Workers Rights & Displacement
Monday, February 25, 2008 at 5pm in Harper 130 [1116 E. 59th Street, Chicago, IL 60637]

Presented by
Students Organizing United with Labor (SOUL)

Abstract
Displacement is changing the geography of life, work and organizing for workers in Chicago and throughout the world. Plant closures force Mexican workers to leave their homes to pursue new jobs. Americans unable to afford property values or rents in the area around their work, face not only long commutes and less time with their families, but also the challenges of organizing a workforce scattered through the city. The South Side of Chicago, once physically and economically centered around the steel mills and meat-packing plants that employed thousands, has become an area that most leave to work and is now facing gentrification that will remove workers farther from transportation and resources. How do these shifts affect workers' ability to unionize and organizing strategies? What opportunities and problems are posed by the increased distances between work and home and rising worker mobility? Is displacement ultimately a workers' rights issue?



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