- Email: [email protected]
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada Winnie Ng, CAW-Sam Gindin Chair in Social Justice and Democracy, Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada Ó 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Abstract This article argues that the rise of new managerialism and new public management has taken the ‘worker’ out of social work, to the extent that the field has lost its historic connection to social justice. The need for solidarity between social workers and unions is urgent in the face of rising neoliberalism and austerity agendas that threaten to undo fundamental social reforms. Through historical examples and case studies, and with an eye toward the importance of equity, this article proposes means for building new community–labor alliances through a critical linkage between social workers as professionals and trade union activists.
Introduction Setting the Broader Context Globally, trade unions, public services, and the public at large are bearing the brunt of the deep cuts in social spending, job reductions, outsourcing, and related deficit reduction measures. In the present economic climate (termed ‘gloves-off’ by Bernhardt et al., 2008), where managerial flexibility and corporate profit margins take precedence over the needs of working people, global labor market restructuring threatens to have serious impacts on workers, their families, and their communities (Berberoglu, 2011). The dominant political narrative of the austerity agenda has been a ‘blame game’ – blaming the victims, blaming others who are more vulnerable; blaming anyone (such as union bosses and environmentalists) who can be construed as threatening profit maximization or making business less ‘efficient.’ At the same time, the serious funding reductions in social services have ushered in a new era of commodification of services (Dominelli, 2004). Social work services are increasingly under threat and undermined. As a result, people in poverty end up having less access to public services. In the context of a gendered and racialized labor market (Galabuzi and Block, 2011), the intersectionality of race, class, gender, and other forms of systemic oppression is reflected in who bears the brunt of this global race to bottom. Given the adverse impact of the austerity agenda on both the labor movement and social work, this article explores what trade unions and social work share, and reimagines the conditions for possible convergences between the two. Finally, this article considers the strategies that social workers in the dual roles of social work practitioners and trade union activists can carry out to create a collective narrative of resistance.
The Need for Renewal and Convergence between Trade Unions and Social Work Practice Within the Trade Union Context There has been a massive erosion of public sector employment. In Canada alone, the Federal government has eliminated 25 000 jobs in past year. The other pressing challenge is the
International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, 2nd edition, Volume 24
legislative attack on union recognition such as the Rand formula in Canada and right to work legislation in the United States. In November 2012, the American State of Michigan became the 24th state to pass ‘right to work’ legislation which weakens union membership and provides a pretext to lower wages. Over the past two decades, with the decline in union density, labor scholars have raised the urgent need to reverse the trend and proposed new organizing strategies to reach women, youth, racialized, and immigrant workers (Kumar and Schenk, 2003; Briskin, 2006). However, studies have also shown that recruiting new membership without meaningful engagement can be problematic and there is a need for labor to democratize the internal union practices for stronger member participation (Murray and Levesque, 2005; Bernard, 2006). Trade unions, as a microcosm of a society where sexism, racism, and other forms of systemic discrimination are reflected in everyday practice, also find themselves being challenged on their policies and practices of exclusion by their own membership. The vision of building an interracial workingclass movement for social justice and solidarity has also been put forth as part of the critical dialogue on labor renewal (Gasper and Fletcher, 2008; Ng, 2012).
Within Social Work Context The austerity agenda has social workers juggling the ideals of social justice and inclusion with the harsh realities of reduced funding. Government funders have imposed restrictions on the amount of advocacy work that agencies can do, as well as further restrictions on welfare benefits, unemployment insurance, and other ‘safety net’ features of the so-called welfare state. These austerity measures have been imposed throughout the West – in the United States and Canada, to be sure, but also in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus, and Italy, among others. Such restrictions have caused agencies to self-censor or even retreat entirely from advocacy work, which is now deemed ‘too political’ (Carniol, 2010). The new approach to service provision means clients are ‘case managed’ rather than empowered and social workers are ‘micro-managed’ as if they were piece-workers in the manufacturing sector. Service providers are pressured to process more cases, rather than do more good, to justify their
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.28096-3
491
492
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
funding. At the end of the helping process, clients are never engaged as autonomous agents, only as passive recipients of services. Very often, the clients of service providers are workers who have lost their jobs due to plant closures and are now seeking help through a traumatic period of transition. Not only is there a total erasure of the former identities and experiences as employees, union members, or activists, there is an absence of collective work that probes the root cause of these problems. Fisher and Shragge (2008) have been critical of such social work practice and urge community organizations to embrace the model of social action organizing that will deal with underlying issues, create opposition, and challenge the status quo. On the other hand, one wonders how many social workers will identify with Donna Baines’ stance that unions are an effective vehicle for antioppressive resistance (2011) and suggest union organizing to their clients as a possible course of action. Edward Scanlon and Scott Harding (2005) suggest the potential for social work to ‘reconnect’ with organized labor, based on shared fundamental values and the history of the early days of social work. The social work profession needs a political ally if it is to be successful in advancing the historical progressive vision of the profession, and protect social programs from current cuts or threats. The same sentiment is poignantly expressed in the statement of the Social Worker Action Network (SWAN) based in United Kingdom (http:// www.socialworkfuture.org/):
We believe the role of the unions is crucial given the attacks that are looming in the public sector where no area of social work is likely to go unscathed. We will all be blamed for the crisis rather than the target setting, caseloads, staff shortages, bureaucracy and IT pressures that are currently dominating all areas of our practice.
