Portal:Organized Labour

Introduction

Image created by Walter Crane to celebrate International Workers' Day (May Day, 1 May), 1889. The image depicts workers from the five populated continents (Africa, Asia, Americas, Australia and Europe) in unity underneath an angel representing freedom, fraternity and equality.

The labour movement is the collective organisation of working people to further their shared political and economic interests. It consists of the trade union or labour union movement, as well as political parties of labour. It can be considered an instance of class conflict.

In trade unions, workers campaign for higher wages, better working conditions and fair treatment from their employers, and through the implementation of labour laws, from their governments. They do this through collective bargaining, sectoral bargaining, and when needed, strike action. In some countries, co-determination gives representatives of workers seats on the board of directors of their employers.
Political parties representing the interests of workers campaign for labour rights, social security and the welfare state. They are usually called a labour party (in English-speaking countries), a social democratic party (in Germanic and Slavic countries), a socialist party (in Romance countries), or sometimes a workers' party.
Though historically less prominent, the cooperative movement campaigns to replace capitalist ownership of the economy with worker cooperatives, consumer cooperatives, and other types of cooperative ownership. This is related to the concept of economic democracy.

The labour movement developed as a response to capitalism and the Industrial Revolution of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, at about the same time as socialism. The early goals of the movement were the right to unionise, the right to vote, democracy and the 40-hour week. As these were achieved in many of the advanced economies of western Europe and north America in the early decades of the 20th century, the labour movement expanded to issues of welfare and social insurance, wealth distribution and income distribution, public services like health care and education, social housing and common ownership. (Full article...)

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File:National Education Association logo.svg

The National Education Association (NEA) is the largest labor union in the United States. It represents public school teachers and other support personnel, faculty and staffers at colleges and universities, retired educators, and college students preparing to become teachers. The NEA has just under 3 million members and is headquartered in Washington, D.C. The NEA had a budget of more than $341 million for the 2012–2013 fiscal year. Becky Pringle is the NEA's current president. During the early 20th century, the National Education Association was among the leading progressive advocates of establishing a United States Department of Education. Driven by pressure from teacher organizing, by the 1970s the NEA transformed from an education advocacy organization to a rank-and-file union. In the decades since, the association has continued to represent organized teachers and other school workers in collective bargaining and to lobby for progressive education policy. The NEA's political agenda frequently brings it into conflict with conservative interest groups. State affiliates of the NEA regularly lobby state legislators for funding, seek to influence education policy, and file legal actions. At the national level, the NEA lobbies the United States Congress and federal agencies and is active in the nominating process for Democratic candidates. From 1989 through the 2014 election cycle, the NEA spent over $92 million on political campaign contributions, 97% of which went to Democrats. (Full article...)

