cutting through and their unions through the collective bargaining process. the isolation and the disillusionment, educators have They fought for the caps not because it made their lives a huge advantage over a lot of other workers in a lot of easier, but because teaching conditions affect learning other sectors. conditions. Parents and education workers have one very important So when collective agreements expire on August 31, and thing in common: the desire to help care for and support educators are in a strike position, or are rejecting conces- kids. It’s a powerful shared goal that’s hard to argue against. sions demanded by the province, or are being threatened It provides a ready-made starting point to connect to a with (possibly pre-emptive) back-to-work legislation, wider circle of advocates for our kids, our communities, our remember what’s at stake where our kids’ education is schools, our most vulnerable, and a system that provides concerned, and what education unions have been fighting equitably for all of us. for. To directly confront the all too effective divide-and-con- And be prepared to fight—not just for them, but for the quer strategy governments roll out to fight teachers, we gains they’ve made on our behalf, and the gains we need to need to build a movement that emphasizes what we can all continue to collectively make for the next generation. M do to help each other out. Where the government focuses on wages and benefits to reinforce the narrative of entitled union members, educators need to talk to and with parents, children and the public about what would be best for the kids, their families and the community. In 2012, members of the Chicago Teachers Union used their visibility and privilege where they worked and lived to support those who needed their help in making their communities better for themselves and their families. And those communities supported them in return. That’s the 29 BRUNO DOBRUSIN Striking for survival The right to strike in Canada is under attack. Back-to-work legislation has become commonplace. In order to defeat these threats, workers and unions should seize upon the strike, both legal and illegal, as a tool for social change.

GREW UP ON constant strike. And I they belonged to a different category A similar system of labour relations am not saying this metaphorically. called “scientists.” To make any kind of in Argentina led to over 60% union- During my childhood in Argentina, strike happen, we would need to make ization toward the end of the 1980s. Ipublic sector workers, including both sure our colleagues identified as both. However, as was the case in Argen- my parents, were literally on strike for We spent the entire year leading up tina during the harshest neoliberal days, and sometimes weeks, every to that December organizing work- period, right-wing governments do not single year. Teachers went on strike place after workplace. The budgetary care for the limits imposed by legisla- every March (the beginning of the adjustment was so brutal that even tion when attacking unions. In the last school year) and usually one more the most renowned “scientists” came few years in Canada we have seen the time before the year was out, as new out in support of the strike. I had never right to strike under attack, affecting austerity measures were announced before participated in a 1,000-person especially public sector unions, rein- by the provincial or national govern- assembly to decide a strike vote. That forcing restrictions that already exist ments of the time. was remarkable. for labour action in the private sector. Budget deficits, the need to cut “red The strike and the occupation were Governments of different political tape,” and a permanent state of auster- not legal, but they were massive and stripes have clearly stated that the ity were the rule in Argentina during successful and the government caved right to strike in Canada is limited the 1990s. We were the poster child of in. Adjustments for that year were to strikes that do not seriously affect neoliberalism. But then we became a cancelled, so were the layoffs. Did we the functioning of society and the poster child of resistance, with a social get everything we wanted? No. Did it economy. Every time a strike starts to explosion that included blockades in feel for a moment like we could topple noticeably disrupt people’s lives—the major cities, general strikes and fac- a government? Yes. lives of business owners perhaps most tory occupations. (Canadians might importantly—back-to-work legislation remember some of this in Avi Lewis’s is brought in, only to be challenged documentary with Naomi Klein, The THE RIGHT TO in the courts years later. Canada has Take.) STRIKE IN CANADA witnessed hundreds of small strikes Even as a kid I was somewhat aware Since moving to Canada almost two in the private sector that do not nec- that the majority of these strike actions years ago, I have noticed similarities be- essarily affect the overall economy. would be defeated. But sometimes tween the current advance of the right But the moment a strike, even a legal you win. And that feeling of power, of against unions and what I witnessed strike, threatens economic or political victory, of knowing you finally broke in Argentina during the 1990s. I was interests, back-to-work is the answer. the back of the bosses and they have to surprised that aggressive government We witnessed it in Ontario with the give in…. That feeling feels pretty good. policies against unions did not trigger college faculty strike, in which thou- Fast-forward to December 2016. general or large strikes, until I learned sands of precarious workers around the I found myself sleeping inside the that legal restriction on “political province were forced back to work by the building that houses Argentina’s strikes” has become an ingrained feature previous Wynne government. Similarly, Ministry of Technology. The strike and of labour disputes in Canada. the still new Ford government legislated occupation went on for a week, to fight I also learned about the Rand York University workers back to work as back against layoffs and a reduction formula and the system it created of one of its first actions after being sworn in the budget dedicated to research. strong collective bargaining, allowing in. The federal government under Prime I was a researcher at the time and an for improvements in wages and work- Minister Trudeau sent postal workers active member of the public sector ing conditions; a system that has also back to work once the strike seemed union. Researchers and scientists did maintained an overall high union to be heading in the direction of a total not historically identify as “workers”; density, especially in the public sector. stoppage around Christmas. 30 Arguably the most problematic re- CANADIAN LABOUR DISPUTES, WAGE GROWTH cent example of back-to-workism was AND INFLATION, 19032016 against the power workers in Ontario at the end of 2018. With a negotiating Average Hourly Strike Intensity deadline approaching and no solution in 15% Earnings Days lost to work 0.45% Nominal rate of stoppages as a sight, the Ford Conservatives, with sup- change, three-year percent of total work port from the lone Green MPP and the moving average, left time, three-year Ontario Liberals, voted pre-emptively moving average, right 0.30% to forbid any strike in the power sector. 10% What incentive does a company have to negotiate in good faith with its workers, to bring positions closer, if it 5% 0.15% knows that at the end of the day, back- to-work legislation will tilt the scales in its favour? These attacks on unions and 0% 0% especially on union strongholds like the public sector have hampered the capacity to take strike action, which is already comparatively weaker in the -5% -0.15% private sector. Despite some high-vis- 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 ibility strikes in the last two decades, the total number of hours lost due to work stoppages has declined signifi- That is not the context at the moment, A ROAD AHEAD cantly since the 1970s (see the chart and the challenges to the system itself If there is anything to learn from here from Jordan Brennan, part of require a more direct confrontation workers’ experience in Argentina, it’s Maclean’s “91 most important charts to with employers. The system can only that if you don’t get directly in the way watch in 2018”), to the point Canadians be strengthened in labour’s favour by of anti-worker plans, you will have now strike about as much as they did direct action. little to no chance of stopping them. during the Great Depression. The recent teachers’ strikes in the Premier Ford and the Progressive U.S. demonstrate the need to return to Conservative government in Ontario a strike cycle that actually disrupts a typify this attitude: going after student DEFENDING COLLECTIVE sector, or even an entire society. Teach- unions (even accusing them, in anoth- BARGAINING BY STRIKING ers in West Virginia were not allowed er throwback to the Winnipeg General Collective bargaining is under attack to strike, but they went ahead anyway Strike, of “crazy Marxist nonsense”), and employers are increasingly hostile with a massive rank-and-file strike that scrapping labour rights, freezing the to the notion of negotiations. Gains for was formally deemed illegal. It never- minimum wage and floating the pri- unionized workers are still made in theless gathered enough momentum vatization of key public services like collective bargaining agreements, but to force the political class to sit down transport and health care. Unions and decreasing union membership, espe- and negotiate. social movements have many fights cially in the private sector, implies that The government shutdown used by ahead. those gains represent a smaller portion U.S. President Donald Trump to push Strikes build power even if they of the working class. In the context of his administration’s conservative settle for less than expected. The work- “competitive pressures,” why would an agenda extended for more than 30 ers who filled the streets of Winnipeg employer negotiate better conditions? days and was only cancelled when air 100 years ago recognized this core They wouldn’t—unless there were the traffic controllers threatened to strike truth. That work stoppage did not take chance of workers withholding their due to unsafe working and flying con- place in a vacuum, but rather at a time labour power, the source of all com- ditions. That strike would have been of high labour militancy throughout pany profits. A company can declare considered illegal, too. different industries. a lockout or shutdown, avoiding nego- The recent Canadian postal work- Corporations hold about as much tiations altogether. So should workers ers’ strike was a threat because of the relative wealth and political power consider this as one of their options. massive disruptions it would have today as they did in the early 20th The Rand formula system has created so close to the holidays. An century. If workers had to strike then produced significant improvements Ontario power workers’ strike car- to correct the imbalance, it’s hard to to workers’ lives, allowing unions to ried the same potential. A sustained see how we will level the playing field grow and take care of their members. challenge to the restrictions on strike again now without doing the same— But it assumes collective bargaining action, going beyond the courts, may and on as large a scale. What better takes places within a political context be a necessary step to actually defeat way to honour their actions than to in which labour rights are respected. anti-union/right-to-work schemes. emulate them? M 31 ZAEE DESHPANDE Lessons in protest culture The case of South Korea

