Working-class environmentalism in the UK – Organising for sustainability beyond the workplace

Bell, Karen

Abstract

The labour movement has increasingly articulated the necessity to engage workers in the transition to sustainability (e.g. Labor4sustainability, Mission Statement of the Labor Network for Sustainability, 2017). Workplace mobilisation is vitally important, but to achieve a more effective and equitably, efforts will also need to be made to marshal working-class communities beyond the workplace. This chapter, therefore, considers how trade unions can join forces with those not currently engaged with mainstream labour unionism. Drawing on examples of community environmentalism and the author’s personal experience as a community development worker, the chapter outlines actual and potential actions of joint solidarity, and the barriers that will need to be overcome. In particular, it discusses ‘joint health and safety campaigns’, ‘community unionism’ and ‘socially useful production’ as examples of actual and potential environmental organising successes within and beyond the workplace.

• Online Publication Date: Aug 30, 2021
• Publication Date: Aug 31, 2021
• Deposit Date: Feb 14, 2021
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan (part of Springer Nature)
• Pages: 441-463
• Edition: 1st
• Book Title: The Palgrave Handbook of Environmental Labour Studies
• Chapter Number: 19
• ISBN: 9783030719081
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-71909-8_19
• Keywords: Community unionism; Environmental justice; Sustainability; Class; Community development; Health
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/7094567
• Publisher URL: https://www.palgrave.com/gb/book/9783030719081
• Contract Date: Dec 1, 2020