The Deep Historical Roots of Collaboration and Shared Values The labor movement has always acknowledged unequal power relations in the workplace and in society at large and recognized that countervailing power can come from organizing, mobilizing, and agitation. Employers have been unwilling to relinquish or share their control and power in their workplaces. In North American labor history, worker-oriented legislation and social programs were won as a result of protest, civil disobedience, and working-class solidarity (see, e.g., Hicks and Swank, 1992). May First as International Workers Day originated as a way to commemorate the workers killed in agitating for an 8-h work day in Chicago in May 1886. In Canada, the General strike of Winnipeg in 1919 is a testimony to workers’ courage when skilled trade workers protested about unemployment after WWI. The Trek to Ottawa in the 1930s was initiated by unemployed workers as a response to the intolerable conditions in the work camp set up by the Federal government during the recession. As a result, unemployment insurance benefits were legislated in 1936. Through the years, other key social reforms such as pensions, worker’s compensation,
universal health care, occupational health and safety, employment standards have all come partly as a result of labor and community mobilizing. A social justice orientation within social work has deep historical roots in mobilizing and organizing for progressive change (Benjamin, 2011). Throughout these and other milestones in workers’ struggles, social workers as community advocates walked side by side with organized labor, a tradition that lives on today, for example, in the ‘radical social work’ movement in the United Kingdom (Lavalette, 2011). During the Great Depression, a ‘rank and file’ movement of social workers emerged. Swelling to as many as 15 000 members by 1936, the movement was a force to be reckoned with. Rooted in the Marxist class analysis, the rank and filers identified themselves as white-collar workers and were strong supporters for the rights of white-collar workers to organize unions. Similarly, founders of the settlement house movement such as Jane Addams, Lillian Wald, and Florence Kelley established the National Women’s Trade Union League in 1903 and worked closely with organized labor in advocating for strong, progressive social and public policy and services. As a result of these formidable alliances, far-reaching social and labor legislation – the Social Security Act and the National Labor Relations Act – were passed in the United States during this period (Scanlon and Harding, 2005). However, after the post-WWII era, the relationship between organized labor and social work grew tenuous as unions partially retreated from activism during McCarthyism. And social workers also retreated for fear of being targeted politically. Many moved along the path of professionalization and ‘cultivating’ a middle-class professional identity. Instead of pursuing union organizing strategies, priorities were placed on the professionalization of social work, such as advanced clinical training, the development of professional journals, and the formation of professional association of social workers (Walkowitz, 1999). The resurgence of activism in the 1960s and 1970s only partially rekindled social work’s reformist zeal. Today’s social workers are, in general, more engaged in mainstreaming the social work profession and have left the notion of the ‘worker’ in social work behind. Others, of course, have retained a social justice orientation and got involved in the civil rights movement, the women’s movement, antiwar protests, and, more recently, environmentalism and the movement for marriage equality and LGBT rights.
Community–Labor Alliances and Best Practices in the Mobilization for Social Justice For the past three decades, some of the more progressive trade unions have recognized the need to build broad-based community coalitions as part of the resistance to the austerity agenda. Coalitions are able to provide a shield for community agencies participating on broader shared goals, without being targeted or running the risk of defunding. Peter Leonard refers to such coalitions as a ‘confederation of diversity’ where the politics of difference are incorporated with the politics of solidarity (Leonard, 1997; Mullaly, 2002). Four examples of successful coalition building are discussed below: the women’s movement’s involvement in trade unionism, the mobilization
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
for employment equity legislation, the minimum wage campaign, and the Solidarity City Campaign. One key example of community–labor alliances has been through women who are active in both the labor and feminist movements. The influx of women into the public sector in the 1970s enabled activists in the women’s movement to use their trade unions as another site to challenge gender discrimination in workplaces, unions, and the broader society. As a result of their commitment, progressive and inclusive policies such as childcare, pay equity, and initiatives to end violence against women were given voice and in many cases then legislated into broader social change. In the late 1980s, trade unionists in Ontario, Canada, came together with women’s organizations, people of color, people with disabilities and Indigenous Peoples to create the Alliance for Employment Equity. The advocacy work of this Alliance, which addressed systemic and discriminatory barriers to employment, led to the passing of the first ever mandatory employment equity legislation in 1993. The successful mobilization around the minimum wage campaign in Ontario is another example of community mobilizing and political bargaining. The Toronto Workers Action Centre, a community-based agency providing advocacy services for low-wage, nonunionized workers, began the mobilizing and campaigning for a minimum wage raise after a 10-year freeze under a conservative regime. Their campaign was strengthened by a targeted mobilizing effort by the Toronto and York Region Labor Council in forging a broad-based coalition and groundswell of support (Vosko, 2012–13). On 21 February 2013, the Toronto City Council passed a historic motion to provide services to residents without full immigration status or documents. This work was organized by members of Solidarity City Network which is composed of many community workers and activists from many frontline service providers, legal clinics and antipoverty organizations and immigrant rights advocacy groups. The above examples of community and labor collaboration speak to the power in numbers. However, the mobilization of these alliances is not without tensions and contradictions when coalition partners have to work outside their comfort zones, being challenged to work across differences. Sometimes, partners come to the table for the sake of appearances while others (who come with financial contributions) can be overzealous in taking up space and claiming credit. Resolving some of these moments of tensions through critical antioppression social work practice has provided invaluable lessons of deepening relationships and solidarity building.
Lessons from the Los Angeles Immigrant Labor Activism The successful collaboration between labor and community can be best demonstrated by the mobilization of Latino immigrants in Los Angeles (LA) County. Due to deep organizing over the past 15 years, LA has gained over 60 000 new, predominately Latino, unionized workers, bringing new energy and vision to the American labor movement (Milkman, 2012). Ruth Milkman’s (2012) study argues that the LA success in organizing immigrant labor is explained by three overlapping approaches to organizing. The first involves traditional trade union organizing. Several leading U.S. unions have organized
493
Latino immigrants employed in low-wage janitorial, retail, and hospitality work. The Justice for Janitor campaign launched by Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is a prime example of a more innovative organizing approach of direct action and sectorial city wide coverage rather than being restricted to a single workplace. The second approach within immigrant labor activism is the advocacy and organizing efforts of labor-oriented worker centers. These centers, which number more than a 100 nationwide, provide advocacy, support, and mobilization to workers in precarious employment or in the informal sector (Fine, 2006). Finally there is the broader immigrant and migrant rights movement and its organizing. This too involves a broadbased coalition including partners from churches, ethnic organizations, community agencies, and organized labor. Foregrounded by the vision of human rights, the coalition has worked for legal status as the panacea to improve immigrant workers’ employment and working conditions (Milkman, 2011). The synergy of the three interlocking strategies has bonded immigrant workers into a cohesive group with a class identity grounded in their common experiences of exploitation and exclusion. It has dispelled the myth commonly held by unions that immigrant workers cannot be organized (Tattersall, 2009). Mobilization has also politicized workers and transformed members of the Latino community into a powerful political and voting bloc that U.S. political parties have had to take notice of.