N NOVEMBER 2018, over 150,000 South to the streets. In recent years, South South Korea’s large family-owned Korean workers walked out of facto- Korea has seen everything from a year- conglomerates—Samsung, Hyundai, ries to remind the country’s president, long sit-in on top of a smokestack to a LG and other household names known IMoon Jae-in, of his pledges to improve “ghost rally” that displayed life-sized collectively as chaebol—embody the working conditions. Two months later, hologram protesters instead of actual classic “too big to fail problem.” Al- two Korean taxi drivers set themselves people. though these companies are involved on fire in protest of plans by a large The recent mass demonstrations in numerous corruption scandals and national mobile messaging company have largely been a response to Pres- have been resistant to progressive, to introduce an Uber-like ride-shar- ident Moon’s faltering support for pro-worker reform, the export-driven ing app. Then this February, labour labour and his lack of chaebol reform. economy’s dependence on the chaebol groups joined in solidarity with Bud- The two concerns go hand in hand. have made governments hesitant to dhist monks to march against South place restrictions on them. Korea’s lack of basic labour protections A portrait of a taxi driver who died by For decades, labour has paid the for irregular workers. setting himself on fire is seen as tens cost of the state’s inability—and lack These demonstrations are not of thousands of taxi drivers take part of desire—to dismantle the chaebol isolated events in the South Korean in a protest against a carpool service system. In the second half of the 20th landscape. The nation boasts a vibrant application launched by Kakao Corp. century, workers were made to endure and often militant protest culture that in Seoul, December 20, 2018. insufferable working conditions in continues to discover new ways to take REUTERS/KIM HONG-JI order to foster chaebol growth. 32 At an institutional level, little has changed in the present Korean unions are day. Recent administrations have continued to let the chae- bol influence labour legislation and frequently let labour demanding the violations slide. In a tale that is all too familiar around the “dismantlement of the world, labour policy in South Korea has therefore continued to serve the interests of big business. chaebol-controlled economic regime in order to pave resident Moon was supposed to break the status quo and transform South Korea. Not necessarily because the way to true economic Pof his own election promises, but rather because Moon democratization.” entered office in 2017, on the heels of a massive revolution that left South Koreans feeling inspired and energized. Beginning in October 2016, protestors filled the streets of Seoul and other major cities in South Korea to rally against the corrupt rule of then president Park Geun-hye. The protests were sparked by allegations that President Park of the list is increasing trade friction with China, which was offering multi-million-dollar favours to South Korea’s put in place a number of restrictions on Korean imports in largest chaebol, Samsung. retaliation for the latter’s installation of a U.S.-made missile Unlike the more violent South Korean social movements defence system. of the 20th century—in which protestors used stones, Nonetheless, Moon appears to have caved in to the firebombs and steel pipes—this movement employed demands of his critics. In November, his administration different tactics. announced that it was considering expanding its flexible Demonstrators came out every Saturday night of the work-hour system. Labour unions see the government’s fall and winter of 2016, carrying candles, singing, dancing move to introduce greater flexibility to the workplace as and wearing costumes to create a visceral image of joyous- the president backpedaling on his commitment to reducing ness and collectivity. The protests thus earned the name working hours and limiting precarious work. the Candlelight Revolution. At its height, over 2.3 million A flexible work-time system would “allow companies to participants flooded the streets carrying candles, showing make their employees work 80-hour weeks without over- the world what democracy looks like. time penalty rates,” says Hyewon Chong, a representative Ultimately the protestors succeeded. In 2017, Park Ge- of the Korean Metal Workers’ Union (KMWU) in a recent un-hye was impeached from office. This was a victory for Facebook post. Chong adds that both the KMWU and labour unions such the Korean Confederation of Trade KCTU are calling for the complete “dismantlement of the Unions (KCTU) and its affiliates, who had been protesting chaebol-controlled economic regime in order to pave the Park’s right-wing neoliberal labour policies since her way to true economic democratization.” election. While the unions continue to take to the streets, looming The revolution depended on coalition-based mobilization trade consultations with the EU are adding additional fuel to weave together labour, hundreds of civil society organiza- to the fire. In July 2011, South Korea entered a free trade tions, and individuals across the political spectrum to face agreement with the EU that required both parties to agree the age-old problems of chaebol corruption and the repres- to a comprehensive list of labour commitments. Now the sion of workers. Admittedly, South Korean civil society has EU asserts that South Korea has not held up its end of the not been as cohesive since, but the Candlelight Revolution bargain, especially when it comes to labour rights. set a precedent for what collectivization could be. In January 2019, the EU began consultations with Elected in the aftermath of this monumental movement, the government of South Korea to push the nation into President Moon distinguished himself as an alternative to ratifying core conventions of the International Labour the previous government. The Moon administration’s five- Organization (ILO). South Korea has yet to ratify ILO year plan prioritized limiting irregular employment, raising clauses concerning the freedom of association, the right the minimum wage and reducing the maximum work week. to collective bargaining and the abolition of forced labor. These changes were long overdue in South Korea, where The EU has also expressed concerns around South Korea’s in 2017 the average worker was clocking nearly 14% more treatment of irregular workers. (Canada, it’s worth noting, hours than the average OECD worker. does not seem to share the European concerns, even though its own free trade agreement with Korea, in force since oon upheld his promises, at least initially. In 2018, his 2015, also requires both sides to recognize these ILO rights.) government hiked the minimum wage and slashed As he faces heat from labour, big business and the EU Mmaximum weekly working hours from 68 to 52. Both alike, President Moon will have to confront the issue of law-makers and big business quickly blamed South Korea’s labour protection and its companion, chaebol reform, in sluggish economy on Moon’s new labour-friendly legislation. the upcoming months. And while a wishy-washy president While it’s true that the Korean economy is decelerating, attempts a balancing act, one thing seems certain: whether the slowdown can be better explained by a range of struc- they bring stones or come carrying candlelight, South tural challenges currently facing the country. Near the top Koreans will march on. M 33 International

