Histories of Labour : National and International Perspectives

Contents: Notes on contributors. Preface. Introduction. 1. Organized labour history in Britain: 1750-1900/Joan Allen and Malcolm Chase. 3. Britain: The twentieth century/Alan Campbell and John Mcllroy. 4. Ireland/Emmet O’Connor and Conor McCabe. 5. The United States of America/Elizabeth Faue. 6. Canada/Bryan Palmer. 7. Australia/Greg Patmore. 8. Germany/Klaus Tenfelde. 9. India/Rana P. Behal, Chitra Joshi and Prabhu P. Mohapatra. 10. Japan/Takao Matsumura, John Mcllroy and Alan Campbell. 11. Labour history beyond borders/Marcel Van Der Linden. Index.

Provides a unique and authoritative survey of trends in labour history and historiographical developments around the world over the last fifty years; The essays are written by leading scholars from Britain, America, Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, Germany, India, Ireland and Japan. It is wide-ranging, meticulously documented an accessibly written.

This book asserts the importance of the lives, aspirations and actions of ordinary workers. Their history is as important for understanding the past as the activities of their rulers.

An indispensable volume for all historians of work, workers and organised labour, it will be immensely valuable to those engaged in labour movements who believe that, in the face of globalisation, labour\'s future depends on understanding its past in all its complexities. It is published to commemorate the creation of the Society for the Study of Labour History in 1960 which, as Eric Hobsbawm remembers in his Preface, made British labour history for a time the most globally influential in the field.