1. Precarization of Working Conditions in Toronto and San Salvador through 2010: Workers' Self-Organizing and Transnational Labour in Times of Crisis.
- Author
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Vance, Chris
- Subjects
- *
WORK environment , *FINANCIAL crises , *IMPERIALISM , *NEOLIBERALISM - Abstract
This article assesses worsening working conditions in San Salvador and Toronto through the crisis year of 2010, applying conceptual understandings of self-organizing, precarity, and transnational labour. Workers' self-organizing against precarization in both cities is informed by direct experiences of the gendered, racialized, and imperialist applications of neoliberalism and is thus an important site of resistance. San Salvador and Toronto, because of their particular positions in contemporary capitalism, represent two significant sites of workers struggle. Shaped by neoliberalization through structural adjustment policies and massive export of labour in San Salvador, and austerity policies and major labour-import practices in Toronto, workers are severely constrained and capitalists enriched. The article contends that workers' precarious labour, like that of transnational labour, is a central source of accumulation for renewed capitalist development. While the hyper-exploitation of this labour is crucial to global economic apartheid, workers' experiences against precarity contribute to a liberatory struggle. This article argues that workers' self-organizing against labour precarization is a powerful tool in their attempts to transform the gendered, racialized, and imperialist intensifications of neoliberalism. It gives workers greater agency in their resistance to capitalist domination, making the broader working class more active and effective protagonists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2012