ASAD ISMI South Africa’s new revolutionary party takes on a corrupt system

HEN SOUTH AFRICANS go to the “conscious rejection” of the Tri-Partite community-controlled co-operative polls in May, they will have a Alliance [between the ruling African production and feminist systems of radical new choice on the bal- National Congress party, South Afri- reproduction. I think the standard Wlot. The Socialist Revolutionary can Communist Party and Congress vehicles are appropriate: radical social Workers’ Party (SRWP) of South Africa, of South African Trade Unions] in its movements allied with trade unions, which announced itself in December, resolutions taken in 2013. together creating a socialist political will formally launch its election bid “The ‘NUMSA Moment’ squarely party and eventually taking state this March. Created by the National raises the question of the creation of a power.” Union of Metalworkers of South Af- vanguard working class party gaining According to Bond, the closest the rica (NUMSA), the country’s biggest a mass following in South Africa,” says left in South Africa came to creating labour union with 400,000 members, Khan. “This fundamentally changes the kind of organization he favours the party aims to unite the working the political landscape in the country.” was the United Front in 2014, in which class to fight capitalism and create a Rather than pursuing votes, Khan NUMSA attempted to bring together socialist South Africa free of mass pov- says, the SRWP is “focused on using labour, women, youth, the elderly, en- erty, unemployment and corruption. every opportunity to raise the con- vironmentalists, the LGBTQ+ rights “We are the only ones fighting for sciousness of the working class on movement and other progressives. the total destruction of capitalism,” the nature of the capitalist system and The United Front fell apart, in Bond’s SRWP and NUMSA spokesperson our need to organize independently opinion, partly because NUMSA “lost Phakamile Hlubi-Majola told Theto outside of parliament and against it.” interest” in the project. Mahlakoana of the Financial Mail The party’s aim is “merely to secure Khan disagrees with that outlook. in December. “We want a socialist a presence in parliament from which He tells me the United Front, “was [South Africa], where the interests of we can raise the working class voice designed to unite the working class in the working class will be primary and and expose the capitalist nature of struggle, irrespective of party affilia- the wealth of the country will be used parliament itself.” tion. This meant that within its ranks for the benefit of all.” the United Front was always going to According to Irvin Jim, NUMSA’s here have been other attempts to be facing different views and perspec- general secretary, the party is growing start radical leftist parties in South tives on the meaning and character of rapidly and has a presence in all nine TAfrica, but none of them were the struggle. provinces of South Africa. That pres- backed by NUMSA, the country’s most “There were very few real Commu- ence includes “a sizeable number of powerful union. Professor Patrick nists in the UF to fight for a revolutionary national leadership and branches,” he Bond, who teaches political economy perspective and transform the UF into told Mahlakoana. But the party’s main at Witwatersrand (Wits) University in a revolutionary, working class front,” emphasis is not on winning elections. Johannesburg, tells me he’s encouraged Khans says. “In this sense, while pock- “As communists,” Jim explained, “we by this historic development, but also ets of the UF still remain, it will fall to have an old view that elections are cautions that it may not be enough. the SRWP to resurrect a militant and not necessarily a solution, however, “I’m an independent ecosocialist fighting UF in the country.” they are a tactic that can be explored so my bias is towards the kinds of While forming a united front out to test if we have the support of the social struggles that address concrete of such diverse groups is a tall order working class.” problems caused by capitalism at their for any organization, Imraan Buccus Shaheen Khan, who serves on the root, in the commodity form, and in says the time is right in South Africa national core and national working strengthening the power of labour in for the SRWP’s formation. Buccus, committee of the SRWP, tells me the production and especially women’s a senior researcher at the Auwal party “grew out of two important labour in social reproduction,” he Socio-Economic Research Institute historical moments.” One was the tells me. (ASRI) based in Johannesburg, points Marikana massacre of 34 miners (at “That means the main long-term agen- out that “the road is open” for NUMSA least 78 others were wounded) by state da is transition to ecologically sound, to capture a currently vacant political forces in 2012; the other was NUMSA’s decommodified, worker self-managed, space on the left. 34 “They have a charismatic leader “stagnant economy,” according to Azar Bond, for abusing tax havens via his in Jim, an impressive organizational Jammine, director of Econometrix, a main holding company, Shanduka coal, infrastructure, an equally impressive South African economic consultancy as exposed in the Paradise Papers leak international network and a dues-pay- firm. The South African economy went in late 2017. ing base of 400,000 workers. There into recession in the second quarter of MTN transferred billions of rands has never been a better foundation 2018 and emerged from it in the third earned in Africa to offshore tax havens for anyone to start a new party in quarter, leaving overall GDP growth while Ramaphosa was its chairman be- post-apartheid South Africa.” weak (expected to be below 1%) for tween 2001 and 2013. This was exposed in SRWP’s two main competitor parties the previous year. The rand currency a joint investigation by amaBhungane on the left are both discredited, says fell by 18% in less than a month in (Centre for Investigative Journalism) Buccus. These are the South African June 2018 and South Africa’s debt has and Finance Uncovered, a global in- Communist Party (SACP) and the become junk-rated, making it harder vestigative journalism network. After Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF). for the government to borrow money. Ramaphosa left MTN to become South The former has lost “its claim to being The ANC’s current leader, Cyril Africa’s deputy president in 2014 he a party of the left,” he says, due to the Ramaphosa, cannot be untangled from criticized corporations “that make Communists’ alliance with the corrupt his party’s record, though he promised profits ‘disappear’ by shifting them ‘to African National Congress (ANC) and in January that the ANC is “getting out low-tax operations where there is little especially its former leader Jacob of that. We’re cleansing ourselves.” or no genuine activity,’” as reported in Zuma, who had to be removed by his Ramaphosa is worth about $450 the Mail & Guardian in October 2015. own party in February 2018. million, making him the 42nd richest Ramaphosa has been compelled The EFF, which often employs leftist person in Africa. He is implicated in by these factors to launch an official and anti-corruption rhetoric and wins the Marikana massacre. As a non-ex- anti-corruption drive, but this is ham- about 10% of the vote, has been em- ecutive director of Lonmin (the British strung by his own history and that of broiled in its own corruption scandals. mining company the workers were other ANC leaders whose support he The party allegedly benefited financial- striking against), Ramaphosa urged depends upon. Jacob Zuma’s support- ly from the scandalous collapse of VBS the authorities to take “concomitant ers are still powerful within the ANC Mutual Bank, with deputy leader Floyd action” against the miners before the and, as Bond explains, “Ramaphosa’s Shivambu allegedly getting 10 million massacre. agenda is extremely complicated, rand (just under $1 million) from VBS. Bond calls Ramaphosa the “ideal Jo- because in order to keep the ANC He, in turn, tried to suppress the official hannesburg branch-plant comprador from fracturing, he had to continually investigation into VBS by questioning partner to multinational corporations.” re-appoint corrupt officials.” the integrity of officials in the National He points to the politician’s “aiding” of Khan pledges that the if any SRWP Treasury and the Reserve Bank. both mining company Lonmin in “bra- candidates win legislative seats in the Buccus calls the SRWP’s formation zen illicit financial flow profit transfers upcoming election they will be subject “a thrilling moment.” He acknowledges to Bermuda,” and MTN, the largest Afri- to instant recall by the party and will that the party does not have much can cellphone firm (which Ramaphosa not be paid more than the wage of an time to build public support for the chaired), “in its prolific profit outflows “average skilled worker,” with the rest election, but he maintains that “the to Mauritius.” The current ANC leader of their salary going to the SRWP to presence of an explicitly left-wing should also be remembered, asserts “advance working class struggle.” M party in the fray will shift the political discourse.” The SRWP’s emergence, for Buccus, is “an important step towards the normalization of our politics, and towards offering real choices to the electorate.”