Social Workers as Professionals and Union Members The ideal of social work practice as a caring profession that fosters social justice has been greatly undermined by the rise of the new managerialism where service standardization and performance management models are now repacked and introduced into the social services sector as New Public Management (NPM) (Baines, 2011). With multitasking and casework overload, social workers are either being pushed to have more qualifications, or they experience deskilling and devaluing of their work at the other extreme. Dominelli (2004) urges for social workers to break from “the shackles of a government-imposed bureau-rationality that has turned them into bureau-technocrats.” Unionization provides an alternate forum for social workers to exercise their commitment not only to improve their own working conditions, but also to advocate broad public policy change. Collective bargaining has been effective in countering the pace of restructuring in the social services sector. For example, one community agency in Toronto has secured a no-contracting-out clause in their collective agreement and set a precedent in the sector. Others have used the contract negotiation process to raise work restructuring issues that are detrimental to the quality of care and well being of their clients. Tara La Rose’s (2009) study of the strike of a child welfare agency describes how the workers, who were members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), went on strike for 6 weeks after the management refused to address the issue of heavy caseloads
494
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
and high levels of stress experienced by their members. Through the bargaining and strike process, workers developed a strong bond, exercised their collective power as union members, challenged state managerial policies, and created positive social change (La Rose, 2009). The hard-won gains such as caps on caseloads and improved workload contract language have set a precedent for child welfare agencies across Ontario (Baines, 2011). The empowerment of these workers through the strike exemplifies the spirit of the union slogan – “collectively we bargain, individually we beg!” Another successful example of collective resistance comes from a group of social workers who work for a social service agency in Toronto and belong to the Ontario Public Services Employees Union (OPSEU). Ben Carniol (2010) provides a vivid account of how Lisa Quarta, a clinical social worker and the President of her local, organized to stop management from dismissing housekeeping and clerical staff who were predominately racialized women, to cut costs. Quarta first called a union meeting where all affected workers shared their stories and reactions about the pending dismissals with other union members, who were mainly white professionals. As a result, staff members showed up to the subsequent meeting with management wearing black as a way of protesting. Two days later, management backed off the restructuring scheme. Not only did this collective action succeed in saving jobs, it also built solidarity and bridged the divide between racialized members who were in the lower, entry-level positions and white professional members (Carniol, 2010). The challenges for trade unions representing social workers are twofold. Firstly, as a female-dominated sector, how can unions engage more social workers, when women social workers are often juggling the responsibility of caring for their families with overfull caseloads? Secondly, how do we create transformation at the local union level, where it is closest to the membership? There is great need for rank and file membership to experience transformative moments as union members (Bernard, 2006). In labor organizing, a key goal is to persuade workers to think less about ‘I’ and more about ‘We.’ Organizing does not stop when the workers sign their union cards. They must also develop a sense of engagement and belonging. The following example from the Chicago Teachers Union offers insights on the practice of organizing from the inside outward to involve the wider public.
The Work Behind the Successful Chicago Teachers’ Strike On 10 September 2012, the Chicago teachers went out on strike for 9 days and were able to win public support to stop the austerity moves proposed by the Mayor. It took everyone, including the leadership of the labor movement, by surprise, but the seeds had been planted 2 years earlier when Karen Lewis was elected President of the Chicago Teachers’ Strike (CTU) on a platform to “change this into a democratic union responsive to its members” (Sokolower, 2012). Instead of employing a model of traditional leadership that stifles opposition, the leadership reached out and listened to the diverse opinions of the membership. The CTU rank and file activists were (and are) involved in their local school community, working with parents and other community
members on specific issues. Through such involvement, a strong bond between parents and teachers was built. When the strike came, this bond was reflected in widespread parents’ support for the teachers’ action. This mobilizing approach is very much reflected in Karen Lewis’ stance (Sokolower, 2012):
It all comes down to how you teach people to fight with the tools they have. We have been fighting with the bosses’ tools. We can spend a lot of time doing legislation. I think that’s fine – have a legislative approach. But understand that you don’t control that process..You need to have good relationships with legislators; you need to have members get in touch and let them know what’s important to you. That’s one tool. But it’s not the only tool. Our best tool is our ability to put 20 000 people in the street. I don’t care if one rich guy buys up all the ad space. The tool that we have is a mass movement. We have the pressure of mass mobilization and organizing.
What is interesting about this case is that community involvement and mobilization extended long past the resolution of the strike. Six months later, CTU and a coalition of students and parents staged a mass community protest against the closure of 54 schools affecting more than 30 000 students, primarily in low-income black and Latino areas. Networks of Faith, Community and Teachers for Students (FACTS) had sprung up throughout the city to stop the closures. The Union’s leadership also vowed to launch a voter education campaign and send organizers to neighborhoods where schools were slated to close and register a minimum 100 000 new voters. Such action speaks to what Mullaly has referred to as a political strategy to ‘relegitimate the state’ and “build more rather than less government involvement in social, economic and human affairs” (2002: p. 202). It underscores the importance of moving from the traditional practices of electoral politics to building broad-based coalitions where the inclusion of marginalized groups is meaningful and real. These activities allow a deeper relationship building whereby trust and commitment to each other come to be based on shared values and struggles.
Translating Progressive Core Values into Meaningful Practice The progressive core values that trade unions and social work share is grounded in a critical analysis of the various ways that social structures, power dominance, and privilege are constructed and in learning to question who benefits from any particular set of social relations. It is also about finding new ways of challenging unjust social relations (Carniol and Del Valle, 2010) and transforming them into equitable processes based on economic, political, environmental, and social justice (Baines, 2011; Benjamin, 2011; Carniol and Del Valle, 2010; Dominelli, 2004). In reimagining possible new convergences to resist the austerity agenda, it is critical to translate some progressive core values into meaningful practice. For further collaboration and bridging between trade unions and social work, I offer the following three ideas for consideration.
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
First is advice for trade unions about handling complaints and grievances. Very often, in the expediency of time and resources, union representatives end up resorting to the shortest route to resolve or mediate individual cases, without making deeper connections between the incidents and the larger structural context. Potential cases of harassment and/or differential treatment based on sexism, racism, and other grounds of discrimination are often complicated and difficult to prove. These cases require empathy, skills, and time for the local leadership to take such complaints seriously and respectfully. For a union member from one of the equityseeking groups, who has finally mustered enough courage to step forward, the support and encouragement offered by a shop steward will make a world of difference and bring them closer to the union family. These can be powerful and transformative moments of union building. A second recommendation is for the social work profession to reinforce the clarity of social justice and put the notion of worker back into social work. The primary entry point for this transformation is through social work education – by integrating social action organizing as a major element in the curriculum, and having a stronger presence of workers’ struggles and trade unions in it. I would argue that social work student placements in unions should be expanded, to create a critical mass of such students, dispelling some of the myths about unions, and facilitating a deeper understanding and relationship building for future joint opportunities. Last is the need to glean lessons from past community and labor collaboration. The conditions to deepen the roots of these community and labor alliances are more horizontal democratic practices that are bottom-up; a transformative leadership that has the political will and courage to challenge the status quo; a commitment to empowerment; and mobilizing strategies that will move people from the comfort of their own silos to the larger space of building the ‘We.’ It is in the vision of rebuilding the ‘We’ that there is a need to probe deeper into the nuanced notion of community unionism and the complexity of movement building for social justice. If the end goal for community unionism is only to broaden the unions’ reach to potential membership or to ‘rebrand’ unions in a more contemporary image, the effort will rapidly dissolve into self-interest and competition. Trade unions in social movements need to go beyond a narrow economistic focus and define themselves by demonstrating their capacity to connect with life experiences under capitalism (Fairbrother, 2008). In the new norm of workplaces with precarious and informal labor, where workers are no longer confined to traditional workplace settings, it is important to build a repertoire of practice that will reach out to marginalized workers. Dae Oup Chang’s study (2012) of the organizing efforts of workers in precarious employment in four East Asian countries proposes an alternate vision of the labor–social movement, where the anchoring is shifted from unions as the site of growth to a community where precarious and marginalized workers, regardless of status and workplace, all come together as an united force. In these community settings, social work practitioners can play a pivotal role in mobilizing to overcome fragmentation in the social sector. They can potentially represent a different path of coalition building that offers a more
495
genuine partnership, empowerment, and innovative practice for social transformation.
