Women, Solidarity & the Global Factory

[Excerpt] For many of us who are concerned with international labor issues, a new image has come to represent our collective understanding of the global economy. It is an image of women in Third World nations toiling under sweatshop conditions in huge assembly plants owned by U.S.-based transnational corporations (TNCs). Yet what does international solidarity really mean in practice? Who does it include, and how? From a U.S. standpoint, if so many women workers are not organized into unions, how can they be included in international networks? If their voices are not heard, what can these networks hope to accomplish? This article explores these questions by looking at the experience of several groups in promoting international communication among women workers in the nonunion sector. It is excerpted from The Global Factory: An Organizing Guide for a New Economic Era. The complete publication, developed by the American Friends Service Committee, surveys the efforts of many different kinds of groups, inside and outside the trade union movement, to build international labor networks

Organizing for Justice: ILGWU Returns to Social Unionism to Organize Immigrant Workers

[Excerpt] Desperate situations bring forth desperate responses. But garment workers are demonstrating that when educated of their rights and assured of support, they are ready to struggle for justice, even when chances of success seem poor. The ILGWU currently faces many challenges: How do we organize an industry composed of thousands of tiny, subcontractors? How do we build on isolated collective actions to create a groundswell for change in the workers\u27 communities that cannot be ignored? How do we restrict the flight of jobs from unionized communities to nonunion areas, within the U.S. and beyond its borders

La imatge de la dona a la premsa de la Guerra Civil : ABC i Solidaridad Obrera: dos models antagònics

La Guerra Civil Espanyola (juliol de 1936 - abril de 1939) fou un període caracteritzat pels conflictes socials, polítics i bèl·lics a gran part dels territoris espanyols. En aquest estudi s'analitza el tractament de la imatge de la dona a partir de dos periòdics d'ideologia oposada, l'ABC i Solidaridad Obrera, incloent-hi líders i moviments feministes sorgits a la Guerra Civil, com Federica Montseny i "Mujeres Libres", o el tradicionalisme femení marcat per Pilar Primo de Rivera i la "Sección Femenina", elements clau durant la guerra per situar el paper de la dona en la societat.La Guerra Civil Española (julio de 1936 - abril de 1939) fue un periodo caracterizado por los conflictos sociales, políticos y bélicos en gran parte de los territorios españoles. En este estudio se analiza el tratamiento de la imagen de la mujer a partir de dos periódicos con ideología opuesta, el ABC y Solidaridad Obrera, incluyendo líderes y movimientos feministas surgidos durante la Guerra Civil, como Federica Montseny y Mujeres Libres, o el tradicionalismo femenino marcado por Pilar Primo de Rivera y la Sección Femenina, elementos clave durante la guerra para situar el papel de la mujer en la sociedad.The Spanish Civil War (july of 1936 - April of 1939) was a period characterized by social, political and military conflicts in the major part of the spanish region. In this study, we will analise the treatment of the women portrait based on two newspapers which share opposing views, ABC and Solidaridad Obrera. It will include leaders and feminist movements arising during the Civil War, such as Federica Montseny and "Mujeres Libres" or the feminine traditionalism lead by Pilar Primo de Rivera and the "Sección Femenina", key elements during the Civil War in order to describe the role of women in society

Memorias que hacen historia

Lo que presento en este artículo es un avance de investigación sobre la historia del clasismo, en el que abordaremos algunos rasgos culturales de la clase obrera que marcaron sus prácticas cotidianas en los años setenta. Reflexionaremos sobre las vinculaciones entre la ideología de izquierda y la clase obrera, tratando de explicar condiciones que favorecieron el desarrollo del clasismo en Córdoba y Argentina. Concretamente, abordaremos rasgos constitutivos de la cultura obrera reflejados en la cotidianeidad de la fábrica, el barrio, el hogar, eventos futbolísticos; todas situaciones de sociabilidad que tenían una especificidad obrera y hacían a la identidad del "laburante". Estos repertorios formaban parte de una cultura ordinaria que comprendía ciertas tradiciones políticas y sindicales reflejadas en el sentido común, que compatibilizaban con las ideas izquierdistas que circularon en aquellos año