fter 25 years of ANC rule, 65% of South Africans still live in poverty, A40% are unemployed, and voters are disillusioned from the unending corruption scandals stemming from the looting of public resources by ANC leaders and officials. Not surprisingly, the World Bank declared South Africa the most unequal country in the world (in terms of income) in an April 2018 report. Adding to these disasters on the eve of the election is the country’s PHOTO FROM THE SRWP’S TWITTER ACCOUNT. 35 Feature

KATHLEEN RUFF How we beat asbestos

SBESTOS IS THE biggest killer of n important factor in the asbestos Another characteristic of single-in- Canadian workers. As well as the story is concern felt for the plight of dustry towns is that they have some human tragedy, asbestos contin- Athe asbestos workers and the fact political influence. The voters are con- Aues to be an economic disaster for that we as a country do not provide centrated in one area and determine Canada and other countries who put decent economic security and train- who gets elected there. Political parties, millions of tonnes of the carcinogenic ing to workers who need to transition motivated by human compassion or material in their homes, schools, gov- when an industry retracts or closes cynical self-interest, generally seek to ernment buildings and infrastructure. down. The heroic strike back in 1949 woo single-industry towns by adopting Billions of dollars are now being spent by Quebec asbestos miners against policies that favour the industry. Until on health care costs for asbestos vic- appalling exploitation by the U.S. and just over a decade ago, all federal and tims and to deal with deteriorating English-Canadian mine owners created Quebec political parties unquestioning- asbestos-containing materials in our an indelible legacy of respect and pride ly supported the Quebec asbestos mines. built environment. in Quebec, which increased the sense of The asbestos companies, the Cana- The scientific evidence that all asbes- solidarity with the workers now facing dian and Quebec governments and tos is deadly has been well established the shutdown of the industry. Quebec unions jointly formed an or- for decades. Other industrialized coun- As is often the case with extractive ganization, the Asbestos Institute (later tries banned asbestos years ago. Yet just industries, towns where asbestos was renamed the Chrysotile Institute), that a few short years ago—in 2012—the mined tended to be single-industry for decades marketed asbestos overseas Canadian and the Quebec governments towns. In some cases, such as Asbes- and lobbied against any restriction on denied the scientific evidence and sup- tos in Quebec and Cassiar in British asbestos use. ported the opening of an underground Columbia, the mine came first and the asbestos mine in Quebec to massively town was built around the mine. The he tobacco industry is notorious increase mining and export of asbestos. power dynamics were clear: the mine for its tactic of funding scientists Only four other countries were still ruled the town, not vice versa. If the Tto deny or create doubt about mining and selling asbestos: Russia, mine closed down, the town risked tobacco harm. The asbestos industry China, Kazakhstan and Brazil. disappearing, as happened after the employed the same strategy. While the scientific battle had been Cassiar mine closed. The Quebec Asbestos Mining Asso- won, the political battle had not. Just as it is ecologically unhealthy ciation (QAMA) decided in 1965 to seek Public policy at the federal, Quebec to create monocultures, similarly it an “alliance with some university such and regional level had been captured is socially unhealthy and dangerous as McGill, for example, so that authori- by asbestos interests. The facts did to create single-industry towns. The tative background for publicity can be not matter. The health of workers in community is at the mercy of the va- had.” QAMA gave $1 million to McGill Canada and especially overseas (where garies of the marketplace and industry professor John McDonald to fund his all the asbestos from the new mine decisions. If the company shuts down, studies of Quebec asbestos miners. was to be shipped and where safety workers not only lose their jobs, but These funds enabled McGill University measures are virtually non-existent) house prices plummet, schools and to create a department of epidemiology did not matter. community amenities close and the with McDonald as its chair. When the Parti Québécois was elect- younger generation leaves. McDonald’s studies concluded that ed in September 2012, it cancelled a $58 Workers, their families and their chrysotile asbestos is “essentially in- million government loan that former communities are held hostage in sin- nocuous.” No other scientist—except premier Jean Charest had approved to gle-industry towns. The workers at the scientists with financial ties to the open the asbestos mine. Asbestos min- Jeffrey mine in Asbestos owned 35% asbestos industry—has duplicated ing in Quebec and Canada then finally of the company’s shares. They were McDonald’s findings. McDonald and ceased. With asbestos mining ended, fighting to save their jobs, their finan- McGill refused to make available the the Trudeau government banned cial investment and their community. data on which McDonald based his asbestos as of December 30, 2018. The failure of the government to offer findings. Chrysotile asbestos repre- How did this human and political a transition strategy meant that the sents 95% of all asbestos ever sold. catastrophe happen? What can we workers and their community were McDonald assisted the asbestos learn so that we might stop other trapped in a desperate crisis with no industry by opposing stricter occu- disastrous policies that betray science alternative option but to keep mining pational exposure standards, stating, and democracy? asbestos. falsely, that he had no ties to the 36 asbestos industry. In 1986, McDonald collaborated with the Asbestos Institute to oppose plans by the U.S. Environmen- tal Protection Agency to ban asbestos. In 1998, McDonald argued before a World Trade Organization tribunal that countries should not have the right to ban chrysotile as- bestos. In 1999, McDonald went to Brazil to argue against a proposed asbestos ban. McGill is influential and provided the asbestos industry with academic cover. McDonald’s work promoting use of chrysotile asbestos in developing countries is still cited today by the asbestos industry.

