Kendra Strauss is director of the Labour Studies Program and associate professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Simon Fraser University.
The East Palestine disaster is a horrifying, spectacular version of what has become the normal occurrence of train derailments in America. Joe Biden could use this as an opportunity to overhaul a crooked and dangerous industry. So far, he appears uninterested.
Sarah Polley’s film Women Talking depicts the brutal true story of rape in a Mennonite colony. It’s a poor fit for the oversimplified, “you go, girl” feminist message of its framing.
We tend to associate the inflation problem with the 1970s. But it was years earlier, in the era of Sputnik and Elvis, that the world first woke up to the reality of chronically rising prices. We’re still coping with that episode’s wrongheaded “lessons” today.
Catalonia has a proud history of popular protest, from the 15th-century peasant revolts to an anarchist-led revolution, and the anti-Franco resistance that followed. This has not been hindered by Catalans’ desire for independence, but nurtured by it.
The overwhelming majority of Australian Labor Party federal MPs are landlords. Maybe that’s why they can’t solve the housing crisis.
In December 2022, TruckSol, a trade union of South Korean truck drivers, waged a massive 16-day strike that cost employers over $2 billion. The union’s history and organizing strategy have lessons for precariously employed workers around the world.
The US government and media instigate international fearmongering and saber-rattling on a regular basis. But the recent Chinese spy balloon incident belongs in the Hall of Fame as one of the most idiotic panics by a jittery, trigger-happy warfare state.
From Brexit to Donald Trump and Joe Biden’s anti-China policies, elites are offering their own challenges to the free-trade consensus — just as they did during the early 20th century’s pushback against “globalism.”
Corporate dentistry is on the rise in Canada, lining investors’ pockets at the expense of patients’ oral health. Dental treatment should be fully incorporated into Canada’s universal health care system to prevent the nightmare of American-style dental care.
Born on this day in 1915, Claudia Jones became a leading figure in the US anti-racist movement who highlighted the oppression faced by black women. The US authorities deported Jones for her communist views in 1955, but they couldn’t snuff out her legacy.
This summer could see 350,000 UPS workers walk off the job, the United States’ largest strike in the 21st century thus far. The Teamsters are getting ready. Here’s a look at how.
Last week the NLRB ruled that workers fired from a Philadelphia Starbucks for unionizing should be reinstated. The decision is part of a series of recent worker victories against a company intent on putting an end to all unionization efforts.
The Austrian economist and philosopher Otto Neurath devised elaborate ideas for a democratically planned economy. They are a monument to the most optimistic strands of the interwar socialist movement.
US labor union density is at historic lows, and multinational corporations seem more powerful than ever. But by organizing to take advantage of strategic vulnerabilities in supply chains, workers can still score major victories.
The new PBS documentary Ruthless: Monopoly’s Secret History tells the story of how a board game intended to warn Americans about inequality ended up teaching them how to be good little capitalists.
Today, on Presidents’ Day, we rightly celebrate Abraham Lincoln for helping end slavery. But we shouldn’t forget the unstoppable force that also brought down the Slave Power: the several million slaves who left the plantation, many of whom joined the Union Army.
From Karl Marx to Eugene Debs to 1930s American Communists, leftists have regarded Lincoln as a prolabor hero who played a crucial role in vanquishing chattel slavery. We should celebrate him today as part of the great radical democratic tradition.
A Queens Starbucks worker was one of many across the country fired in retaliation for union organizing. Thanks to NYC laws that require due process for firing fast-food workers, he was reinstated.
Mexican autoworkers in the city of Emiliano Zapata’s burial just voted to join a new independent union, breaking from the company-friendly unions that dominate the country.
Lamar Johnson’s 1995 murder conviction was overturned on Tuesday — but only after he spent most of his life in jail. The circumstances of his wrongful conviction reflect an American justice system quick to condemn working-class men of color.