LRAN 2015: Exploring Labor Research to Build Worker Power
Date: June 15th - 16th, 2015
Location: Georgetown Law Center, Washington, D.C
The Worker Institute is pleased to announce that the 2015 Labor Research and Action Network national conference, planned in part by Advisory Board member, Jeff Grabelsky, Co-Director of The Worker Institute, will be held June 15th and 16th at Georgetown Law Center in Washington, D.C. The Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor will host the conference, which will explore how labor unions and other worker-based organizations can effectively collaborate. The conference will examine methods of building worker power and advancing a new social movement in an economy where collective bargaining is imperiled, and where employer-employee relationships are increasingly fragmented. Scholars, labor practitioners and activists from across the country will convene to reflect on this core theme, share news ideas and lessons learned, and connect around research and campaign work.
This year we are organizing the conference around a set of four tracks:
- Developing New Membership Models and Sustainability (i.e., worker center/union collaborations, building membership in open shops, minority unionism)
- Innovating Campaign Strategies That Build Power (i.e., bridging racial and economic justice fights, strike strategies, supply chain organizing, coalition building, ‘common good’ bargaining)
- Advancing Worker Rights in a Changing Economy
- Holding Corporations Accountable (i.e., municipal finance reform, global coordination and solidarity, executive compensation, environmental coalition building)
We invite those interested to submit ideas that fit within at least one of the above tracks. We encourage a wide range of formats, including panels, workshops, trainings, film showings and strategy sessions. Submissions are due by March 6th. Proposals are being collected here.
2015 LRAN Conference Planning Committee:
- Jeff Grabelsky, The Worker Institute at Cornell University
- David Bensman, Rutgers University
- Paul Booth, AFSCME
- Jessica Cook, University of Illinois at Chicago
- Janice Fine, Rutgers University
- Sheena Foster
- Eric Geist, Department of Professional Employees, AFL-CIO
- Erin Johansson, Jobs With Justice
- Meg Lewis, AFSCME Council 31
- John Logan, San Francisco State University
- Dan Marschall, AFL-CIO
- Nancy Van Meter, American Federation of Teachers
- Cassandra Ogren, Teamsters
- Naomi Williams, Georgia Institute of Technology
- Lane Windham, University of Maryland
LRAN is a project of the Jobs With Justice Education Fund