oth the Quebec and Canadian governments refused to heed their own scientific experts. The mandate of the BQuebec National Public Health Institute (INSPQ) is to provide expert health advice to the government. It had Rachel Lee, who died in December 2011 from carried out extensive research and published numerous mesothelioma as a result of exposure to asbestos, reports on asbestos. Its recommendations opposed the is shown demonstrating outside the Quebec premier's government’s asbestos policy and were disregarded. office in 2010 with the Asia-Quebec Solidarity Delegation. The government’s 16 directors of public health for every RIGHTONCANADA region of Quebec, including the asbestos mining region, publicly challenged their government’s policy. They put a media release up on the government’s website stating that mine and not to export millions of tonnes of asbestos to the government’s “safe use” policy was a failure in Quebec India and elsewhere. and that the government’s planned expansion of the The delegation was accompanied and supported by Que- asbestos mine would result in an increase in asbestos-re- bec health professionals. Amir Khadir, then leader of Québec lated diseases among workers and the general population, Solidaire, presented the Solidarity delegation in Quebec’s creating social and financial costs. national assembly and introduced a bill to ban asbestos. At the federal level, politics overrode science. Former Together they sent a powerful message of scientific integrity, prime minister Stephen Harper was ideologically opposed international solidarity and political leadership. to any government action that would interfere with the mining industry and vowed he would not allow the as- t was no easy matter to defeat the asbestos industry. The bestos industry to be “discriminated against.” Successive asbestos lobby had political and social power, received Canadian health ministers rejected appeals to fulfil their Imillions of dollars in government funding and employed duty and stop supporting asbestos. public relations professionals, lawyers and others to ad- vance its cause. The campaign against the asbestos industry hallenging governments to respect scientific evidence was run with no funds, no staff and no big organization is critical, but it is not enough. In order to mobilize the behind it. Still, the asbestos lobby accused the campaign of Cforce of public opinion it is essential to convey the re- being funded by powerful, hidden interests and attacked al-life and human dimension of an issue—wherever the the scientists at the INSPQ as being “a little gang of Taliban.” impacts are being felt. Government ministers threatened retaliation against the Thanks to collaboration between activists in Canada and INSPQ. One of the directors of the International Chrysotile India, former premier Charest was challenged by asbestos Association (still based in Quebec) who works for the Ka- victims while on a trade mission to India in 2010. India was zakhstan asbestos industry hired a spy who infiltrated the Canada’s biggest asbestos customer and the premier was global movement to ban asbestos, including the Canadian accompanied on that trip by Quebec’s leading asbestos campaign, for four years at a cost of more than $1 million. exporter. While Charest refused a meeting with the activ- Yet in spite of its money, power and dirty tactics, the asbes- ists, the Quebec journalists on his plane interviewed the tos lobby was defeated in Quebec. International solidarity premier about it and filmed the Indian workers suffering involving activists, scientists and asbestos victims played from asbestos-caused diseases. a key role in winning this victory. The willingness of the The human face of Quebec’s export of asbestos became Quebec health professionals to challenge their government real instead of theoretical. This had a strong impact on and advocate for public health policy based on scientific ev- Quebec public opinion. idence and human solidarity provides an inspiring example Then in December 2010, again through international of what can be achieved when scientific experts are willing collaboration, the Asia-Quebec Solidarity Delegation— to speak truth to power. M composed of asbestos victims, a trade unionist and activists KATHLEEN RUFF WAS AWARDED THE MEDAL OF THE QUEBEC NATIONAL from Asia—came to Quebec to appeal directly to the ASSEMBLY IN 2016 FOR HER WORK TO STOP THE MINING AND USE OF ASBESTOS. SOME OF THE CONTENT OF THIS ARTICLE WAS PUBLISHED IN THE EDITED provincial government, unions and the people of Quebec. COLLECTION SICK AND TIRED: HEALTH AND SAFETY INEQUALITIES (FERNWOOD They asked the government not to finance the asbestos PUBLISHING, OCTOBER 2018). 37 Feature

JIM HODGSON Fighting the tide in Nicaragua The Sandinista government faces strong pressure to change—from allies and enemies alike