Acknowledgments The author thanks Ben Carniol, Pramila Aggarwal, Deena Ladd, Judy Chow, and David Kidd for their invaluable insights for the writing of this article.
See also: Critical Social Work Practice; Labor Unions; Marxist Approaches to Social Work; Neoliberalism; New Managerialism and New Public Sector Management; Public Sector Organizations; Radical Social Work; Social Action and Social Justice; Social Justice: Historical and Theoretical Considerations; Social Work Ethics; Trade Unions, Economic Behavior of; Urban Neoliberalism.
Bibliography Baines, D. (Ed.), 2011. Doing Anti-oppressive Practice: Social Justice Social Work. Fernwood Publishing, Black Point, NS. Benjamin, A., 2011. Doing anti-oppressive social work: the importance of resistance, history, and strategy. In: Baines, D. (Ed.), Doing Anti-oppressive Practice: Social Justice Social Work. Fernwood Publishing, Black Point, NS, pp. 289–297. Berberoglu, Berch, 2011. The global capitalist crisis: its origins, dynamics, and impact on the United States. International Review of Modern Sociology 37 (2), 159–184. Bernard, E., October/November 2006. Organizing the Organized. Our Times Magazine. Bernhardt, A., Boushey, H., Bresser, L., Tilly, C. (Eds.), 2008. The Gloves-Off Economy: Problems and Possibilities at the Bottom of America’s Labor Market. Labor and Employment Relations Association, Champaign, IL. Briskin, L., 2006. Union leadership and equity representation. Gender and Work Database (online). http://www.genderwork.ca/Briskin_Leadership_Paper_April_ 2006.pdf. Carniol, B. (Ed.), 2010. Case Critical: Social Services and Social Justice in Canada, sixth ed. Between the Lines, Toronto, ON. Carniol, B., Del Valle, V., 2010. “We have a voice”: helping immigrant women challenge in, abuse. In: Hick, S., Peters, H.I., Corner, T., London, T. (Eds.), Structural Social Work in Action: Examples from Practice. Canadian Scholars’ Press Inc, Toronto, ON. Chang, D., 2012. The neoliberal rise of East Asia and social movements of labour: four moments and a challenge. Interface: A Journal for and about Social Movements 4 (2), 22–51. Dominelli, L., 2004. Social Work: Theory and Practice for a Changing Profession. Polity Press, Cambridge, UK. Fairbrother, P., 2008. Social movement unionism or trade unions as social movements. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal 20, 213–220. Fine, Janice, 2006. Worker Centers: Organizing Communities at the Edge of the Dream. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY. Fisher, J., 1980. The Response of Social Work to the Depression. G.K. Hall, Boston, MA. Fisher, R., Shragge, E., 2008. Challenging community organizing. Journal of Community Practice 8 (3), 1–9. Fletcher Jr., B., Gapasin, F., 2008. Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and a New Path toward Social Justice. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA. Galabuzi, G.E., Block, S., 2011. Canada’s Colour-Coded Labour Market: The Gap for Racialized Workers. Wellesley Institute and Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Toronto, ON. Hicks, A.M., Swank, D.H., 1992. Politics, institutions and welfare spending in industrialized democracies, 1960–1982. American Political Science Review 86 (3), 658–674. Kumar, P., Schenk, C. (Eds.), 2003. Paths to Union Renewal: Canadian Experiences. Broadview Press, Peterborough, ON. La Rose, T., 2009. One small revolution: unionization, community practice, and workload in child welfare. Journal of Community Practice 17 (1).
496
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
Lavalette, M. (Ed.), 2011. Radical Social Work Today: Social Work at the Crossroads. Policy Press, Bristol, UK. Levesque, C., Murray, G., Le Queux, S., 2005. Union disaffection and social identity: democracy as a source of union revitalization. Work and Occupations 32 (4), 400–422. Milkman, R., 2011. Immigrant workers, precarious work, and the US labor movement. Globalizations 8 (3), 361–372. Milkman, R., 2012. Immigrant workers, precarious work, and the US labour movement. In: Munck, R., Schierup, C., Wise, R.D. (Eds.), Migration, Work and Citizenship in the New Global Order. Routledge, London and New York, pp. 113–124. Mullaly, B., 2002. Challenging Oppression: A Critical Social Work Approach. Oxford University Press, Toronto, ON. Ng, W., November 2012. Pedagogy of solidarity: educating for an interracial working class movement. Journal of Workplace Learning 24.
Scanlon, E., Harding, S., 2005. Social work and labor unions: historical and contemporary alliances. Journal of Community Practice 13 (1), 9–30. Sokolower, J., 2012. Lessons in social justice unionism: an interview with Chicago teachers union president Karen Lewis. Rethinking Schools (online). http://www. rethinkingschools.org/archive/27_02/27_02_sokolower.shtml. Tattersall, A., 2009. Using their sword of justice: the NSW teachers 161 federation and its campaign for public education between 2001 and 2004. In: McBride, J., Greendwood, I. (Eds.), Community Unionism: A Comparative Analysis of Concepts and Contexts. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Vosko, Leah F., 2012–13. “Rights without remedies”: enforcing employment standards in Ontario by maximizing voice among workers in precarious jobs. Osgoode Hall Law Journal 50, 845ff. Walkowitz, D.J., 1999. Working with Class: Social Workers and the Politics of Middle Class Identity. UNC Press, New York.
