Portside

In the past 11 months, 151 workers and trade unionists have been arrested in Egypt and at least 2,691 have been fired taking legal strike actions. Repression of conflicts in the workplace has increased dramatically within the last few months, together with the worsening economic crisis. Recent economic and monetary policies have caused a dramatic deterioration in the living conditions of workers and the middle classes.

"Workers complain of verbal abuse, impossible targets and ‘poverty pay’ so bad they have to live away from their children."

A new Republican-controlled National Labor Relations Board could roll back pro-union decisions dating back decades. This could be devastating to already weakened unions. With private sector union membership hovering at a dismal 6.4 percent – down from about 17 percent in 1983 – nothing short of the end of the labor movement could be at stake.

The OECD should be in the business of helping people build democratic institutions that give them economic and political voice—guardians of equality and democracy. The alternative to addressing wage stagnation and the status of working people in the global economy is not more of the same elite dominated globalization. The alternative is an escalating crisis where the false promises of authoritarianism and racism threaten to overwhelm the democratic ideal.

In the words of Illinois Network of Charter Schools president Andrew Broy, “Chicago has become the epicenter of charter union organizing in the country.”

In their claim against GEO, plaintiffs argue that the company violated the TVPA through it’s “Housing Unit Sanitation” policy which dictated that six detainees be randomly selected in each “pod” every day and forced to complete maintenance tasks without pay, under threat of solitary confinement.

A group of young professionals, who initially organized to protest the treatment of Tamils in Sri Lanka, went on to form the Young Tamil Nadu Movement to highlighting problems such as caste oppression, minority rights and gender inequality in the workplace. They have since established the Forum for Information Technology Employees with chapters in nine cities including Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Mumbai and Delhi.

"Oil industry company Halliburton has been branded “obscene” for advertising unpaid UK internships, which critics say give an unfair advantage to people from privileged backgrounds."

“The Trump administration’s rhetoric on immigration and its approach to enforcement have made immigrant communities obviously fearful in a new way,” says Laura Huizar, a staff attorney with the National Employment Law Project. “This is going to prevent a lot people from filing wage complaints that they otherwise would have.”

As organizers we have an obligation to review our prognostications and do some self-criticism when we are way off on our turnout calls. That was the case with our predictions for participation in the 2017 May Day immigrant rights protests.