Palermo's workers strike
Submitted by andr00 on Jun 4 2012 23:50
The people who make our frozen pizzas are on strike.
Beginning on Friday, June 1st, 2012, approximately 120 workers at Palermo's, a frozen pizza factory in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, went on strike demanding that their union, the Palermo's Workers Union, be recognized so that they can obtain higher wages and benefits. At 8 am.
Why M1GS?: lessons from Wisconsin
A piece from a union staffer in Wisconsin who saw the movement go from the potential of a general strike to just a recall, and how we should remember this in Occupy's efforts for a May 1st general strike.
A year ago, the original 21st century “Occupy” occurred in the United States - at the State Capitol in Madison, Wisconsin. Scott Walker, Tea Party, Koch-funded governor sought to eliminate collective bargaining of public workers. The unions erupted, thousands stormed the building and did not leave for two weeks.
The general strike that didn't happen: a report on the activity of the IWW in Wisconsin
This is a report written by two IWW organizers from out of state on the activities of the union during the height of the protests in Madison and Wisconsin. The version is slightly modified from a text sent to the 2011 Delegate Convention and reflects the opinion of the authors.
Shortly before Valentine’s day of 2011, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker announced a budget bill which, along with a package of severe neoliberal cuts to social services, took the unprecedented measure of effectively outlawing unions for state or municipal employees.
More on Madison - Insurgent Notes
The following letter synthesizes two e-mails from a comrade, AS, about some disagreements with Loren Goldner’s article on Madison in IN No. 3
I don’t think I was criticizing what you wrote that sharply. I do remember mentioning that one of the first groups out there was the Latino “Immigrant Workers Union” which is a coalition to draw attention to things that affect Latinos in the Madison. In Milwaukee the mood was much different than in Madison.
Wisconsin: What now?
Submitted by Juan Conatz on Jun 19 2011 07:55
An update on what's happened in Wisconsin since early April.
Last week, the Wisconsin Supreme Court overruled a lower judge's injunction against the collective bargaining law, allowing it to go into effect at the end of this month. The budget bill also passed the assembly and senate, marking it a twin defeat for the movement here that emerged in February.
2011 Wisconsin protests
Submitted by Juan Conatz on Jun 19 2011 04:52
Pictures from the protests in response response to the Wisconsin Governor's proposed bill that would eliminate collective bargaining for public sector employees, among other things.
Early Spring for the Badger
Early Spring for the Badger is a collection of anonymously written notes on the Wisconsin February – March 2011 Struggle against Austerity Measures. Contained is a collection of communiques and actions, reflections on the struggle, critique concerning the themes of democracy, race, policing, madness, and violence, and propositions for a revolutionary strategy within the global anti-austerity struggle.
Early Spring for the Badger is a collection of anonymously written notes on the Wisconsin February – March 2011 Struggle against Austerity Measures.
On, Wisconsin - Paul Mattick Jr.
In the aftermath of the recent struggle in Wisconsin, Paul Mattick Jr. analyses the historical background to the rise and the current curtailing of the unions in the US and the attacks on the working and living conditions that are happening alongside this.
March’s civic strife in Wisconsin, with citizens and workers in the hundred-thousands protesting anti-union legislation passed by the Republican-dominated state government, suggests that, at long last, the spirit of rebellion may be migrating even to our politically somnolent shores.
The Power of Working Class Solidarity
Pamphlet by the Madison IWW branch. Intended as a follow-up to Kill the Bill:The Power of a General Strike.
What Do We Face?
The Beloit Iron Works and the submergence of class struggle
Submitted by tastybrain on Apr 28 2011 10:09
The history of class struggle in the Beloit Iron Works and how the company responded to it and kept it to a minimum.
This paper concerns class struggle---or its absence---in a factory in one American town. The Beloit Iron Works, or the Beloit Corporation as it was known after 1962, was a company founded in the late nineteenth century that primarily manufactured paper-making machines and was the leader in its industry.
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