My reading in 2019 was marked with the discovery of new Indigenous authors, the completion of some ambitious classics, and reading through a wide range of new authors, in French and English. As is becoming a tradition, I am sharing the bright spots that got me through the year.
Working people have been dealing with changes in the application of technology in their workplaces since the beginning of capitalism. The recent interest in the subject has largely been driven by the tech industry's promises of automated production and job-destroying robots, which will still somehow deliver a type of techno-Utopia. It is time for workers to take back the discussion and drive an agenda for the future based on clear analysis and the broader community's interests. In this full-length article, we revisit some of the issues and concepts around automation and its affects on workers.
Cette année, j'ai fait la grande découverte de Naomi Fontaine, auteure innue de la communauté de Uashat, sur la côte Nord du fleuve Saint-Laurent. Ses romans sont courts, mais percutants; remplis de tendresse et de sensibilité. Naomi Fontaine est un auteure qu'il faut lire en entier, en plus de s'engager à suivre tout ce qu'elle publie.
On October 16, there were 11 of us to walk up to Ontario Premier Doug Ford's constituency office in Etobicoke. Since his arrival to power 17 months ago, two workers have lost their lives in the same commercial bakery located a mere six minute drive from Ford's office.
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The dog days of summer saw a new development in what some are calling a new world-historical event, and not in a good way. It is the creation of Sidewalk Labs on the Toronto waterfront through an *innovative* (one hears this word a lot) and perhaps unholy alliance between the Alphabet subsidiary (Alphabet is both Google's and Sidewalk Labs' parent company) and an odd bird of municipal governance, Waterfront Toronto.
A version of this article was presented to the Canadian Federation of Students-Ontario 2018 general meeting. The domination of the neoliberal view for the previous nearly four decades has meant that all public spending has to be couched as supporting the private economy. Even for something as basic as higher education cannot be described as having an inherent value, it must be commodified and linked to some private sector profit. In the case of university, public funding is only available because it is part of the private sectors desire to have skilled workers. As such, a post-secondary education degree is only talked about as a pathway to a job, and not as a valuable process by itself.
The newly elected United Conservative Party under Jason Kenney announced in the speech from the throne that their main priority is to drive wages down for workers, remove protections for workers at work, defund their political opposition, and undermine future generations in Alberta and around the world. Bill 1 is to attack the environment – kicking them while they are down. Bill 2 is going to attack workers, their unions, wages, youth, and health & safety for employees.
It was just a question of time before the Ford government went after libraries. Of all the things that are going on in Ontario, it is so sad that we have to take up the fight to defend local library services.
Today is May Day, International Workers' Day. With roots in the workers' struggle for an 8-hour work day, this day has been marked for more than a century in countries across the world. May Day is a great day for socialists, labour organizers and agitators to draw connections between the workers' struggle under capitalism and the gains we have made in history. May Day is marked around the world with cultural celebrations and also protests where workers' rights are under attack.
