Solidarity Transformed - by Mark S Anner (Hardcover)

About the Book

How Latin American labor unions are developing new strategies to defend workers' interests in a global economy.

Book Synopsis

Mark S. Anner spent ten years working with labor unions in Latin America and returned to conduct eighteen months of field research: he found himself in the middle of violent raids, was detained and interrogated in a Salvadoran basement prison cell, and survived a bombing in a union cafeteria. This experience as a participant observer informs and enlivens Solidarity Transformed, an illustrative, nuanced, and insightful account of how labor unions in Latin America are developing new strategies to defend the interests of the workers they represent in dynamic global and local contexts. Anner combines in-depth case studies of the auto and apparel industries in El Salvador, Honduras, Brazil, and Argentina with survey analysis. Altogether, he documents approximately seventy labor campaigns--both successful and failed--over a period of twenty years.

Anner finds that four labor strategies have dominated labor campaigns in recent years: transnational activist campaigns; transnational labor networks; radical flank mechanisms; and microcorporatist worker-employer pacts. The choice of which strategy to pursue is shaped by the structure of global supply chains, access to the domestic political process, and labor identities. Anner's multifaceted approach is both rich in anecdote and supported by quantitative research. The result is a book in which labor activists find new and creative ways to support their members and protect their organizations in the midst of political change, global restructuring, and economic crises.

Review Quotes

Solidarity Transformed is one of the first studies of labor politics in less developed countries that systematically incorporates the transnational dimension. Anner has done a tremendous amount of fieldwork, and this comes across in his intimate knowledge not only of particular countries but also of firms and unions. The book also serves to chart an agenda for future scholars of labor and other social movements.... It is a major contribution to the literature on labor politics, globalization and state-society relations. The book deserves to be widely read.

Anner's book is an informative, rich analysis of labor movements, successful and unsuccessful, in Latin America.... Anner carefully combines theory and case-study analysis to reveal what techniques were successful or not in the context of each industry and country.... His years of primary fieldwork and in-country experiences add richness to the analysis... [and] his conclusions are generalizable beyond Latin America and the industries examined.... Highly recommended.

Anner's theoretical contributions [to the literature on labor solidarity] alone would be enough to recommend the book, but what makes Solidarity Transformed a truly unique work are Anner's personal experiences as an international trade union activist, primarily in El Salvador in the 1980s and 1990s.... His role as a participant-observer gives the book a level of urgency and engagement rarely seen in scholarly works.

The book adds to a body of literature... that explores new strategies for organized labour within the context of a global economy often hostile to union organization.... He admirably demonstrates the costs of persistent division within organized labour, long-standing political schisms having been exacerbated by the segmentation initiated by transnational production regimes.

About the Author

Mark S. Anner is Assistant Professor of Labor Studies and Political Science at The Pennsylvania State University, University Park.