Despite constitutions that enshrine equality, until recently every state in Latin America permitted longer working hours (in some cases more than double the hours) and lower benefits for domestic workers than other workers. This has, in effect, subsidized a cheap labor force for middle- and upper-class families and enabled well-to-do women to enter professional labor markets without having to negotiate household and care work with their male partners. While elite resistance to reform has b...

In 2020, as Latin American countries shuttered their economies, it became clear that effective lockdowns would require states to provide income support. In a region that has historically struggled to build systems of social protection, the effort to expand benefits was notable. Policies varied in scope and generosity, but in what seemed to signify a new era of state-building, Latin American democracies demonstrated a nearly uniform commitment to providing assistance to the poor. Why did so...

This book analyzes the problems that arise when women's rights conflict with the views of conservative organized religion.Specifically, it addresses the legalization - or lack thereof - of divorce and abortion in three recently democratized Catholic countries: Spain, Chile, and Argentina. Offering a vital and timely contribution to political debates on democratic consolidation, social policy, gender, politics and religion, it challenges many of the accepted assumptions and conclusi...

The relationship between socioeconomic inequality and democratic politics has been one of the central questions in the social sciences from Aristotle on. Recent waves of democratization, combined with deepened global inequalities, have made understanding this relationship ever more crucial. In The Great Gap, Merike Blofield seeks to contribute to this understanding by analyzing inequality and politics in the region with the highest socioeconomic inequalities in the world: Latin Am...

SHADOWBOSSES reads like an organized crime novel, but it's actually a true story of how labor unions are infiltrating our government and corrupting our political process. This compelling and insightful book exposes how unions have organized federal, state, and local government employees without their consent, and how government employee unions are now a threat to our workers' freedoms, our free and fair elections, and even our American way of life. And, Mallory Factor reveals what's coming...

In modern Britain, the working class has become an object of fear and ridicule. From Little Britain’s Vicky Pollard to the demonization of Jade Goody, media and politicians alike dismiss as feckless, criminalized and ignorant a vast, underprivileged swathe of society whose members have become stereotyped by one, hate-filled word: chavs.In this acclaimed investigation, Owen Jones explores how the working class has gone from “salt of the earth” to “scum of the earth.” Exposi...

'Hasn't it been a full life, Lillie, and isn't this a good end?', were James Connolly's last words to his wife in Dublin Castle in the early hours of 12 May 1916 just before his execution for his part in leading the Easter Rising. James Connolly, the son of Irish immigrants, was born in Edinburgh. The first fourteen years of his life were spent in Edinburgh and the next seven years in the King's Liverpool Regiment in Ireland. In 1889, he returned to Edinburgh where he was a socialist activ...

On Friday, December 10, 2010, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders walked on to the floor of the United States Senate and began speaking. It turned out to be a very long speech, lasting over eight and a half hours. And it hit a nerve. Millions followed the speech online until the traffic crashed the Senate server. A huge, positive grassroots response tied up the phones in the senator's offices in Vermont and Washington. President Obama reportedly held an impromptu press conference with former Pr...

John W. Budd's The Thought of Work provides a much needed and highly eloquent statement of the meanings and orientations to work across time and nations. It is essential reading for students of work from senior scholars to beginning undergraduates.— Randy Hodson, Distinguished Professor of Social and Behavioral Sciences The Ohio State University and past editor ― American Sociological ReviewBy drawing explicit attention to diverse, implici...

"Culture and Anarchy" is a series of periodical essays by Matthew Arnold, first published in Cornhill Magazine 1867-68 and collected as a book in 1869. The whole scope of the essay is to recommend culture as the great help out of our present difficulties; culture being a pursuit of our total perfection by means of getting to know, on all the matters which most concern us, the best which has been thought and said in the world, and, through this knowledge, turning a stream of fresh and free ...

Scheduling staff shifts is a difficult task. In organizations that work on Sundays, and/or on public holidays, and/or during night hours, scheduling shifts accurately and efficiently is a time consuming job, and it also exposes employers to the risk of excessive overtime costs and poor distribution of workload among employees.In order to be efficient, anyone who has the task of planning the activities of an organization must learn to perform two activities that are interconnected bu...

The political scene is changing rapidly in America. The religious right is on the defensive, acceptance of gay rights is at an all-time high, social conservatives are struggling for relevance, and more Americans than ever identify as nonreligious. What does this mean for the country and the future? With these demographic shifts, can truly progressive, reason-based public policy finally gain traction? Or will America continue to carry a reputation as anti-intellectual and plutocratic, eager...