(Dis)Assembling Rights of Women Workers Along the Global Assembly Line: Human Rights and the Garment Industry Symposium: Political Lawyering: Conversations on Progressive Social Change

Some observers would like to explain away sweatshops as immigrants exploiting other immigrants, as cultural, or as the importation of a form of exploitation that normally does not happen here but occurs elsewhere, in the Third World. While the public was shocked by the discovery at El Monte, garment workers and garment worker advocates have for years been describing abuses in the garment industry and have ascribed responsibility for such abuses to manufacturers and retailers who control the industry. Sweatshops, like the one in El Monte, are a home-grown problem with peculiarly American roots. Since the inception of the garment industry, U.S. retailers and manufacturers have scoured the United States and the rest of the globe for the cheapest and most malleable labor-predominantly female, low-skilled, and disempowered-in order to squeeze out as much profit as possible for themselves. Along with this globalization, the process of subcontracting, whereby manufacturers contract out cutting and sewing to contractors to avoid being considered the employer of the workers, has made it extremely difficult for garment workers in the United States to assert their rights under domestic law. This Article examines the challenges garment workers in the United States face in asserting their rights in the global economy and investigates how transnational advocacy can be deployed to compensate for the inability of U.S. labor laws to respond to problems with international dimensions. Using a purely domestic U.S. legal framework, advocates can attack the problem of transnational corporations\u27 (TNCs) subcontracting in the United States. Such efforts, however, will have limited effect because of the global nature of the garment industry. Most efforts to change the structure of the garment industry have occurred within the limitations of U.S. law, even while there has been a predominant failure of the U.S. legal system effectively to utilize a human rights framework. While the nation-state has traditionally been viewed as the locus for the development and enforcement of rights-creating norms, it cannot adequately respond to all of the dynamics that now arise from markets that cut across borders. Violation of workers\u27 rights on the global assembly line calls for strategies that are transnational, and this Article highlights past successes and suggestions in this vein. Because of the difficulty of restraining TNCs in a global economy, no strategy used in isolation will be successful. We present here alternative strategies that can be used in multiple and flexible ways in the struggle for human rights

Ser jocista en la Argentina de mediados de siglo XX. La construcción de identidades etarias, confesionales y laborales en la Juventud Obrera Católica

Mi propuesta de trabajo refiere a la problematización del sentido del ser “joven”, “obrero” y “católico” transmitidos por la asociación laical Juventud Obrera Católica a mediados del siglo XX en Argentina. Me interesa indagar en la conformación de diferentes subjetividades a través de discursos, relaciones y prácticas entramados en un contexto que las condiciona y con el que tienen que negociar. Las principales fuentes utilizadas remiten a entrevistas a antiguos miembros y a publicaciones vinculadas a la asociación.This paper concerns the problematization of the sense of “young”, “worker” and “catholic” of the Juventud Obrera Católica in the mid-20th century in Argentina. I want to inquire in the formation of different subjectivities throught discourses, relationships and practices framed in a context that affects them and with which they have to negotiate. The main sources used refer to interviews with former members and publications linked to the association.Fil: Blanco, Jessica. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Instituto de Antropología de Córdoba. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Facultad de Filosofía y Humanidades. Instituto de Antropología de Córdoba; Argentin

Forward

This special issue of Río Bravo: A Journal of the Borderlands highlights a series of essays and creative work presented at the National Association for Chicana and Chicano Studies (NACCS) Tejas Foco conference at the University of Texas, Pan American in the Río Grande Valley in South Texas in February 2013. We are excited by the quality of the essays in this special issue, and we encourage scholars and activists in the Chicana/o and Latina/o studies community to engage with the scholarship and creative work in this volume. A print copy will be available sometime this August. The Mexican American Studies Center at the at the University of Texas, Pan American is pleased to announce the adoption of Río Bravo amidst the historical transitioning of UTPA into UTRGV. Author Instructions and Manuscript submission guidelines will be available in Fall 2014 and we will begin to accept essay submissions in October 2014