Jenny Chan (2023) Buy with 1-Click (The Asia-Pacific Journal)

Chan, Jenny. 2023. “Buy with 1-Click: Independent Contracting and Migrant Workers in China’s Last-Mile Parcel Delivery.” The Asia-Pacific Journal 21(2): 1-18.

See also: Boris, Eileen, Heidi Gottfried, Julie Greene, and Joo-Cheong Tham, eds. 2023. Global Labor Migration: New Directions. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press.

Abstract: This article analyzes labor informality in the Chinese platform economy. Drawing on participant observation at a parcel delivery station in Beijing, the author discusses how individual and family lives are impacted by the hectic world of logistics work, and indeed, how companies have increased cost competitiveness through driving exploitation into forms hidden within the household. Migrant family members frequently assist each other by calling customers and wrapping parcels while their unpaid labor is subsidizing the company’s business operations. Although the spheres of production and social reproduction can sometimes be integrated in cities, they confront precarious work and unequal urban citizenship.

 

Keywords: Independent Contracting; Logistics and Delivery Services; Production and Social Reproduction; Informality and Precarity; Chinese Rural Migrant Workers

 

Figure 1: A team of couriers unloads a full truck of parcels in an early morning at the delivery station. The author, pictured in blue shirt, is a trainee while conducting participant observation in Beijing. Photo provided by the author (Jenny Chan).

Josep Maria Antentas (2022) The 15M, Podemos and the Long Crisis in Spain (Journal of Iberian and Latin American Research)

Antentas, Josep Maria. 2022. “The 15M, Podemos and the Long Crisis in Spain: Gramscian Perspectives.” Journal of Iberian and Latin American Research 28(3): 365-80.

ABSTRACT

This article aims to analyze the 15M movement and its outcomes through Gramscian lenses. The 15M expressed a crisis of ruling class hegemony based on a crisis of political representation. It was a moment of collective splintering and political subjectivation. Viewed from Gramsci’s distinction between small and big politics, the 15M marked the beginning of a phase in which big politics ceased to be the exclusive prerogative of the dominant classes and shifted towards subaltern groups. The sequence from 15M to Podemos can be analyzed as a cathartic moment in the Gramscian sense of the term and can also be read with the help of his concept of translation. Discussing Machiavelli’s work, Gramsci defined the party as a modern Prince. However, the conception of the party that prevailed in Podemos is narrower than that of Gramsci. His concept of transformism is useful to analyze Podemos’ strategic evolution.

Pablo Pérez Ahumada (2023) Class, union membership and organizational commitment (Economic and Industrial Democracy)

Pérez Ahumada, Pablo. 2023. “Class, Union Membership, and Organizational Commitment: A Multilevel Analysis of 28 Countries.” Economic and Industrial Democracy, online first 19 Jan, pp. 1-27.

Abstract

This article studies how organizational commitment is shaped by individual and macro-level factors. Drawing upon data from the 2015 International Social Survey Program (ISSP) and using multilevel modeling, the article shows that workers have less organizational commitment than employers. The article also presents evidence indicating that strong trade unions are positively correlated with organizational commitment. Finally, contrary to the hypothesis derived from previous studies, cross-level interactions suggest that in countries with strong corporatist industrial relations (IR) institutions, union members have lower levels of organizational commitment than non-union members. The article discusses how the findings contribute to the literature on class, neo-corporatism, and power resources. In addition, it reflects on how the findings contribute to the recent debate on the ‘neoliberal convergence’ of IR systems.

Jeff Hermanson (2022) Mexican Labor (NLF)

Hermanson, Jeffery. 2022. “Mexican Labor’s New Deal and the Promise of North American Worker Solidarity.” New Labor Forum, first published December 29.  https://doi.org/10.1177/10957960221144973

Author Biography

Jeffery Hermanson has been a union organizer and officer since 1977, working with the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union (later UNITE!), United Brotherhood of Carpenters, Writers Guild of America, West, and the AFL-CIO Solidarity Center. He is president of the International Union Educational League, a non-profit organization that supports unions in Asia, Latin America and the Middle East.

Verena Schmidt, Edward Webster, Siviwe Mhlana and Kally Forrest (2023) ILO

Schmidt, Verena, Edward Webster, Siviwe Mhlana and Kally Forrest. 2023. “Negotiations by Workers in the Informal Economy.” ILO Working Paper 86.

This paper provides empirical evidence from Africa, Asia and the Americas on negotiations and collective bargaining by workers in the informal economy.

Kim Scipes (Jan 2023)

Scipes, Kim. 2023. “A Response to Jeff Schuhrke’s ‘From Solidarity to Shock Therapy: The AFL-CIO and the Fall of Soviet Communism,’” with Schuhrke’s response. LAWCHA Newsletter [The Labor and Working-Class History Association], January 4. 

 

Scipes, Kim. 2023. “Review: Learning from an Older Generation of Troublemakers”: Troublemaker: Saying No to Power by Frank Emspak (2022). Labor Notes, January 5.

 

Scipes, Kim. 2023. “Climate Change is Real—and It is Now.” Northwest Indiana Times, January 8 (B-1 and B 7). 

Pablo Pérez Ahumada (2022) Class politics (European Journal of Industrial Relations)

Pérez Ahumada, Pablo. 2022. “Class Politics, Collective Labor Rights, and Worker-Management Conflict in Comparative Perspective.” European Journal of Industrial Relations, Ahead-of-print version, 5 Nov, pp. 1-23. DOI: 10.1177/09596801221133453  

Abstract

This article studies how perceptions of worker-management conflict are shaped by individual-level and macro-level variables. Drawing upon data from 33 countries from the 2015 International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), it uses multilevel models to examine how individual perceptions of worker-management conflict are affected by social class, union membership status, and the country-level protection of collective labor rights. The evidence supports the hypothesis that workers and union members perceive more conflict than employers and non-union members. The results also show that, as hypothesized, perceived workplace conflict is lower in countries with stronger protection of workers’ collective rights. Finally, contrary to an initial hypothesis, cross-level interactions suggest that in countries where collective rights are more strongly protected, union members perceive more worker-management conflict than non-union members. Contributions to the literature on class and power resources as well as to the recent debate on the “neoliberal convergence” of industrial relations (IR) systems are discussed.

Biographies

Pablo Pérez Ahumada is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Chile and Adjunct Researcher at the Centre for Social Conflict and Cohesion Studies (COES, Chile) He is also Director of the Observatory of Labor Strikes (OHL – COES/UAH). His research focuses on social class, industrial relations, labor movements, and politics in Latin America.