PLACING LEGITIMACY: ORGANISING RELIGIOUS SUPPORT IN A HOSPITAL WORKERS’ CONTRACT CAMPAIGN¹

Abstract

Religion‐labour alliances, like other faith‐based and religious organisations, raise questions about the invocation of religion to establish moral authority and political legitimacy in Western democracies. This paper argues that legitimacy should be understood as produced through spatio‐temporally contingent practices. The question of legitimacy is explored through a case study of the activities of a religion‐labour alliance in an urban hospital workers’ contract campaign. The paper traces the work of religion‐labour organising through the multiple space‐times of the campaign. As religion‐labour organising negotiates various habituses, attempting to legitimate itself as well as the union's struggle, it draws on not only religious discourses, but discourses of human rights, democratic deliberation, and social scientific evidence. The analysis is based on participant observation throughout the campaign, interviews with coalition members and other union staff, and internal documents and public reports from the campaign.

Enacting an Equitable Agenda: Exploring Community Strategies in Milwaukee's Inner-City Redevelopment1

“…Consequently, since the mid-1990s religionlabor alliances have formed in U.S. cities, mobilizing people of faith together with progressive organized labor in an effort to advocate for low-wage and immigrant workers' rights (Leitner et al, 2007b;Sziarto, 2008). Such efforts include building new interscalar connections, forming translocal networks, and extending organizing to the regional, national, and global scales (Leitner et al, 2007a;Sites et al, 2007;Parks and Warren, 2009).…”

“…14 The structure and tone of the open house were static, silent, and reinforcing of a lay public-expert divide, as the event consisted primarily of information displayed on posters and maps (DCD and WI DNR, 2008). However, in response to this unexpected and unfavorable spatial arrangement for facilitating substantive feedback or even interaction between residents and public officials, GJLN and MEA quickly altered their initial engagement trajectory toward an opposition one (Leitner et al, 2007a(Leitner et al, , 2007b, thereby directly challenging the government agencies' silencing agenda by reconfiguring and subverting the event's participatory space (e.g., see Sziarto, 2008). Some 50 residents-who attended the event entirely due to GJLN mobilizing efforts-departed the "poster" area, quickly gathering in the back of the room to strategize a new plan for ensuring meaningful engagement with agency representatives.…”

“…GJLN engaged in an additional manipulation of microspace within the city (Sziarto, 2008) to advocate for the Corridor's residents. In 2008 the Urban Economic Development Association (UEDA), in cooperation with DCD, organized the UEDA Quarterly Gathering.…”

The geographies of community‐oriented unionism: scales, targets, sites and domains of union renewal in South Africa and beyond

“…Such a shift does not necessarily increase the trade union’s membership directly, but it can serve to widen its political base through alliance‐building and coalitions. This has brought unions into contact with religious organisations, women’s movements, environmental justice groups and community‐based organisations (Sadler 2003; Sziarto 2008). In fact, an expanded domain of mobilisation often entails a new gender dynamic in the trade union organisation (Jepson 2005; Munro 1999).…”

“…Another step away from labour‐centrism can be seen in studies of union engagement with other civil society organisations (e.g. Sziarto 2008; Wills 2001) and those exploring the links between workers and consumers in global production chains (Hale and Wills 2007; Hartwick 1998; Johns and Vural 2000). Much of this literature looks at trade unions, which in different ways try to renew their strategies, often under unfavourable conditions.…”