A examination of the politics of gender in the auto industry and in the labor movement from 1937 to 1979 in southern Ontario. Discusses women's roles in the United Automobile Workers, industrial restructuring and the UAW women's struggle for equality, and relationships between women in the workplace. Paper edition (unseen), $19.95. Canadian call number: C94-931771-3. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

For thirty years the Labour Party was wracked by conflict over membership of the European Community, swinging back and forth, pro and anti, when in and out of office. It was a conflict that helped keep the party in opposition for eighteen years until it abandoned its socialist basis under New Labour. The author as journalist and European Union official knew many of the major and minor players and brings this experience to bear.

In Putin's Labor Dilemma, Stephen Crowley investigates how the fear of labor protest has inhibited substantial economic transformation in Russia. Putin boasts he has the backing of workers in the country's industrial heartland, but as economic growth slows in Russia, reviving the economy will require restructuring the country's industrial landscape. At the same time, doing so threatens to generate protest and instability from a key regime constituency. However, continuing to prop up Russia's Soviet-era workplaces, writes Crowley, could lead to declining wages and economic stagnation, threatening protest and instability. Crowley explores the dynamics of a Russian labor market that generally avoids mass unemployment, the potentially explosive role of Russia's monotowns, conflicts generated by massive downsizing in "Russia's Detroit" (Tol'yatti), and the rapid politicization of the truck drivers movement. Labor protests currently show little sign of threatening Putin's hold on power, but the manner in which they are being conducted point to substantial chronic problems that will be difficult to resolve. Putin's Labor Dilemma demonstrates that the Russian economy must either find new sources of economic growth or face stagnation. Either scenario—market reforms or economic stagnation—raises the possibility, even probability, of destabilizing social unrest.

Labour stands at a decisive point in its history. A change of leadership can help reinvigorate the party, but winning a fourth term of government will be impossible unless Labour's ideological position and policy outlook are thoroughly refurbished. What form should these innovations take?

Originally published in 1996, Workers’ Dilemmas analyses the management skills of those with least resources, the women of the urban poor, and finds that there is an abundance of evidence on the high levels of managerial competence within this group. It is information which has largely been hidden from history. This study of poor women’s involvement in the world of work corrects this missing record. For over a century (1850–1960s), women and children travelled from their urban homes in the East End of London to work in the hop picking fields of Kent and Hampshire. The scale of the annual migration and the complexity of neighbourhood and household organization it required to provide this volume of labour have escaped the literature. Drawing on a variety of historical records and on oral history, this book explores the high level of management and occupational skills possessed by the urban poor in their construction of household survival strategies. Above all this book highlights the key entrepreneurial role played by women in this labour market and the importance of the financial support provided by this regular seasonal labour for household survival. Workers’ Dilemmas provides a fresh look at how work patterns, family structure and community networks interrelate and in the process challenges accepted ideas in the wider fields of anthropology and the sociology of work.

An anthropological study of a major national political party - one which dominated Israeli politics for nearly five decades and was returned to office in summer 1992. The analysis focuses on the relationship between culture and politics to explain the crucial role the Labour Party has played.

Britain’s first Labour government took office on 22 January 1924. Its centenary provides an opportunity to reassess the party's performance over the last 100 years, and with an election pending, the character and purpose of the modern party. Labour defined the dominant political settlement of much of the Twentieth Century: the welfare state. It has achieved much in pursuit of material change, social reform and equality. It has challenged patriarchy, racism and the legacy of imperialism, promoted human rights and delivered democratic and constitutional renewal. Yet any honest assessment must acknowledge a century littered with failures and missed opportunities. In this compelling book, Jon Cruddas, one of the country's foremost experts on Labour politics, details the vivid personalities and epic factional battles, the immense achievements and profound disappointments that define a century of Labour. Uniquely framed around competing visions of socialist justice within the Party, he provides a way to rethink Labour history, the divisions and factions on the left and to reassess key figures at the helm of the movement from Keir Hardie through to Keir Starmer.