Abstract This article argues that the rise of new managerialism and new public management has taken the ‘worker’ out of social work, to the extent that the field has lost its historic connection to social justice. The need for solidarity between social workers and unions is urgent in the face of rising neoliberalism and austerity agendas that threaten to undo fundamental social reforms. Through historical examples and case studies, and with an eye toward the importance of equity, this article proposes means for building new community–labor alliances through a critical linkage between social workers as professionals and trade union activists.
Introduction Setting the Broader Context Globally, trade unions, public services, and the public at large are bearing the brunt of the deep cuts in social spending, job reductions, outsourcing, and related deficit reduction measures. In the present economic climate (termed ‘gloves-off’ by Bernhardt et al., 2008), where managerial flexibility and corporate profit margins take precedence over the needs of working people, global labor market restructuring threatens to have serious impacts on workers, their families, and their communities (Berberoglu, 2011). The dominant political narrative of the austerity agenda has been a ‘blame game’ – blaming the victims, blaming others who are more vulnerable; blaming anyone (such as union bosses and environmentalists) who can be construed as threatening profit maximization or making business less ‘efficient.’ At the same time, the serious funding reductions in social services have ushered in a new era of commodification of services (Dominelli, 2004). Social work services are increasingly under threat and undermined. As a result, people in poverty end up having less access to public services. In the context of a gendered and racialized labor market (Galabuzi and Block, 2011), the intersectionality of race, class, gender, and other forms of systemic oppression is reflected in who bears the brunt of this global race to bottom. Given the adverse impact of the austerity agenda on both the labor movement and social work, this article explores what trade unions and social work share, and reimagines the conditions for possible convergences between the two. Finally, this article considers the strategies that social workers in the dual roles of social work practitioners and trade union activists can carry out to create a collective narrative of resistance.
The Need for Renewal and Convergence between Trade Unions and Social Work Practice Within the Trade Union Context There has been a massive erosion of public sector employment. In Canada alone, the Federal government has eliminated 25 000 jobs in past year. The other pressing challenge is the
International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences, 2nd edition, Volume 24
legislative attack on union recognition such as the Rand formula in Canada and right to work legislation in the United States. In November 2012, the American State of Michigan became the 24th state to pass ‘right to work’ legislation which weakens union membership and provides a pretext to lower wages. Over the past two decades, with the decline in union density, labor scholars have raised the urgent need to reverse the trend and proposed new organizing strategies to reach women, youth, racialized, and immigrant workers (Kumar and Schenk, 2003; Briskin, 2006). However, studies have also shown that recruiting new membership without meaningful engagement can be problematic and there is a need for labor to democratize the internal union practices for stronger member participation (Murray and Levesque, 2005; Bernard, 2006). Trade unions, as a microcosm of a society where sexism, racism, and other forms of systemic discrimination are reflected in everyday practice, also find themselves being challenged on their policies and practices of exclusion by their own membership. The vision of building an interracial workingclass movement for social justice and solidarity has also been put forth as part of the critical dialogue on labor renewal (Gasper and Fletcher, 2008; Ng, 2012).
Within Social Work Context The austerity agenda has social workers juggling the ideals of social justice and inclusion with the harsh realities of reduced funding. Government funders have imposed restrictions on the amount of advocacy work that agencies can do, as well as further restrictions on welfare benefits, unemployment insurance, and other ‘safety net’ features of the so-called welfare state. These austerity measures have been imposed throughout the West – in the United States and Canada, to be sure, but also in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Cyprus, and Italy, among others. Such restrictions have caused agencies to self-censor or even retreat entirely from advocacy work, which is now deemed ‘too political’ (Carniol, 2010). The new approach to service provision means clients are ‘case managed’ rather than empowered and social workers are ‘micro-managed’ as if they were piece-workers in the manufacturing sector. Service providers are pressured to process more cases, rather than do more good, to justify their
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.28096-3
491
492
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
funding. At the end of the helping process, clients are never engaged as autonomous agents, only as passive recipients of services. Very often, the clients of service providers are workers who have lost their jobs due to plant closures and are now seeking help through a traumatic period of transition. Not only is there a total erasure of the former identities and experiences as employees, union members, or activists, there is an absence of collective work that probes the root cause of these problems. Fisher and Shragge (2008) have been critical of such social work practice and urge community organizations to embrace the model of social action organizing that will deal with underlying issues, create opposition, and challenge the status quo. On the other hand, one wonders how many social workers will identify with Donna Baines’ stance that unions are an effective vehicle for antioppressive resistance (2011) and suggest union organizing to their clients as a possible course of action. Edward Scanlon and Scott Harding (2005) suggest the potential for social work to ‘reconnect’ with organized labor, based on shared fundamental values and the history of the early days of social work. The social work profession needs a political ally if it is to be successful in advancing the historical progressive vision of the profession, and protect social programs from current cuts or threats. The same sentiment is poignantly expressed in the statement of the Social Worker Action Network (SWAN) based in United Kingdom (http:// www.socialworkfuture.org/):
We believe the role of the unions is crucial given the attacks that are looming in the public sector where no area of social work is likely to go unscathed. We will all be blamed for the crisis rather than the target setting, caseloads, staff shortages, bureaucracy and IT pressures that are currently dominating all areas of our practice.