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Image 1The Western Federation of Miners' famous flyer entitled "Is Colorado in America?".
Image 2Mounted police chase demonstrators through Vancouver's East End during the Battle of Ballantyne Pier in 1935.
Image 3Cripple Creek, Colo., under martial law, during the 1894 strike.
Image 4Striking American Railway Union members confront Illinois National Guard troops in Chicago, Illinois, during the Pullman Strike in 1894.
Image 5Rally in Dhaka, organized by Jatiyo Nari Shramik Trade Union Kendra (National Women Workers Trade Union Centre), an organization affiliated with the Bangladesh Trade Union Kendra.
Image 6Richard Trumka.
Image 7Strike sign used by the German Train Drivers' Union in the German national rail strike of 2007.
Image 8Camp put up by striking Pepsi-Cola workers, in Guatemala City, Guatemala, 2008.
Image 9Strike leaders at the Paterson silk strike of 1913. From left, Patrick Quinlan, Carlo Tresca, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, Adolph Lessig, and Bill Haywood.
Image 10George Meany, former leader of the AFL–CIO.
Image 11An AFL–CIO protest of Rite Aid, with Rev. Mark Reisinger (Pastor of Grace United Methodist Church in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania), Bill George, and Richard Bloomingdale.
Image 12Joe Hill.
Image 13Political cartoon about the Coal Strike of 1902 from the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Image 14Union elections with an illegal firing, 1951 to 2007.
Image 15Samuel Gompers, President of the American Federation of Labor, and his wife, circa 1908.
Image 16Detail of monument to the Reesor Siding Strike of 1963.
Image 17Samuel Gompers.
Image 18Exaggerated 19th century engraving showing flames and smoke following the Haymarket riot.
Image 19Lewis Hine's 1920 image "Power house mechanic working on steam pump," which shows a working class young American man with wrench in hand, hunched over, surrounded by the machinery that defines his work.
Image 20Illustration from the Brisbane Worker newspaper condemning the brutality of the Queensland Police on Black Friday during the 1912 Brisbane General Strike.
Image 21Big Bill Haywood, a founding member and leader of the Industrial Workers of the World.
Image 22Registered nurses on strike in 2006 outside Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital.
Image 23Australian industrial relations legislation national day of protest, 2005.
Image 24Public and Commercial Services Union members on strike in Manchester 2006.
Image 25Members of the United Steelworkers in Ohio phone bank other union members to educate them about critical issues in the 2008 election in the U.S.
Image 26William Green, president of the AFL–CIO from 1924 to 1952.
Image 27Empty Gare du Nord train station during the November 2007 strikes in France.
Image 28American Federation of Teachers (AFT) president Albert Shanker.
Image 29Shields used by striking workers at the Carnegie Steel Works during the Homestead Strike in 1892.
Image 30Striking workers march moments before the Swedish military opened fire, killing five workers during the Ådalen shootings.
Image 31Mary Harris "Mother" Jones.
Image 32The Place de la Sorbonne in Paris is closed by police during the 2006 labour protests in France.
Image 33The front page of the Union Record on the Seattle General Strike of 1919.
Image 34Protesters barricade the street on June 22 during the 2006 Oaxaca protests.
Image 35Barges set ablaze by steelworkers during the Homestead strike in 1892.
Image 36Metropolitan Transportation Authority (New York) notice of subway closure during the 2005 New York City transit strike.
Image 37Former headquarters of the United Mine Workers of America and the Congress of Industrial Organizations, 900 15th Street NW, Washington, D.C., in 200.
Image 38Striking teamsters armed with pipes battle police in the streets during the Minneapolis Teamsters Strike of 1934.
Image 39J. Warren Madden, the first Chair of the National Labor Relations Board.
Image 40National Federation of Federal Employees officials sign a collective bargaining agreement with the U.S. 8th Army in October 2002.
Image 41Union members picketing recent NLRB rulings outside the agency's Washington, D.C., headquarters in November 2007.
Image 42May Day Rally in Mumbai, India, 2004.
Image 43Great Railroad Strike of 1877.
Image 44Striking I.W.W. members confront Massachusetts National Guard troops in Boston, during the Lawrence textile strike in 1912.
Image 45A. Philip Randolph.

Image 45A. Philip Randolph.
Image 46During World War II, a female aircraft worker checks electrical assemblies at the Vega Aircraft Corporation in Burbank, California.
Image 47AFL–CIO unions protest outside Verizon headquarters in Philadelphia using a giant inflatable rat.
Image 48Breaker boys, child laborers, working in a U.S. coal mine in 1911.
Image 49Union members march in Argentina on Human Rights Day in December 2005. The signs read "Worker rights are human rights..
Image 50Armed vigilantes deport striking copper miners during the Bisbee Deportation in Bisbee, Arizona, July 12, 1917.
Image 51Crowd gathered outside old City Hall during the Winnipeg general strike, June 21, 1919.
Image 52John L. Lewis (right, President of the United Mine Workers, confers with Thomas Kennedy (left), UMW Secretary-Treasurer of the UMW, and a UMW official at the War Labor Board in 1943 about a coal miners' strike.
Image 53The Ludlow massacre monument located in Ludlow, Colorado, United States.
Image 54Picket signs at the 2007 Writers Guild of America strike.
Image 55Wilma B. Liebman, chair, NLRB.
Image 56Memorial marker for the Bay View Tragedy.
Image 57Knights of Labor Grand Master Workman Terence V. Powderly.
Image 58United Mine Workers of America poster circa 1902.

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What is a labour victory? I maintain that it is a twofold thing. Workers must gain economic advantage, but they must also gain revolutionary spirit, in order to achieve a complete victory. For workers to gain a few cents more a day, a few minutes less a day, and go back to work with the same psychology, the same attitude toward society is to achieve a temporary gain and not a lasting victory."

— Elizabeth Gurley Flynn

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