Trade Union

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.

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.

Public service reform … but not as we know it!

March 2009
Hilary Wainwright

The need for convincing alternatives to market-led politics is urgent, especially as the government continues to defer to the financial markets rather than to challenge them.

Asia: the coming fury

February 2009
Walden Bello
With the sudden end of the export era, East Asia may be entering a period of radical protest and social revolution that went out of style when export-oriented industrialization became the fashion three decades ago, writes Walden Bello.

French

Voices from the World Social Forum

February 2009
TNI

The Networked Journalism Project, organised by TNI's Networked Politics, brought together a team of journalists from around the world to report on the World Social Forum.

The Coming Capitalist Consensus

December 2008
Walden Bello
Economic and political elites are converging on Global Social Democracy as a solution to the current economic crisis. But we need more than social management, argues Walden Bello: we should aspire to paradigms of social organisation that aim for equality and participatory democratic control of both national and global economy.

Not surprisingly, the swift unraveling of the global economy combined with the ascent to the U.S. presidency of an African-American liberal has left millions anticipating that the world is on the threshold of a new era.

Tata Motors move to Gujarat less than secular

October 2008
Praful Bidwai

NEW DELHI, Oct 23 (IPS) - Tata Motors' decision to shift the production site of its ultra-cheap, iconic Nano car from communist-ruled West Bengal state to Gujarat -- scene of the 2002 anti-Muslim pogrom -- has caused consternation and dismay among liberals and secular-minded people all over India.

The decision was personally taken by Ratan Tata, the company's chairman, and one of India's best-known and -regarded industrialists.

Development Redefined

September 2008
John Cavanagh
Robin Broad

Today, just as faith in deregulated markets has evaporated in the nightmare on Wall Street, so too is the long reign of market fundamentalism (or neoliberalism) ending in the development arena. And, a debate over the best route to development has returned.

Labor code as an instrument of social revolution

May 2008
Boris Kagarlitsky
The Russian labour code, written to suit the interests of employers, has pushed workers to unite and oppose its draconian terms.

Recently Russian mass media have focused on labor movement. For the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union the Russian journalists are writing about strikes and workers’ protests on May 1, 2008. Strike movement has been on the rise in Russia during the last ten months. It was started by the workers of the transnational companies and was assumed by the employees of the Russian corporations.

A Labor Code in Bad Need of Revision

April 2008
Boris Kagarlitsky
There is growing realisation that it is better to renegotiate the pro-business Russian Labor Code than to face the consequences of spontaneous and uncontrollable strikes.

The labor movement has been making a lot of headlines lately. Workers at multinational companies were the first to strike for higher wages, but now the conflict has spread to Russian firms as well.