The Deep Historical Roots of Collaboration and Shared Values The labor movement has always acknowledged unequal power relations in the workplace and in society at large and recognized that countervailing power can come from organizing, mobilizing, and agitation. Employers have been unwilling to relinquish or share their control and power in their workplaces. In North American labor history, worker-oriented legislation and social programs were won as a result of protest, civil disobedience, and working-class solidarity (see, e.g., Hicks and Swank, 1992). May First as International Workers Day originated as a way to commemorate the workers killed in agitating for an 8-h work day in Chicago in May 1886. In Canada, the General strike of Winnipeg in 1919 is a testimony to workers’ courage when skilled trade workers protested about unemployment after WWI. The Trek to Ottawa in the 1930s was initiated by unemployed workers as a response to the intolerable conditions in the work camp set up by the Federal government during the recession. As a result, unemployment insurance benefits were legislated in 1936. Through the years, other key social reforms such as pensions, worker’s compensation,
universal health care, occupational health and safety, employment standards have all come partly as a result of labor and community mobilizing. A social justice orientation within social work has deep historical roots in mobilizing and organizing for progressive change (Benjamin, 2011). Throughout these and other milestones in workers’ struggles, social workers as community advocates walked side by side with organized labor, a tradition that lives on today, for example, in the ‘radical social work’ movement in the United Kingdom (Lavalette, 2011). During the Great Depression, a ‘rank and file’ movement of social workers emerged. Swelling to as many as 15 000 members by 1936, the movement was a force to be reckoned with. Rooted in the Marxist class analysis, the rank and filers identified themselves as white-collar workers and were strong supporters for the rights of white-collar workers to organize unions. Similarly, founders of the settlement house movement such as Jane Addams, Lillian Wald, and Florence Kelley established the National Women’s Trade Union League in 1903 and worked closely with organized labor in advocating for strong, progressive social and public policy and services. As a result of these formidable alliances, far-reaching social and labor legislation – the Social Security Act and the National Labor Relations Act – were passed in the United States during this period (Scanlon and Harding, 2005). However, after the post-WWII era, the relationship between organized labor and social work grew tenuous as unions partially retreated from activism during McCarthyism. And social workers also retreated for fear of being targeted politically. Many moved along the path of professionalization and ‘cultivating’ a middle-class professional identity. Instead of pursuing union organizing strategies, priorities were placed on the professionalization of social work, such as advanced clinical training, the development of professional journals, and the formation of professional association of social workers (Walkowitz, 1999). The resurgence of activism in the 1960s and 1970s only partially rekindled social work’s reformist zeal. Today’s social workers are, in general, more engaged in mainstreaming the social work profession and have left the notion of the ‘worker’ in social work behind. Others, of course, have retained a social justice orientation and got involved in the civil rights movement, the women’s movement, antiwar protests, and, more recently, environmentalism and the movement for marriage equality and LGBT rights.
Community–Labor Alliances and Best Practices in the Mobilization for Social Justice For the past three decades, some of the more progressive trade unions have recognized the need to build broad-based community coalitions as part of the resistance to the austerity agenda. Coalitions are able to provide a shield for community agencies participating on broader shared goals, without being targeted or running the risk of defunding. Peter Leonard refers to such coalitions as a ‘confederation of diversity’ where the politics of difference are incorporated with the politics of solidarity (Leonard, 1997; Mullaly, 2002). Four examples of successful coalition building are discussed below: the women’s movement’s involvement in trade unionism, the mobilization
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
for employment equity legislation, the minimum wage campaign, and the Solidarity City Campaign. One key example of community–labor alliances has been through women who are active in both the labor and feminist movements. The influx of women into the public sector in the 1970s enabled activists in the women’s movement to use their trade unions as another site to challenge gender discrimination in workplaces, unions, and the broader society. As a result of their commitment, progressive and inclusive policies such as childcare, pay equity, and initiatives to end violence against women were given voice and in many cases then legislated into broader social change. In the late 1980s, trade unionists in Ontario, Canada, came together with women’s organizations, people of color, people with disabilities and Indigenous Peoples to create the Alliance for Employment Equity. The advocacy work of this Alliance, which addressed systemic and discriminatory barriers to employment, led to the passing of the first ever mandatory employment equity legislation in 1993. The successful mobilization around the minimum wage campaign in Ontario is another example of community mobilizing and political bargaining. The Toronto Workers Action Centre, a community-based agency providing advocacy services for low-wage, nonunionized workers, began the mobilizing and campaigning for a minimum wage raise after a 10-year freeze under a conservative regime. Their campaign was strengthened by a targeted mobilizing effort by the Toronto and York Region Labor Council in forging a broad-based coalition and groundswell of support (Vosko, 2012–13). On 21 February 2013, the Toronto City Council passed a historic motion to provide services to residents without full immigration status or documents. This work was organized by members of Solidarity City Network which is composed of many community workers and activists from many frontline service providers, legal clinics and antipoverty organizations and immigrant rights advocacy groups. The above examples of community and labor collaboration speak to the power in numbers. However, the mobilization of these alliances is not without tensions and contradictions when coalition partners have to work outside their comfort zones, being challenged to work across differences. Sometimes, partners come to the table for the sake of appearances while others (who come with financial contributions) can be overzealous in taking up space and claiming credit. Resolving some of these moments of tensions through critical antioppression social work practice has provided invaluable lessons of deepening relationships and solidarity building.
Lessons from the Los Angeles Immigrant Labor Activism The successful collaboration between labor and community can be best demonstrated by the mobilization of Latino immigrants in Los Angeles (LA) County. Due to deep organizing over the past 15 years, LA has gained over 60 000 new, predominately Latino, unionized workers, bringing new energy and vision to the American labor movement (Milkman, 2012). Ruth Milkman’s (2012) study argues that the LA success in organizing immigrant labor is explained by three overlapping approaches to organizing. The first involves traditional trade union organizing. Several leading U.S. unions have organized
493
Latino immigrants employed in low-wage janitorial, retail, and hospitality work. The Justice for Janitor campaign launched by Service Employees International Union (SEIU) is a prime example of a more innovative organizing approach of direct action and sectorial city wide coverage rather than being restricted to a single workplace. The second approach within immigrant labor activism is the advocacy and organizing efforts of labor-oriented worker centers. These centers, which number more than a 100 nationwide, provide advocacy, support, and mobilization to workers in precarious employment or in the informal sector (Fine, 2006). Finally there is the broader immigrant and migrant rights movement and its organizing. This too involves a broadbased coalition including partners from churches, ethnic organizations, community agencies, and organized labor. Foregrounded by the vision of human rights, the coalition has worked for legal status as the panacea to improve immigrant workers’ employment and working conditions (Milkman, 2011). The synergy of the three interlocking strategies has bonded immigrant workers into a cohesive group with a class identity grounded in their common experiences of exploitation and exclusion. It has dispelled the myth commonly held by unions that immigrant workers cannot be organized (Tattersall, 2009). Mobilization has also politicized workers and transformed members of the Latino community into a powerful political and voting bloc that U.S. political parties have had to take notice of.