After the eruption of social conflict in as co-ordinator of the reconstruction leaders are getting old and there is Nicaragua between May and June 2018, government, and with Sandinista more than a whiff of corruption. the World Council of Churches (WCC) fighters converted into a political Better-educated young people in sent a team of observers to the Central party, he was elected president in 1984. particular feel a need for change; American country. Among them was Jim He lost elections in 1990, 1996 and 2001, older Nicaraguans who have always Hodgson, Latin America partnerships but then won in 2006, 2011 and 2016. opposed the Sandinistas have their co-ordinator at the United Church of Part of the opposition boycotted that Republican allies back in power in Canada. Hodgson first visited Nicaragua last election, but there was a 68% voter Washington. (Earlier this year, Elliott in 1984, five years after the Sandinista turnout, and Ortega won with 72% of Abrams, who organized the covert Revolution, and his current work has the vote. funding of Contra rebels against the taken him back at least once each year At least until early last year, educa- Nicaraguan government, was made since 2000. Almost immediately after tion and health indicators continued U.S. Special Envoy for Venezuela.) the triumph of the revolution, the United to improve, as did employment and During two visits in August, I had States began to fund a “contra” war as economic growth. Nicaragua’s GDP many good, uncomfortable conver- well as legal opposition parties. After grew by 38% over the past 11 years sations with friends and others who a decade of war, and just weeks after (ahead of its neighbours). The World sought to persuade me to different the United States invaded Panama, Bank said in 2018 that poverty had points of view. At the beginning of an opposition alliance defeated the been cut nearly in half, from 48% to the month, I visited United Church of Sandinistas in an election in 1990. They 25%. Nicaragua has largely avoided Canada partners: a school in the San returned to power in the 2006 election, the violence related to drug trafficking Judas neighbourhood in Managua, and part of the “pink wave” that was sweep- that afflicts its neighbours in Central Nicaragua’s Moravian Church—the ing Latin America. Now, as the tide ebbs, America. Some people leave to work in largest Protestant church in Central Sandinista leaders face strong pressure Panama or Costa Rica, but you don’t America with a 170-year history of for change. see the large outflow that occurs from ministry among the Indigenous and Honduras, Guatemala or El Salvador. Afro-Caribbean people of the Atlantic ESPITE MORE THAN three decades But the Sandinista party has been coast. of connecting with people in in power for a dozen years now. The Later in August, I joined a small Nicaragua, I did not expect the World Council of Churches (WCC) upheavals that tore families and delegation. We visited church, gov- communities apart between ernment, opposition and civil society DApril and June last year. A proposed organizations. At the end of our trip, reform to the national pension plan we called for dialogue as a means to drew strong opposition, and even resolve differences. We supported calls when the government dropped the for justice and peace, including respect plan, protests continued. Opposition for the human rights of all people and forces demanded the resignations of respect for diverse ways of thinking President Daniel Ortega and his wife, One person’s in contemporary societies. In months Rosario Murillo, the vice-president. “social populism” since then, several of us have also The government acknowledges that defended the right of human rights 269 people were killed in protests or or “clientelism” organizations to do their work. at road barricades; the Inter-American or “package of I know that some people reading Commission on Human Rights put the my words would rather see more number at 325. crumbs” is another than dialogue—either a resounding Ortega has been at the forefront person’s right to call for the president’s resignation of Nicaraguan politics since before or a strident defence of his record. the triumph of the Sandinista Revo- access health care After my August visits, I am more lution on July 19, 1979. After serving and education. convinced than ever that neither of 38 those positions is realistic or useful: both reflect only the extremes of a polarization that is again wounding the people of Nicaragua and their social fabric, still unhealed after the civil wars of past decades. Instead, we will continue to sup- port calls for dialogue and efforts to open space for collaboration across divisions. I would say the same today about Venezuela, where the Cana- dian government, in lockstep with the Trump administration, is calling aggressively for regime change. And also about Colombia, where the gov- ernment has abandoned what was a difficult but fruitful peace process. In Nicaragua our WCC delegation met with the Civic Alliance and with other government opponents. I asked questions about matters that have troubled me since the crisis began. Beyond being rid of the presidential couple, what do you want? How will you preserve free education and health care? Why don’t “progressive” voices distinguish themselves from the right-wing groups that look for support in the United States? “We think we’re strong enough to political platform. “There is a risk in A truck containing a mobile clinic talk with everyone,” was one response. calling for an early election,” he said. is adorned with an image of “Everybody talks to us now. We have “You need a political platform to win Nicaragua’s presidential couple. unity now. If we put forward specific an election.” AUTHOR’S PHOTO interests, then we divide.” “The left in Latin America is playing Another person said, “In these con- with its own credibility,” responded ditions, I will talk with the extreme one person. “In various countries, right.” social movement and environmental options that face every society. And Another voice: “In the next moment, leaders have had troubles with gov- they are about good public admin- there will be other confrontations, but ernments of the left.” Before elections, istration: overcoming corruption; not death. We will be adversaries, but they would talk about citizen partic- proposing better ways to do things; a without violence. But we are not think- ipation and municipal autonomy, better-run and fairer electoral system. ing about the next moment yet. At the but not once they were in power, she A new dialogue—with or without moment, we need national unity.” said. “Human rights should not have the Catholic bishops, with or without A student leader said, “I trust that a [political] colour,” she added. the WCC, with or without accompani- the future of Nicaragua is inclusive: Another person said “the left thinks ment by foreign governments—could students, environmentalists, femi- it can win with social populism.” produce better government for all Nic- nists—we all have room. What the I was grateful for the opportunity to araguans. The alternative to dialogue government does is clientelism” (re- test my impressions with people who is not “more of the same,” but rather ferring to social programs that benefit quite clearly see things in a different a descent into chaos where the only impoverished people). way. To me, one person’s “social pop- winners are those who profit from A university administrator said ulism” or “clientelism” or “package of weapons sales and access to new you can’t look at this moment with crumbs” is another person’s right to routes for illegal drugs. M traditional labels. “We’re talking access health care and education. To ECONOMIC DATA IN THIS ARTICLE COMES FROM about truth against lies.” He said the me, those views belie contempt for the JAKE JOHNSTON, “SOCIAL SECURITY PROTESTS IN NICARAGUA? HOLD ON A SECOND…,” CENTER government’s social programs were poor, and for the goal of universality FOR ECONOMIC POLICY AND RESEARCH, APRIL rife with corruption and handed out in social programs (still an incomplete 27, 2018. THE AUGUST 2018 MESSAGE FROM THE DELEGATION OF THE WORLD COUNCIL OF only “packages of crumbs.” project in Nicaragua). CHURCHES AND ACT ALLIANCE TO THE CHURCHES Another member of our delegation But they also show the need for AND PEOPLE OF NICARAGUA CAN BE READ AT WWW.OIKOUMENE.ORG. pressed again on the absence of a dialogue. These are policy choices, 39 by a California school harmful emissions. / Oslo 5.7 million tonnes of cabin groundskeeper. / A 13-year- was named European waste in 2017, according old girl from Lone Tree, Green Capital for 2019 for to the Air Transport Colorado by the name of its plans to employ fossil Association. / European Gitanjali Rao, named North fuel–free construction home improvement America’s top scientist methods and meet energy company Kingfisher, which in 2017 for designing a efficiency standards on owns 1,300 branches small mobile device that all new buildings, lower across Europe, Russia tests for lead in drinking citywide emissions by and Turkey, is phasing out The good water, is now working with 36% from 1990 levels by phthalates, perfluorinated a lab manager at Denver end of 2020 and put a and polyfluorinated news page Water on a prototype of heat-recovery-based power chemicals, and halogenat- the device, named Tethys plant in the basement of ed flame retardants from Compiled by (pictured), with the aim of city hall. / Norway, already its own-brand products. / Elaine Hughes getting it to market in the a leader in electric car The European Chemicals next two years. / Mongabay sales, is now exempting Agency is proposing to ban o more effectively use / GreenBiz / Reuters / NPR battery-driven vehicles from microplastics, which are Ttheir limited arable land, taxes and providing free overwhelming oceans and some Tajikistan farmers are he Port Authority of New parking to their drivers. / other marine ecosystems, adopting the agroforestry TYork and New Jersey has Spain’s paradores, a chain of in products such as practice of “alley cropping,” begun testing an electric state-owned hotels founded cosmetics, detergents or growing vegetables or vehicle that might one in 1928 that today employ and agricultural fertilizers forage crops between rows day replace all 300 of the more than 4,000 people, by the year 2020. / Since of fruit trees, resulting in port’s gas-powered straddle is converting all of its 97 2014, 70 New York City doubled harvests, better carriers, which lift 30-tonne establishments to renew- restaurants have been use of scarce water and cargo containers and place able power. / Associated sending their cleaned, decreased soil erosion. them on trucks for ground Press / Good News Network discarded oyster shells to / Following 17 years of transport. / By as early as / Deutsche Welle / Reuters / some 75 public schools diplomatic work led by 2022, the U.K.’s Class 321 Guardian (U.K.) where students attach baby the international peasant commuter trains will be oysters; the young bivalves, alliance La Via Campesina, replaced by newer models, he world’s first natural water purifiers, are the United Nations has ap- called “Breeze” trains, that Tplastic-free flight, an then added to strategically proved the Declaration on run on hydrogen power, Airbus A340, took 700 placed reefs off the coast. the Rights of Peasants and creating engineering jobs, passengers from Lisbon to / The Telegraph (U.K.) Other People Working in increasing passenger Brazil on Boxing Day. Airline / Chemical Watch / Reuters Rural Areas, which extends capacity and emitting zero passengers generated over / CNN human rights protection to farmers whose “seed sov- ereignty” is threatened by government and corporate practices. / A French court slapped an immediate ban on use of Monsanto’s glyphosate-based weed- killer, Roundup Pro 360, citing a 2015 World Health Organization assessment that the product was probably carcinogenic. Meanwhile, Germany’s Bayer, which bought Monsanto for US$63 billion (about $83 billion) in 2018, faces thousands of U.S. lawsuits from people who say its Roundup and Ranger Pro products caused their cancers—a claim recently made successfully in court 40 Books

REVIEWED BY TOM SANDBORN Sustainable living (if you ignore the scary risk of a firestorm)

