Where is the working class’ power? An interview with Peter Olney and John Womack

Peter Olney is a labor organizer of over half a century, long-time organizing director at the ILWU, and researcher on labor strategy. John Womack is a Harvard historian of the labor movement and the Mexican Revolution. In this episode they sit down with Ira and Rudy to discuss Peter and John’s 2023 book Labor, Power, and Strategy. They discuss the controversial approach of organizing workers in the choke points of production, what it will take to rebuild the labor movement, and new opportunities for working class internationalism.

John Womack’s original work Working Power over Production: Labor History, Industrial Work, Economics, Sociology, and Strategic Position was presented as a paper in its original English at the 2006 XIV International Economic History Congress in Helsinki, and is available in its entirety here. It is also available in Spanish as a published book with the name Posición estratégica y fuerza obrera. Hacia una nueva historia de los movimientos obreros .

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