Social Workers as Professionals and Union Members The ideal of social work practice as a caring profession that fosters social justice has been greatly undermined by the rise of the new managerialism where service standardization and performance management models are now repacked and introduced into the social services sector as New Public Management (NPM) (Baines, 2011). With multitasking and casework overload, social workers are either being pushed to have more qualifications, or they experience deskilling and devaluing of their work at the other extreme. Dominelli (2004) urges for social workers to break from “the shackles of a government-imposed bureau-rationality that has turned them into bureau-technocrats.” Unionization provides an alternate forum for social workers to exercise their commitment not only to improve their own working conditions, but also to advocate broad public policy change. Collective bargaining has been effective in countering the pace of restructuring in the social services sector. For example, one community agency in Toronto has secured a no-contracting-out clause in their collective agreement and set a precedent in the sector. Others have used the contract negotiation process to raise work restructuring issues that are detrimental to the quality of care and well being of their clients. Tara La Rose’s (2009) study of the strike of a child welfare agency describes how the workers, who were members of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), went on strike for 6 weeks after the management refused to address the issue of heavy caseloads
494
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
and high levels of stress experienced by their members. Through the bargaining and strike process, workers developed a strong bond, exercised their collective power as union members, challenged state managerial policies, and created positive social change (La Rose, 2009). The hard-won gains such as caps on caseloads and improved workload contract language have set a precedent for child welfare agencies across Ontario (Baines, 2011). The empowerment of these workers through the strike exemplifies the spirit of the union slogan – “collectively we bargain, individually we beg!” Another successful example of collective resistance comes from a group of social workers who work for a social service agency in Toronto and belong to the Ontario Public Services Employees Union (OPSEU). Ben Carniol (2010) provides a vivid account of how Lisa Quarta, a clinical social worker and the President of her local, organized to stop management from dismissing housekeeping and clerical staff who were predominately racialized women, to cut costs. Quarta first called a union meeting where all affected workers shared their stories and reactions about the pending dismissals with other union members, who were mainly white professionals. As a result, staff members showed up to the subsequent meeting with management wearing black as a way of protesting. Two days later, management backed off the restructuring scheme. Not only did this collective action succeed in saving jobs, it also built solidarity and bridged the divide between racialized members who were in the lower, entry-level positions and white professional members (Carniol, 2010). The challenges for trade unions representing social workers are twofold. Firstly, as a female-dominated sector, how can unions engage more social workers, when women social workers are often juggling the responsibility of caring for their families with overfull caseloads? Secondly, how do we create transformation at the local union level, where it is closest to the membership? There is great need for rank and file membership to experience transformative moments as union members (Bernard, 2006). In labor organizing, a key goal is to persuade workers to think less about ‘I’ and more about ‘We.’ Organizing does not stop when the workers sign their union cards. They must also develop a sense of engagement and belonging. The following example from the Chicago Teachers Union offers insights on the practice of organizing from the inside outward to involve the wider public.
The Work Behind the Successful Chicago Teachers’ Strike On 10 September 2012, the Chicago teachers went out on strike for 9 days and were able to win public support to stop the austerity moves proposed by the Mayor. It took everyone, including the leadership of the labor movement, by surprise, but the seeds had been planted 2 years earlier when Karen Lewis was elected President of the Chicago Teachers’ Strike (CTU) on a platform to “change this into a democratic union responsive to its members” (Sokolower, 2012). Instead of employing a model of traditional leadership that stifles opposition, the leadership reached out and listened to the diverse opinions of the membership. The CTU rank and file activists were (and are) involved in their local school community, working with parents and other community
members on specific issues. Through such involvement, a strong bond between parents and teachers was built. When the strike came, this bond was reflected in widespread parents’ support for the teachers’ action. This mobilizing approach is very much reflected in Karen Lewis’ stance (Sokolower, 2012):
It all comes down to how you teach people to fight with the tools they have. We have been fighting with the bosses’ tools. We can spend a lot of time doing legislation. I think that’s fine – have a legislative approach. But understand that you don’t control that process..You need to have good relationships with legislators; you need to have members get in touch and let them know what’s important to you. That’s one tool. But it’s not the only tool. Our best tool is our ability to put 20 000 people in the street. I don’t care if one rich guy buys up all the ad space. The tool that we have is a mass movement. We have the pressure of mass mobilization and organizing.
What is interesting about this case is that community involvement and mobilization extended long past the resolution of the strike. Six months later, CTU and a coalition of students and parents staged a mass community protest against the closure of 54 schools affecting more than 30 000 students, primarily in low-income black and Latino areas. Networks of Faith, Community and Teachers for Students (FACTS) had sprung up throughout the city to stop the closures. The Union’s leadership also vowed to launch a voter education campaign and send organizers to neighborhoods where schools were slated to close and register a minimum 100 000 new voters. Such action speaks to what Mullaly has referred to as a political strategy to ‘relegitimate the state’ and “build more rather than less government involvement in social, economic and human affairs” (2002: p. 202). It underscores the importance of moving from the traditional practices of electoral politics to building broad-based coalitions where the inclusion of marginalized groups is meaningful and real. These activities allow a deeper relationship building whereby trust and commitment to each other come to be based on shared values and struggles.
Translating Progressive Core Values into Meaningful Practice The progressive core values that trade unions and social work share is grounded in a critical analysis of the various ways that social structures, power dominance, and privilege are constructed and in learning to question who benefits from any particular set of social relations. It is also about finding new ways of challenging unjust social relations (Carniol and Del Valle, 2010) and transforming them into equitable processes based on economic, political, environmental, and social justice (Baines, 2011; Benjamin, 2011; Carniol and Del Valle, 2010; Dominelli, 2004). In reimagining possible new convergences to resist the austerity agenda, it is critical to translate some progressive core values into meaningful practice. For further collaboration and bridging between trade unions and social work, I offer the following three ideas for consideration.
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
First is advice for trade unions about handling complaints and grievances. Very often, in the expediency of time and resources, union representatives end up resorting to the shortest route to resolve or mediate individual cases, without making deeper connections between the incidents and the larger structural context. Potential cases of harassment and/or differential treatment based on sexism, racism, and other grounds of discrimination are often complicated and difficult to prove. These cases require empathy, skills, and time for the local leadership to take such complaints seriously and respectfully. For a union member from one of the equityseeking groups, who has finally mustered enough courage to step forward, the support and encouragement offered by a shop steward will make a world of difference and bring them closer to the union family. These can be powerful and transformative moments of union building. A second recommendation is for the social work profession to reinforce the clarity of social justice and put the notion of worker back into social work. The primary entry point for this transformation is through social work education – by integrating social action organizing as a major element in the curriculum, and having a stronger presence of workers’ struggles and trade unions in it. I would argue that social work student placements in unions should be expanded, to create a critical mass of such students, dispelling some of the myths about unions, and facilitating a deeper understanding and relationship building for future joint opportunities. Last is the need to glean lessons from past community and labor collaboration. The conditions to deepen the roots of these community and labor alliances are more horizontal democratic practices that are bottom-up; a transformative leadership that has the political will and courage to challenge the status quo; a commitment to empowerment; and mobilizing strategies that will move people from the comfort of their own silos to the larger space of building the ‘We.’ It is in the vision of rebuilding the ‘We’ that there is a need to probe deeper into the nuanced notion of community unionism and the complexity of movement building for social justice. If the end goal for community unionism is only to broaden the unions’ reach to potential membership or to ‘rebrand’ unions in a more contemporary image, the effort will rapidly dissolve into self-interest and competition. Trade unions in social movements need to go beyond a narrow economistic focus and define themselves by demonstrating their capacity to connect with life experiences under capitalism (Fairbrother, 2008). In the new norm of workplaces with precarious and informal labor, where workers are no longer confined to traditional workplace settings, it is important to build a repertoire of practice that will reach out to marginalized workers. Dae Oup Chang’s study (2012) of the organizing efforts of workers in precarious employment in four East Asian countries proposes an alternate vision of the labor–social movement, where the anchoring is shifted from unions as the site of growth to a community where precarious and marginalized workers, regardless of status and workplace, all come together as an united force. In these community settings, social work practitioners can play a pivotal role in mobilizing to overcome fragmentation in the social sector. They can potentially represent a different path of coalition building that offers a more
495
genuine partnership, empowerment, and innovative practice for social transformation.
