Category: Labor / Economics
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Directly Challenging the US Empire, Capitalism, and the Global Climate Crisis
I argue the need for the left–however defined–to directly challenge the US Empire, Capitalism, and the Global Climate Crisis, which are interlinked. It argues that Capitalism has failed working people and cannot be reformed and supporting the US Empire is only making things worse, while enhancing the global climate crisis.
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The Globalized Industrial Farm System is Destroying the World
Big business is co-opting what now is a worldwide local food movement by shifting the focus to “regenerative” agriculture. This narrower focus on just the mode of production obscures the vital importance of shorter distances. Shortening the distances between the farm and the consumer and creating more self-reliant economies is the biggest threat to global…
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Review Essay-Blue Collar Empire: The Untold Story of US Labor’s Global Anticommunist Crusade by Jeff Schuhrke
This is a very detailed examination of AFL and AFL-CIO foreign policy program between the 1940s and 1990s, showing not only their efforts but the process by which they carried out this work. Focuses on anticommunism to rationalize its repressive work against workers around the world, with especially strong focus on the work of the…
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The white saviour complex and global AI governance
To counter the white saviour industrial complex in global AI governance, a shift towards more inclusive and equitable practices is necessary, that places positionality and reflexivity at the centre of global AI governance and overall ELSP research on the digital economy. Inclusive representation is paramount, voices from the Global Majority and marginalised communities should be…
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Ratepayers Have Had Enough of Rising Energy Bills
Some advocates are calling for more community-owned electricity providers, or public power, instead of investor-owned utilities. Public power utilities would be owned by community members and controlled by local government, giving ratepayers a more direct say in decisions about electricity sourcing or rate changes.
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Against Productivism
Capitalist society has a dynamic tendency towards constant technological change — change in products, methods of production, and in the ways workers are managed in the production process. I am going to suggest that capitalism has a very distinctive way of developing technology that is inherently conflicted — it provides human benefits but is also…
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US Unions Must Look Beyond Themselves to Save Themselves
Argues that unions in the US–and by implications elsewhere–need to reject business unionism for social justice unionism by using their power in workplace to not only back workers there, but to back working people in work places AND in the community, at the local, national and/or global levels. Either we work for good of all,…
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Hickel: Climate, Energy and Natural Resources
Relying on capital to deliver an energy transition is a dangerously bad strategy. The only way to deal with this crisis is with public planning. On the one hand, we need massive public investment in renewable energy, public transit and other decarbonization strategies. And this should not just be about derisking private capital – it…
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The Union Makes Us Strong: Understanding Trade Unionism in a Global Context
Discusses the need for labor activists to go beyond “lowest common denominator” union organizing.
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Stop the Ukraine War: Refuse to Handle Military Cargo
The ILWU has always criticized NATO’s war moves. Since the end of World War II we’ve opposed U.S. wars and coups in Korea, Vietnam, Angola, Serbia (former Yugoslavia), Cuba (Bay of Pigs Invasion), Chile (coup), El Salvador and Nicaragua. On May Day 2008, ILWU shutdown all West Coast ports to oppose the “imperialist wars in…
