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By Princess Charles
Work has always existed. At a communal level, work has existed to sustain the needs of communities and the development of societies. With the allocations of roles and duties amongst individuals, work has created a means of survival and livelihood collectively. However, this has been largely impacted and deterred by exploitative systems and practices that have negatively impacted life, climate, and the environment that's inhibited. Communities must revert to working in a way that is collective and inclusive. In doing so, communities redefine the meaning of work and how we can sustain all forms of life.
Exploitative systems have restructured work as the provision of profit for capitalists at the expense of the lower working classes. The lower working classes have been framed as disposable and replaceable beings who are viewed through their profitability and marketability rather than their identity, needs, and abilities. Hierarchical structures were formed to sustain the unequal distribution of financial resources and other essential support facilities to sustain life. In this way, the lower working classes are greatly objectified and disproportionately affected by the conditions that they are forced to navigate.
Capitalism, slavery, colonialism, and neoliberalism are some of the systems that consist of continuous exploitation through the perspective of ownership. This includes ownership of life and the environment, both of which face extremely hazardous conditions for the sake of monetary gain. Such practices consist of the erasure of cultural heritage and various forms of harm towards communities.
What all of these oppressive systems have done is create extremely harmful environments and conditions, resulting in loss of life, biodegradation, heightened climate events, and various forms of harm and injury. In the Caribbean, this has a significant impact on the development, safety, and livelihoods of communities. It has exacerbated risks to marginalized communities such as girls and women, persons with disabilities, and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC).
When one looks at the hierarchy of labor and labor production, there's a relationship that's portrayed. Climate Vanguard, a youth-led think tank empowering the youth climate movement to become a force of radical political-economic transformation, knows this quite well. Noah Herfort, Co-Director of Climate Vanguard, describes such a relationship:
"This is a buyer and seller relationship. The capitalist, who owns the means of production, uses the money to buy the worker’s labour power (the capacity to work). Alternatively, the worker, who owns nothing but their labour power, sells their labour power to the capitalist in exchange for money (a wage) that they use to buy the commodities necessary for their survival (housing, food, medicine, etc.).
In this sense, labour power is a commodity, a thing that is sold and bought. Moreover, this means that the capitalist has exclusive authority over what to do with this “commodity,” just like someone has the legal right to do what they please with an item of clothing they bought."
Human life has been perceived as an operational tool for profit generation which in turn disregards one's sense of humanity and existence outside of their labor. Although this has been understood amongst activist and advocacy groups and as much as there have been great strides towards labor justice, this perception remains a key factor in determining the value of workers globally.
Noah added, "We can begin to see how this twisted relationship leads to abusive working conditions. When treated like a commodity whose sole purpose is to produce profit for the capitalist, your rights and needs don’t matter. Now, of course, through decades of organized labour struggle, the working class has been able to win rights like the 8-hour working day, the weekend, and paid vacation but this doesn’t mean that mistreatment has been stamped out, precisely because labour power remains a commodity. That’s why worker mistreatment, whether it be unsafe working conditions, back-breaking labour intensity, wage theft, etc. continues."
The lens that has been viewed to sustain these systems must be destroyed and instead, looked through a feminist and collectivist one. It must disengage with harmful power dynamics and rediscover an equitable means of distribution. The question that has traveled throughout history is, "How can we further achieve that?"
Achieving this is no easy task, with many constraints and hurdles purposely intact to mitigate grander efforts toward labor justice. Learning from global successes and movements can foster collective growth and strengthen current movements. One group that can identify with both of these is the Miami Workers Center. Located in Miami-Dade County, this nonprofit organization builds power among working-class tenants, workers, women, and families. One characteristic is their advocacy for housing power and the intersection of labor rights — emphasizing the necessity of housing as a human right regardless of employability.
Credit: Miami Workers Center
Lizzie Suarez, Communications Manager at the Miami Workers Center has recognized in her line of work that workers are being exploited by employers who use threats, intimidation, and retaliation to discipline them for trying to speak up about wage theft, mistreatment, and poor conditions on the job.
In acknowledging low-wage workers who must navigate these spaces, she accounts for how their survival has been tied to harmful systems such as capitalism.
She said, "Under capitalism, our labor and how much we can be paid in wages for it is directly tied to our ability to pay for rent, food, care for our children, and all the other necessities to live in dignity. Many of us have been workers, or required to work for survival before we can even consciously reflect on it and what that means for us socially, politically."
Oppressive systems continue to negatively impact and harm lower-class workers on a global scale. An idea of how work must be has led to workers continually placing their lives at risk for their survival rather than for collective and self-care. What's happening in Miami-Dade and the U.S. to a greater extent is occurring in much similar ways in Caribbean countries such as Jamaica. In Kingston, Jamaica, changing the way communities work also involves understanding how oppressive systems have drastically affected their means of survival.