Acknowledgments The author thanks Ben Carniol, Pramila Aggarwal, Deena Ladd, Judy Chow, and David Kidd for their invaluable insights for the writing of this article.
See also: Critical Social Work Practice; Labor Unions; Marxist Approaches to Social Work; Neoliberalism; New Managerialism and New Public Sector Management; Public Sector Organizations; Radical Social Work; Social Action and Social Justice; Social Justice: Historical and Theoretical Considerations; Social Work Ethics; Trade Unions, Economic Behavior of; Urban Neoliberalism.
Bibliography Baines, D. (Ed.), 2011. Doing Anti-oppressive Practice: Social Justice Social Work. Fernwood Publishing, Black Point, NS. Benjamin, A., 2011. Doing anti-oppressive social work: the importance of resistance, history, and strategy. In: Baines, D. (Ed.), Doing Anti-oppressive Practice: Social Justice Social Work. Fernwood Publishing, Black Point, NS, pp. 289–297. Berberoglu, Berch, 2011. The global capitalist crisis: its origins, dynamics, and impact on the United States. International Review of Modern Sociology 37 (2), 159–184. Bernard, E., October/November 2006. Organizing the Organized. Our Times Magazine. Bernhardt, A., Boushey, H., Bresser, L., Tilly, C. (Eds.), 2008. The Gloves-Off Economy: Problems and Possibilities at the Bottom of America’s Labor Market. Labor and Employment Relations Association, Champaign, IL. Briskin, L., 2006. Union leadership and equity representation. Gender and Work Database (online). http://www.genderwork.ca/Briskin_Leadership_Paper_April_ 2006.pdf. Carniol, B. (Ed.), 2010. Case Critical: Social Services and Social Justice in Canada, sixth ed. Between the Lines, Toronto, ON. Carniol, B., Del Valle, V., 2010. “We have a voice”: helping immigrant women challenge in, abuse. In: Hick, S., Peters, H.I., Corner, T., London, T. (Eds.), Structural Social Work in Action: Examples from Practice. Canadian Scholars’ Press Inc, Toronto, ON. Chang, D., 2012. The neoliberal rise of East Asia and social movements of labour: four moments and a challenge. Interface: A Journal for and about Social Movements 4 (2), 22–51. Dominelli, L., 2004. Social Work: Theory and Practice for a Changing Profession. Polity Press, Cambridge, UK. Fairbrother, P., 2008. Social movement unionism or trade unions as social movements. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal 20, 213–220. Fine, Janice, 2006. Worker Centers: Organizing Communities at the Edge of the Dream. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, NY. Fisher, J., 1980. The Response of Social Work to the Depression. G.K. Hall, Boston, MA. Fisher, R., Shragge, E., 2008. Challenging community organizing. Journal of Community Practice 8 (3), 1–9. Fletcher Jr., B., Gapasin, F., 2008. Solidarity Divided: The Crisis in Organized Labor and a New Path toward Social Justice. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA. Galabuzi, G.E., Block, S., 2011. Canada’s Colour-Coded Labour Market: The Gap for Racialized Workers. Wellesley Institute and Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Toronto, ON. Hicks, A.M., Swank, D.H., 1992. Politics, institutions and welfare spending in industrialized democracies, 1960–1982. American Political Science Review 86 (3), 658–674. Kumar, P., Schenk, C. (Eds.), 2003. Paths to Union Renewal: Canadian Experiences. Broadview Press, Peterborough, ON. La Rose, T., 2009. One small revolution: unionization, community practice, and workload in child welfare. Journal of Community Practice 17 (1).
496
Trade Unions and Social Work: Lessons from Canada
Lavalette, M. (Ed.), 2011. Radical Social Work Today: Social Work at the Crossroads. Policy Press, Bristol, UK. Levesque, C., Murray, G., Le Queux, S., 2005. Union disaffection and social identity: democracy as a source of union revitalization. Work and Occupations 32 (4), 400–422. Milkman, R., 2011. Immigrant workers, precarious work, and the US labor movement. Globalizations 8 (3), 361–372. Milkman, R., 2012. Immigrant workers, precarious work, and the US labour movement. In: Munck, R., Schierup, C., Wise, R.D. (Eds.), Migration, Work and Citizenship in the New Global Order. Routledge, London and New York, pp. 113–124. Mullaly, B., 2002. Challenging Oppression: A Critical Social Work Approach. Oxford University Press, Toronto, ON. Ng, W., November 2012. Pedagogy of solidarity: educating for an interracial working class movement. Journal of Workplace Learning 24.
Scanlon, E., Harding, S., 2005. Social work and labor unions: historical and contemporary alliances. Journal of Community Practice 13 (1), 9–30. Sokolower, J., 2012. Lessons in social justice unionism: an interview with Chicago teachers union president Karen Lewis. Rethinking Schools (online). http://www. rethinkingschools.org/archive/27_02/27_02_sokolower.shtml. Tattersall, A., 2009. Using their sword of justice: the NSW teachers 161 federation and its campaign for public education between 2001 and 2004. In: McBride, J., Greendwood, I. (Eds.), Community Unionism: A Comparative Analysis of Concepts and Contexts. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Vosko, Leah F., 2012–13. “Rights without remedies”: enforcing employment standards in Ontario by maximizing voice among workers in precarious jobs. Osgoode Hall Law Journal 50, 845ff. Walkowitz, D.J., 1999. Working with Class: Social Workers and the Politics of Middle Class Identity. UNC Press, New York.