Global Labour History : A State of the Art

The recent wave of globalization has a profound impact on labour. Consequently, research in the field of labour and working-class history has become less Eurocentric and more global over the last twenty years. Outstanding specialists take stock of the globalization of the field in eighteen essays. Two introductory essays discuss the theoretical consequences of this development as well as the early historiography of labour and working-class history. Next, ten essays provide an exceptionally complete coverage of recent historiographical trends in the labour history of Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, China, Japan, and Australasia. Finally, six case studies research worldwide and comparative aspects of global labour history, developing best practices in this new and difficult field. They include a wide variety of occupations and economic sectors: agricultural labour, domestic labour, brick making, coal mining and the work done in the docks and on the railways on different continents.

The recent wave of globalization has a profound impact on labour. Consequently, research in the field of labour and working-class history has become less Eurocentric and more global over the last twenty years. Outstanding specialists take stock of the globalization of the field in eighteen essays. Two introductory essays discuss the theoretical consequences of this development as well as the early historiography of labour and working-class history. Next, ten essays provide an exceptionally complete coverage of recent historiographical trends in the labour history of Western Europe, Eastern Europe, North America, South America, Africa, the Middle East, South Asia, China, Japan, and Australasia. Finally, six case studies research worldwide and comparative aspects of global labour history, developing best practices in this new and difficult field. They include a wide variety of occupations and economic sectors: agricultural labour, domestic labour, brick making, coal mining and the work done in the docks and on the railways on different continents.