BUILDING COMMUNITY but longer-term plans suggest that if is not a big problem, for instance, I GORDON HARRIS successful, the Sidewalk Labs model have spoken to student commuters WITH RICHARD LITTLEMORE may be extended for use in develop- at SFU who adamantly disagree. And ing the entire 324 hectare plot along while a shortage of parking spaces Ecotone Publishing , paperback, November 2018, $34.95 Toronto’s eastern lakeshore. might annoy, both the university and Buildings at UniverCity are built to the village are facing a much more N 1995, Simon Fraser University and a high standard of sustainability and serious danger not mentioned in the City of Burnaby signed a memo- the community design includes many Building Community. randum of agreement about creating green features, although the SFU pro- The storage tank farm for the con- a dense new urban village next to the ject does not include the heated road troversial Trans Mountain pipeline campus, a planned community later sections and extremely tall wooden squats like a cluster of flammable Ibranded, with unfortunate cuteness, buildings planned for the Toronto toads downslope from SFU and Uni- UniverCity. The first buildings in this project. Nonetheless, the focus on verCity. Burnaby’s deputy fire chief, ambitious project were finished in creating a walkable community will Chris Bocock, warned in a 2015 report 2001, and when the project is built out pay off in quality of life for Univer- that the proposed expansion of the to its projected maximum in 2020 it City residents. Burnaby’s director of tank farm would make it impossible will house 10,000 residents. planning and building, Lou Pelletier, for firefighters to respond adequately Building Community can best be speaks highly of the way UniverCity to a fire in the storage area, creating read as a fan’s notes on this ambitious has been developed. “The UniverCity the real danger of a firestorm and project. Lead author Gordon Harris Trust has adhered to the community fallout of toxic chemicals over the has served as President and CEO of the plan well and paid lots of attention to mountain, making an evacuation SFU Community Trust, the body that amenities like day care and parks,” he from the campus and UniverCity very administers UniverCity. It is hardly told me in November. difficult. surprising, then, that the book’s tone Some fairly significant concerns are Given UniverCity’s focus on mar- is celebratory. And there is much to cel- not addressed by this sumptuously keting itself as a sustainable com- ebrate: UniverCity has been designed illustrated and enthusiastic homage to munity in tune with its environment, to be ecofriendly, good for pedestrians UniverCity. While Harris assures the the book’s silence about this danger is and cyclists, and slightly difficult for reader that parking atop the mountain troubling. M automobiles to navigate. (This focus on promoting sustainable travel will advance further if the proposed gondola between a Skytrain station at the bottom of the mountain and the school and village at the top is completed.) In contrast, another Canadian planned community, Quayside, the Google/Sidewalk Labs development proposed for the Toronto waterfront, is committed to being “the world’s first neighborhood built from the internet up,” and seems particularly interested in incorporating driverless cars into its transportation mix. Quayside will be a smaller community than the one at SFU, with the Toronto project maxing out at around 3,000 residents, PHOTO FROM THE UNIVERCITY WEBSITE 41 REVIEWED BY GERRARD DRAGON Memories of a different future

BLACK WRITING MATTERS Community, and Black Writing Matters. of what it means to be Black and WHITNEY FRENCH (EDITOR) Family histories, such as those from disabled. Simone Makeba Dalton, Mary Louise I found parts of my own of my life University of Regina Press, paperback, McCarthy and Rachel Zellers, remind story written in these pages, remind- February 2019, $27.95 us of our hereditary bonds to both the ing me of the seething anger that lay living and those who have gone before dormant during my teen years only HITNEY FRENCH IS to be com- us. We take a cross-country bicycle trip to become fire. Not the combustible mended for the vital work with Phillip Dwight Morgan as he nav- variety, which consumes and destroys of gathering and sharing the igates through spaces usually reserved all in its path, but the fire that nurtures voices of these Black Canadi- for whites. And we experience the all and warms our souls, incubating with- an writers. In this anthology too familiar occurrence of anti-Black in the true self until such a time that Wwe hear from academics, community racism in schools through the telling we are ready for the explosion, a fiery workers, high school and university of Meshama Rose Eyob-Austin, who stream of Black consciousness. students, poets, journalists, essayists, finds her voice to confront her school These stories capture firsthand the activists and many others. Each one teacher. essence of Black Canadian experiences of the essays, stories and interviews Christina Brobby and anthology be they black/queer, black/Indigenous, is grounded in experiences of what editor Whitney French offer their var- black/white or black/disabled. They it means to be Black in Canada right iations of the immigrant experience. have been brought forth as decla- now. They tell of resilience to over- Scott Fraser’s James Baldwin–tinged rations of truth contradicting the come challenges, resistance against work reminds us that the invention typical narrative of Canada as a place oppressive systems and ideas, but of whiteness and its unforgiving re- free from the burden of racism. Each most of all they affirm Blackness. sult—racism—is actually a problem one of these authors has in their own The book is divided into three for white people. And from Brandon way added their voice to the multitude sections: Everyday People, Letters to Wint, a moving introspective glimpse calling for a different path forward. M

REVIEWED BY RICHARD GIRARD Real life superheros

1919, A GRAPHIC HISTORY Working-Class Struggle (2016). Here we centre here. Importantly, though, the OF THE WINNIPEG STRIKE get a complete historical presentation book goes beyond the events leading THE GRAPHIC HISTORY COLLECTIVE of the Winnipeg General Strike from its up to and during the strike, presenting AND DAVID LESTER roots in the bitter class conflict of late- readers with an analysis of the legacy 19th century Winnipeg to its bloody of the strike and how it has influenced Between the Lines, January 2019, paperback, $19.19 climax on June 21, 1919. The detailed the labour movement and social ac- preface, combined with Brandon Uni- tion in Canada over the past 100 years. AULO FREIRE ONCE wrote that “wash- versity Professor James Naylor’s clear As a teacher, I can see the potential ing one’s hands of the conflict be- introduction, provide the layperson of this book to supplement school tween the powerful and the pow- with an essential background that curricula that usually spend only a erless means to side with the pow- is brought to life in Lester’s stunning short time on the Winnipeg General erful, not to be neutral.” Freire’s illustrations, maps, newspaper clip- Strike; the book’s wonderful bibliogra- Pwords rang through my mind as I read pings, actual strike voting data, and phy might be the best clearinghouse David Lester and the Graphic History profiles of strike leaders and political of titles on the subject that I’ve come Collective’s (GHC) astounding publica- and economic actors. across. But beyond the classroom, tion, 1919, A Graphic History of the Win- The conflict between the powerful this latest offering from the collec- nipeg Strike. and powerless runs through and tive should quickly become essential This is the third comic book from literally jumps off the pages of 1919. reading for those who might want to the collective, following May Day: A In particular, the notion that people learn more about a seminal moment in Graphic History of Protest (2012) and working collectively can create true the history of the labour movement in Drawn to Change: Graphic Histories of and lasting social change is front and this country called Canada. M 42 REVIEWED BY JEREMY APPEL Climate action tied up in pipeline politics Two books explore the international and local violence of carbon power

