Scipes 2020 Regional aspirations with a global perspective

Scipes, Kim. 2020. “Regional Aspirations with a Global Perspective: Developments in East Asian Labour Studies.” Educational Philosophy and Theory 52(11): 1214-24.

Abstract

Workers in East Asia have shown over the past 50 years that they are capable of challenging capital, despite facing vehement opposition by corporations, oftentimes joined by governments and their militaries, and sometimes even armed thugs. They have built some of the most dynamic labour organizations in the world. This article is designed to put these developments into a global and historical perspective. It identifies today’s movements of capital as the continuation of processes that developed to a new level in the 1700s, and which continue today. It also discusses struggles of workers under the Kilusang Mayo Uno (KMU-May First Movement) Labor Center of the Philippines, and shows how valuable research conducted to date has identified a number of lessons learned from these struggles, and how they have been communicated to workers worldwide.

Keywords: KMU labor center, labor organizations, global struggles, labor education, worker research, East Asia

Kim Scipes, Ph.D., is a Professor of Sociology at Purdue University Northwest in Westville, Indiana, USA. He has been working to build global labor solidarity since 1983, having published three books and over 230 articles and book reviews in the US and 10 other countries, and with another book currently in press. A list of Dr. Scipes’ publications, many with links to original articles, can be accessed at https://www.pnw.edu/faculty/kim-scipes-ph-d/publications/.

Kim Scipes (2020) book review

Scipes, Kim. 2020. Review of Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India: Popular Mobilization in the Long Depression, by Jörg Nowak (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019). Class, Race and Corporate Power 8(1). Online publication.

“Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India: Popular Mobilization in the Long Depression" by Jörg Novak, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2019) A Review Essay

Kim Scipes, Purdue University - North Central CampusFollow

Abstract

A review of Jörg Novak's “Mass Strikes and Social Movements in Brazil and India: Popular Mobilization in the Long Depression" published by Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.

Kim Scipes (2020) innovations in labor studies

Scipes, Kim. 2020. “Innovations in Labor Studies—Incorporating Global Perspectives: From Exhortation to Making It Real.” Class, Race and Corporate Power 8(1). Online publication.

Innovations in Labor Studies - Incorporating Global Perspectives: From Exhortation to Making It Real

Kim Scipes, Purdue University - North Central CampusFollow

Abstract

Ever since the mid-1840s, there has been an exhortation for workers of the world to unite globally. With the exception of a three-year period between 1946 and 1949 - with the founding and development of the World Federation of Trade Unions immediately after the end of World War II - this has been generally a call limited to rhetoric only. The growing understanding of a globalizing world today, however - affecting the world of work, workers and their organizations - suggests it time for workers to try to make it real. This paper examines two issues pertinent to this new understanding. First, we’ve got to come to terms with “globalization” and its complexity. And second, we need to recognize that there has been an explosion of globally-aware writings on labor that have emerged since the late 1970s.

Richard Hyman (2018) "What future for industrial relations in Europe?"

Hyman, Richard. 2018. “What Future for Industrial Relations in Europe?” Employee Relations 40(4): 569-79.

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to perform a systematic cross-country comparison of key features of industrial relations in Europe in a context where consolidated post-war institutions are under attack on many fronts. The author discusses a number of key similarities and differences across the countries of Europe, and end by considering whether progressive alternatives still exist.

Design/methodology/approach – This paper draws upon academic literature and compares the contributions to this special issue in the light of common problems and challenges.

Findings – The trend towards the erosion of nationally based employment protection and collective bargaining institutions is widely confirmed. In most of Central and Eastern Europe, where systems of organised industrial relations were at best only partially established after the collapse of the Soviet regime, the scope for unilateral dominance by (in particular foreign-owned) employers has been further enlarged. It is also clear that the European Union, far from acting as a force for harmonisation of regulatory standards and a strengthening of the “social dimension” of employment regulation, is encouraging the erosion of nationally based employment protections and provoking a growing divergence of outcomes. However, the trends are contradictory and uneven.

Originality/value – This paper contributes to an updated cross-country comparative analysis of the ongoing transformations in European industrial relations and discusses still existing progressive alternatives.

Keywords Europe, Trade unions, Industrial relations, Neoliberalism, Collective bargaining, Globalization, Austerity

Rebecca Gumbrell-McCormick and Richard Hyman (2019) “Democracy in Trade Unions, Democracy through Trade Unions?”

Gumbrell-McCormick, Rebecca and Richard Hyman. 2019. “Democracy in Trade Unions, Democracy through Trade Unions?” Economic and Industrial Democracy 40(1); 91-110.

Abstract

Since the Webbs published Industrial Democracy at the end of the nineteenth century, the principle that workers have a legitimate voice in decision-making in the world of work – in some versions through trade unions, in others at least formally through separate representative structures – has become widely accepted in most West European countries. There is now a vast literature on the strengths and weaknesses of such mechanisms, and we review briefly some of the key interpretations of the rise (and fall) of policies and structures for workplace and board-level representation. We also discuss the mainly failed attempts to establish broader processes of economic democracy, which the eclipse of nationally specific mechanisms of class compromise makes again a salient demand. Economic globalization also highlights the need for transnational mechanisms to achieve worker voice (or more radically, control) in the dynamics of capital–labour relations. We therefore examine the role of trade unions in coordinating pressure for a countervailing force at European and global levels, and in the construction of (emergent?) supranational industrial relations. However, many would argue that unions cannot win legitimacy as a democratizing force unless manifestly democratic internally. Therefore we revisit debates on and dilemmas of democracy within trade unions, and examine recent initiatives to enhance democratization.

Keywords Capitalism, Europe, globalization, industrial democracy, trade unions

Richard Hyman (2019) “National Trade Unions and Internationalism"

Hyman, Richard. 2019. “National Trade Unions and Internationalism: The Example of the ETUC.” In Internacionalismo obrero:Experiencias del sindicalismo internacional (1888-1986), edited by Manuela Aroca Mohedano. Madrid: Fundación Francisco Largo Caballero and Universidad Carlos III de Madrid.

Richard Hyman (2019) Is Forced Labour the New Normal?

Hyman, Richard. 2019. “Is Forced Labour the New Normal?” Bulletin of Comparative Labour Relations 107: 171-79.