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Problematizing Labour's Agency: Rescaling Collective Bargaining in British Columbia Pulp and Paper Mills
Author(s) -
Sweeney Brendan,
Holmes John
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
antipode
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.177
H-Index - 98
eISSN - 1467-8330
pISSN - 0066-4812
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8330.2012.00988.x
Subject(s) - restructuring , collective bargaining , agency (philosophy) , port (circuit theory) , trade union , sociology , economy , political economy , economics , political science , law , labour economics , social science , engineering , electrical engineering
This paper focuses on the contradictory nature and sometimes unintended consequences of workers’ efforts to defend particular communities against the ravages of capital restructuring. In the past decade, pattern collective bargaining in the highly unionized British Columbia pulp and paper industry has faced enormous strains due to intense industry restructuring. Our analysis focuses on the repercussions of actions taken by union locals in two British Columbia towns—Port Alice and Port Alberni—to try to secure the survival of their pulp and paper mills and, even in the case of Port Alice, the continued existence of the community. Our analysis resonates with recent debates surrounding worker agency as well as writing in the 1980s which addressed the often contradictory and problematic nature of workers’ struggles to “defend place”; writing largely neglected in more recent work in labour geography.