ROM VARIOUS WARS in the Middle East Each side and its corporate subsidi- Throughout the book, Foster to OPEC’s conflict with the U.S. and aries seek to build pipelines bypassing includes useful maps plotting the Russia over oil prices to Canada’s the other’s allies to ensure they retain routes of the Middle Eastern and other internal battle over pipelines and the upper hand. These efforts often pipelines against the locations of its support for regime change in lead to brutal conflict and proxy wars, energy resources. The Russia-backed FVenezuela, petroleum’s influence on if not outrights superpower-to-su- Iran-Syria pipeline would bypass geopolitics shows no sign of waning. perpower conflict as we are seeing Turkey, a major sponsor of the Syrian In Oil and World Politics (Lorimer, Sep- in Syria’s civil war, now entering its anti-government rebels, for example, tember 2018), energy economist John eighth year. while the U.S.-favoured Qatar-Turkey Foster argues that efforts to control oil Foster sees the Syrian war as a battle pipeline would bypass Russia. The and energy resources, whether covert of competing pipelines: one supported author suggests the Gulf states’ and or overt, are in fact essential to explain- by Russia and the Assad regime, to the West’s support of the Syrian rebels ing developments in the international bring oil from Iran through Iraq and has more to do with installing a plia- sphere. Syria to Europe; the other backed by ble government that would support “Power, politics and petroleum all go the U.S. and its Gulf state allies, which their preferred pipeline than it does together,” says Foster early on in the would take oil from Qatar to Turkey with holding the Syrian government book, which to some extent may be a via Saudi Arabia and Jordan. It is a accountable for its atrocities. victim of its own ambition. There are somewhat limited frame of analysis There are few saints among Syria’s chapters for several global hotspots— given the roots of the Syrian conflict multiple competing rebel sects, with Iraq, Syria, Iran, Libya, Afghanistan in the Arab Spring rebellions against the most brutal fighters arguably and Ukraine—each of which could be the region’s autocracies. But as a justi- those, like ISIS, funded by Gulf state the topic of its own volume. But the fication for international intervention theocracies to promote their interests broader treatments on maritime trade in that country over many conflagra- in the civil war. But Foster appears to and economic warfare, and Foster’s tions, it makes sense. gloss over the myriad human rights solid analysis of how the geopolitics of abuses of the Syrian government. energy resources impact international There is not a mention of Assad’s events, take us well beyond main- barrel bombs, for instance, that potent stream discussions, which tend to cast symbol of the war’s lopsided nature these and other conflicts in terms of in favour of the government. One can ideology and national security. acknowledge the geopolitics at stake “Coveting the petroleum of another in the Syrian civil war and oppose country is against the rules of interna- western military intervention without tional law—yet if it can be accomplished ignoring the reality that the majority surreptitiously, under the cover of of deaths—and vast majority of civil- some laudable action, it’s a bonanza,” ian deaths—have been caused by the Foster explains. The motivations are Assad regime. the same whether we’re talking about References to Canadian foreign poli- the United States, Russia, China and cy are made in passing throughout the frequently Canada, too. While the U.S. book, but always as an appendage of works with the Gulf states to invest U.S. power. Foster discusses Canada’s their oil surpluses in U.S. bonds and own powerful oil industry for only a weapons, China and Russia have sim- few pages in a chapter that focuses ilar arrangements with countries like mostly on Russia and Latin America. Iran and Turkmenistan. The latter pose For a more uniquely Canadian per- a clear threat to the petrodollar, and spective, we can turn to another recent with it, American global dominance. title from Lorimer by Donald Gutstein. 43 utstein begins his new book, The increasingly prominent thanks to Big Stall: How Big Oil and Think high-profile politicians including GTanks are Blocking Action on Bernie Sanders and Alexandra Oca- Climate Change in Canada (Lorimer, sio-Cortez taking it up in the U.S. October 2018), by contrasting Pierre The reason the Green New Deal Elliot and Justin Trudeau’s approaches hasn’t become a reality yet, Gutstein to energy issues. While PET at one argues, is because the green economy is time took on private oil interests still regarded as a market opportunity, by creating Petro-Canada and the not a necessity. “In cost-benefit analysis, ill-fated National Energy Program, son there’s no room for moral judgment,” Justin has for the most part sought to he writes. “Once numbers have been work with private industry, pushing attached to recreation benefits and for increased pipeline capacity to life costs, the solution is clear—more accompany his carbon taxation plan. golfing in the U.S. and more dead people Gutstein places this shift from one in the global south.” Trudeau to another in the context of Although carbon taxes aren’t his neoliberalism, which he describes as preferred method of greenhouse gas the notion that “all problems must reduction, Gutstein suggests they’re be solved by the market,” and the preferable to inaction. He approvingly enhancement of corporate power cites the CCPA economist Marc Lee, through the ’80s, ’90s and oughties. who said, “even if carbon taxes don’t The stated goal of Pierre Trudeau’s do much to lower emissions, they can NEP was to keep oil profits in Canada. walked in the door; it had already been service another important purpose: This was a response to the spike in oil making its way into official circles,” he financing measures that help offset prices as a result of the 1978-79 Iranian writes. The Macdonald Commission, negative impacts of increased atmos-

Revolution. Although the program which presented a report to Mulroney pheric CO2 levels.” Revenue-neutral ran roughshod over Indigenous land promoting deregulation and removing carbon taxes like the one in British rights, international oil companies barriers to international investors, was Columbia, which offset any increases aimed their ire at the limits the NEP established by Pierre Trudeau in 1982. with tax cuts, greenwash the shrinking placed on their access to Canadian oil Gutstein spends much of the book of the state while providing no revenue and their ability set prices. Fortunately focused on the tension between to fund a genuine green transition. for the corporations, Brian Mulroney, environmentalism, with its acknowl- Gutstein concludes by offering whom Gutstein describes as “Canada’s edgement of the limits to market readers some advice on how to secure first neoliberal prime minister,” moved expansion, and neoliberalism, which a green future: question unlimited to dismantle the NEP and began the seeks to put a price on everything. But growth, question economists, listen to process of privatizing Petro-Canada. with increases in awareness of climate Indigenous voices and listen to nature. As Gutstein emphasizes, this didn’t change, which energy companies like At the very least, he claims, this will occur overnight. “Neoliberalism didn’t Exxon knew about as early as 1978, the help put humanity on track to enact start in Ottawa the day Brian Mulroney industry has been on the defensive. transformative changes that will not After years of helping sow doubt only save the planet but facilitate a about human-caused climate change more just, equitable future for all. M through neoliberal think-tanks such as the Frasier Institute, much of the industry now seeks market-based solutions of the kind represented by carbon pricing, writes Gutstein. As long as they get their treasured Gutstein argues pipelines built, oil companies, and that only direct apparently the Trudeau government, are happy to acquiesce. government Progressives often defend carbon intervention taxation from attacks by conserva- tives who prefer no action on climate (e.g., mandated change. Gutstein argues that only emission caps) will direct government intervention (e.g., mandated emission caps) will get us get us where we where we need to be. He sees hope in need to be. talk of a Green New Deal becoming

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