Worker organizing in the Global South: an experimental trend

Lynford Dor and Edward Webster

Chapter 37 in The Elgar Companion to Decent Work and the Sustainable Development Goals, 2025, pp 461-472 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: In this chapter we support calls for prioritising the themes of worker organising and organisational form in debates around decent work. We present two cases of worker organizing in the Global South. The first case looks at manufacturing workers in South Africa where precarious workers are fighting against harsh conditions and are looking for solutions to rebuild their associational power. The second case looks at boda boda riders - motorcycle riders - in Uganda. In this innovative case, informal workers joined a weakened public sector transport union, swelling its ranks. Our cases reveal that, workers are experimenting with different organizational forms and organizing strategies to build and rebuild their power from below. In doing so, we move beyond the ILO’s faith in social dialogue and the goodwill of capital, nation states and international financial institutions to imagine a project to fight for decent work from below.

Keywords: Business and Management; Development Studies; Economics and Finance; Sociology and Social Policy; Sustainable Development Goals (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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