Judith Wedderburn, Board Director for WMW Jamaica has learned to identify with the impacts at a regional level. Ownership of human labor has been a prominent factor in the Caribbean. She has recognized how patriarchal and capitalist values have been indoctrinated throughout communities and greatly reflects on what sparked these events.
Credit: WMW Jamaica
Judith shared, "The plantation not only shaped economic relations but also physical, cultural, social, political, racial, and spiritual relations. The establishment and development of the plantation were grounded in exploitation, structures of inequality, and the mistreatment of workers as a “way of life”. These have major social implications through the interconnectedness of race, class, gender discrimination, gender relations and the rules which guided these relations which were established by plantation society."
Thinking of how work has shifted to a state of exploitation and mistreatment requires consideration of past events. Judith's recollection of labor on plantations brings a strong sense of who was considered the main driver for financial gain. Lower-class workers are the driving factors of production, the key contributors to capital, and the ongoing mode of profit generation for corporations.
Judith added, "The worker continues to be viewed/treated as an object to be exploited, as a factor of production, often with minimal investments in the worker, or with concerns for the workers’ human rights, as a human being. There was maximum expectation about the worker’s ability to contribute to the “bottom line”. This is particularly evident in the informal sector, where micro- and small businesses pay the lowest wage with no benefits, to workers who live in poverty, and have great needs, especially women with children and families to provide for."
The objectification of the working class remains an ongoing issue, with grander implications to the safety and care for workers, and the impact of environmental and climate conditions.
Sustainability under these systems can appear unachievable due to the many constraints that inhibit workers from giving thorough attention to eco-friendly initiatives and community-based projects for adaptation and mitigation strategies. If most of a worker's life is centered around their provision of labour for capitalist and corporate bodies, how can they make sufficient time for anything else? This is more than about achieving a "work-life balance" but rather, coming to terms with the reality that the means of work that they're engaged in shouldn't continue.
The debilitating, hazardous, and over-exerted means of work that persists is intentional. The effects of this are exacerbating risks for workers while causing the degradation of ecological spaces and heightening climate change through the burning of fossil fuels and various forms of pollution. Awareness of this amplified the concerns of worker advocacy groups and also the demands for policy recommendations and the involvement of eco-feminist groups. Advocating for workers' rights is a continuous battle and a holistic process, recognizing the many ways that harmful work practices severely impact all groups of life and the earth.
Credit: Markus Spiske
However, this is not a new development and such a battle has been going on for decades. Currently, groups such as Climate Vanguard, the Miami Workers Center, WMW Jamaica, and projects such as the WE-TALK Project for WMW Jamaica are actively working towards strengthening worker solidarity and providing resources for care and support.
For Climate Vanguard, redefining work has entailed restructuring working facilities to center workers' needs. Noah shared some of the organization’s initiatives:
"As we start to hire full-time staff, we are placing our focus on building a democratic work culture where team members can shape our common mission. We’re also building out organizational policies that enable parental and maternal leave, sick leave, ample holiday, and flexible hours. Of course, we encourage our team members to join a trade union."
In Miami-Dade, the Miami Workers Center is organizing care workers (nannies, house cleaners, home health aides) and working-class tenants and supporting them in understanding the rights they do have. They are inviting them to take action on campaigns that seek to win more rights and resources at the local level. They have also launched a joint campaign with "WeCount!" to win a Domestic Worker Bill of Rights in Miami-Dade County.
Credit: "WeCount!"
Much of these practices have been adopted regionally through organizations such as WMW Jamaica. Via the WE-TALK Project, Cecile Johnson Semaj, Project Manager, shared that some of their initiatives include the provision for each member of staff with a contract that clearly states the duties and responsibilities of the role they are engaged to perform, the assurance that the statutory taxes are paid over to the government, and the assurance of clean, non-discriminatory practices based on race, skin color, religion, sex, political opinion, social origin, and other grounds that could result in obstacles to inclusion in the labor force, and the assurance of a safe work environment with the appropriate tools to efficiently complete the assigned tasks. These are supported by worker legislation that reinforces the necessity of these obligations.
Through these efforts, workers are being recognized for their autonomy and needs. It is an inclusive approach toward labour justice, similar to it is for environmental and climate justice. These practices are redefining work to center the worker rather than profit. It is through this shift, that workers can be greater involved and represented in the decision-making processes and strategies towards development.
About the Author
Princess Avianne Charles is a Trinbagonian writer with articles in the fields of human rights, labour laws, and occupational safety and health. She is an advocate for labour rights, mental health, disability rights, and climate justice. With a degree in Occupational Safety and Health, she centres her work on providing safer spaces and risk-reduction strategies for communities and the environment.