Labour and Unions

Labour & Unions

Crack capitalism or reclaim the state

February 2011
Hilary Wainwright
John Holloway

Fascinating debate between two leading left thinkers on whether the state can be democratised, how labour can be empowered and the best ways to confront capitalism.

Activists from across Asia explain how the EU’s free trade agenda affects them: (3) Labour rights in the Philippines

November 2010

In the third of a series of interviews with civil society activists from Asia we hear about the damaging impacts of free trade agreements on labour rights in the Philippines.

Prokhorov’s Shock Modernization

November 2010
Boris Kagarlitsky

The public outrage that was caused by the leakage of a controversial amendment to the Labor Code in Russia might backfire beyond what the unions anticipated.

How about Saving all the Miners

November 2010
Manuel Perez Rocha

The unprecedented global media attention drawn by the Chilean mining story needs to look at the bigger picture - the criminal practices of the global mining industry.

Norma Rae Would Be Proud

October 2010
Boris Kagarlitsky

While intellectuals debate whether Russia has a civil society, union leaders created an organization independent of government control with thousands of members.

The resistible rise of corporate power

October 2010
Hilary Wainwright

The massive concentration and growth of corporate power poses a major threat to what remains of public services, highlighting the ever-deepening crisis of democracy, and the urgent need for people to reclaim the state.

Beyond divide and rule? From the Washington to the Beijing Consensus

September 2010
Tom Reifer

Cold War divisions were central to the rise of Asia-Pacific regionalism, but what factors are influencing alternative visions for Asia in the twentieth century, and what implications do they have for the global system as a whole?

Small country, big struggle

September 2010
Mike Marqusee

Might Western leaders' silence on the human rights abuses of Swaziland's repressive and venal monarchy, compared to the frequently expressed outrage at Zimbabwe's Mugabe, have something to do with King Mswati's enthusiasm for neoliberalism and western corporations?

Insisting on an alternative: meeting the challenge of the cuts

August 2010
Mike Marqusee

The logic of "the market" masks a modern form of despotism where the self-interests of financial elites are dressed up as the "public good."

The Lisbon Treaty: Workshop with Susan George at Enlazando Alternativas, 2010

May 2010
Susan George

Despite repeated democratic rejection of the Lisbon Treaty, the European Commission pushed ahead with it via the EU Constitution via a private, technocratic and non-democratic process. Susan discussed the treaty and its implications in a workshop at the EA4 summit in Madrid, 15 May 2010.