Strikes: when companies collaborate with unions, industrial action can benefit business: Nigel J. Harris/Shutterstock More than 4 million working days have been lost to industrial action in the UK in 2023. This is more than at any point since 1989 and around nine times more than the yearly average of 450,000 days in the 2010s. …
Trade unions in the UK and US have become more powerful despite political interference and falling memberships: In September 2023, Joe Biden became the first sitting US president to join strikers on a picket line. He told car workers that they “deserve a significant raise and other benefits”. Even more surprisingly perhaps, those same workers …
Trade unions and the new economy: 3 African case studies show how workers are recasting their power in the digital age: From US car factories to public sector workers in Nigeria and South Africa, strikes by trade unions continue unabated among the established sectors of the working class. In Detroit in the US, workers are …
How unions could help reality TV cast and crew win better pay and working conditions: “Just because you can exploit young, doe-eyed talent desperate for the platform TV gives them, it doesn’t mean you should.” Original Real Housewives of New York star Bethany Frankel recently issued this rallying call for unionisation of reality TV. She …
I’ve worked in precarious jobs for more than 10 years – here’s what unions should do to support migrant workers: As I rush to clean everything before the sink overfills with plates and pans, I am confronted, yet again, with the brutality of my working conditions. My feet and legs throb and ache from sole …
Iran: unions and civil rights groups demand democracy and social justice: Women, life, freedom: protests against the oppression of Iranian women in Iran in Ottowa, Canada, September 2022. Taymaz Valley/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA Forty-four years after Iranians rose up against their hated monarch in February 1979, a group of 20 organisations engaged in long-term social …
These are the latest trending searches on Google right now: South African Federation of Trade Unions: : Daily Search Trends Have you tried: Visiting Port Elizabeth?
Rugby union’s financial crisis: why the sport’s model is ‘broken’: Philippe Montigny/Shutterstock As athletes, rugby union players are notoriously robust. But in England, the finances behind the sport are looking far from healthy. In the space of a few weeks, two of its most famous club teams, Worcester (founded 1871) and Wasps (1866), have gone …
Mozambican unions hit snooze on a national strike: why it’s a bad thing for workers: Trade unions in Mozambique have been weakened due to their proximity to the ruling party, Frelimo. Photo by Gianluigi Guercia/AFP via Getty Images The surge in food and fuel prices has led to calls for national shutdowns across southern Africa. …
Unions fight to secure better pay and conditions for workers, but they can also benefit employers: Employees and their organisations can gain from union membership, research shows. SFIO CRACHO/Shutterstock Over the past century, unions have successfully campaigned for a minimum wage, holiday and sickness pay, equal opportunity rights, maternity and paternity rights and a two-day …
What trade unions do and what joining one means: Union membership among young workers today is incredibly low. Industrial action scholars speak of a worldwide trend towards the so-called de-unionisation of the young. In 1980 80% of the British workforce was covered by collective bargaining between employers and unions. By the 2000s, that figure had …
Rail strikes: words used to describe unions misrepresent the truth about how they work: The UK could be facing a summer of strikes, but inaccurate language affects public understanding of how unions work. Gorodenkoff/Shutterstock Public discussion of pickets, politics and even profile pictures, have been a daily occurrence this week for Mick Lynch, the general …
The African Union’s Panel of the Wise: an unfulfilled promise?: The opening ceremony of an African Union session in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Eduardo Soteras/AFP via Getty Images In the first years after its launch in November 2007, the African Union’s Panel of the Wise was an important pillar of the African Peace and Security Architecture. …
The African Union’s conflict early warning system is no more. What now?: Police officers under the African Union. STUART PRICE/AFP via Getty Images Since 2017, the African Union (AU) has undergone institutional reforms to increase its efficiency and effectiveness. The gist of these reforms was proposed by the so-called Kagame Report commissioned by the AU …
How Zambian trade unions’ good intentions hurt workers: Zambia's mining industry is highly unionised but the unions are too weak to protect workers' interests. Getty Images In Zambia’s mining industry, wages and working conditions have consistently declined for 30 years. This is primarily because of changes to labour laws. Strikes have been banned, the subcontracting …
Why the African Union’s mediation effort in Tigray is a non-starter: Former Nigerian president General Olusegun Obasanjo. Photo by Jeff Overs/BBC News & Current Affairs via Getty Images The United Nations recognises mediation as one of the most effective methods of preventing, managing and above all, resolving conflicts. The UN guidelines underscore that the mediation …
South Africa in the news: The fragile peace between South Africa’s labour unions and the mining industry: Relations between organised labour and South Africa’s mining industry have, it would seem on the surface, never been better. After decades of intense class conflict, rooted in the grotesque …: “South Africa” – BingNews V&A Waterfront is not …
South Africa in the news: Salga, unions secure 3.5% salary increase: SA Local Government Association and unions have secured a multi-year salary and wage deal that will see employees receive a 3.5% increase over the next three …: “South Africa” – BingNews Premiership 2021-22: Saracens tipped for title challenge on return to top flight: How …