Choke Points: Logistics Workers Disrupting the Global Supply Chain

Description

The global economy seems indomitable. Goods travel all over the globe, supplying just-in-time retail stocks, keeping consumers satisfied and businesses profitable.             But there are vulnerabilities, and Choke Points reveals them—and the ways that workers are finding ways to make use of the power that those choke points afford them. Exploring a number of case studies around the world, this book uncovers a little-known network of resistance by logistics workers worldwide who are determined to contest their exploitation by the forces of global capital. Through close accounts of wildcat strikes, roadblocks, and boycotts, from South China to Southern California, the contributors build a picture of a movement that flies under the radar, but carries the potential to force dramatic change.   Introduction: Forging Workers’ Resistance Across the Global Supply Chain by Jake Alimahomed-Wilson and Immanuel Ness PART I: BUILDING LABOR POWER AND SOLIDARITY ACROSS THE WORLD’S CHOKE POINTS 1. Labor and Social Movements’ Strategic Usage of the Global Commodity Chain Structure by Elizabeth A. Sowers, Paul S. Ciccantell, and David A. Smith 2. Across the Chain: Labor and Conflicts in the European Maritime Logistics Sector by Andrea Bottalico 3. Durban Dockers, Labor Internationalism, and Pan-Africanism by Peter Cole PART II: DISRUPTIONS: LOGISTICS WORKERS RESISTING EXPLOITATION 4. Worker Militancy and Strikes in China’s Docks by Bai Ruixue and Au Loong Yu 5. “Work Hard, Make History”: Oppression and Resistance in Inland Southern California’s Warehouse and Distribution Industry by Ellen Reese and Jason Struna 6. Stop Treating Us Like Dogs! Workers Organizing Resistance at Amazon in Poland by Amazon workers and supporters 7. Decolonizing Logistics: Palestinian Truckers on the Occupied Supply Chain by Jake Alimahomed-Wilson and Spencer Louis Potiker PART III: NEOLIBERALISM AND THE GLOBAL TRANSFORMATION OF PORTS 8. Decoding the Transition in the Ports of Mumbai by Johnson Abhishek Minz 9. Back to Piraeus: Precarity for All! by Dimitris Parsanoglou and Carolin Philipp 10. Contested Logistics? Neoliberal Modernization and Resistance in the Port City of Valparaíso by Jorge Budrovich Sáez and Hernán Cuevas Valenzuela 11. Logistics Workers’ Struggles in Turkey: Neoliberalism and Counterstrategies by Çağatay Edgücan Şahin and Pekin Bengisu Tepe PART IV: NEW ORGANIZING STRATEGIES FOR THE GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAIN 12. “The Drivers Who Move This Country Can Also Stop It”: The Struggle of Tanker Drivers in Indonesia by Abu Mufakhir, Alfian Al’ayubby Pelu, and Fahmi Panimbang 13. Lessons Learned from Eight Years of Experimental Organizing in Southern California’s Logistics Sector by Sheheryar Kaoosji 14. Struggles and Grassroots Organizing in an Extended European Choke Point by Carlotta Benvegnù and Niccolò Cuppini 15. Beyond the Waterfront: Maintaining and Expanding Worker Power in the Maritime Supply Chain by Peter Olney