Rank-and-File Amazon Workers Can Organize Themselves
No simple trick will organize Amazon. A Chicago Amazon worker speaks on how long-term relationships and trust have allowed rank-and-file workers to flex their power on the warehouse floor.
Labor
Insurrection & Abolition: Ida B. Wells and the End of the Convict Lease System
Once slavery was abolished, capitalists rebuilt an industrialized South using a new form of racialized slavery: the convict lease system. It would take multi-racial insurrectionary action to ultimately abolish convict leasing.
Primed for Struggle: Organizing Inside Amazon
"We're not sitting around waiting for anyone to recognize us as a union in order to be or act as a union." An Amazon worker in Chicago talks to Rampant about what it will take to unionize the behemoth.
Why I’m Voting No on the CPS Plan
A teacher and CTU member makes the case for rejecting the unsafe reopening plan put forward by CPS and building on the brave actions that teachers have taken to reach this point.
School Reopenings, Late Night Pressers, and a Hostile Mayor
In last Friday’s press conference, where Mayor Lori Lightfoot attacked the Chicago Teachers Union, she undermined the efforts of those negotiating on behalf of CPS. Just what is she trying to accomplish?
Dill Pickle Workers Deserve Hazard Pay
Behind the friendly face of the Dill Pickle Food Co-op, workers laboring in dangerous pandemic conditions are being refused hazard pay by a vindictive management. The union is fighting back.
Close for Teaching, Open for Recovery
Public schools cannot be reopened safely during the current wave of the pandemic, but imagine what they could provide if they were repurposed to save lives, not endanger them.
Safe Return or No Return
A Chicago teacher describes the background to the current struggle against the mayor’s attempts to reopen schools as the pandemic rages.
We Have to Win for Each Other
Educators in North Carolina's Organize 2020 union caucus discuss how they are building membership and leadership through struggle.
Postal Power vs. Oligarchy
The USPS is the nervous system of democracy in the United States. It has won this round, but the long-running war against the postal service could have lasting consequences for this country.
Sever All Ties with Police Unions
In Chicago and everywhere, the social struggle to defund police departments is only hampered by labor's ties with police unions. A movement to sever ties will have to come from the rank and file.
Social Justice Educators Should Seize This Moment
The crisis induced by the global pandemic has presented a number of key questions to social justice educators around the country. Black Lives Matter at School leader Jesse Hagopian talks to Rampant about how to confront those challenges and build on recent waves of teacher organizing.
May Day Means Class Warfare
International Workers’ Day is rooted in Chicago-style class warfare. By remembering this history today, our movements are tapping into a subterranean fire.
Postal Workers and COVID-19
A Chicago-area letter carrier discusses the situation on the ground in the midst of the pandemic. In spite of widespread failures on the part of management, postal workers are organizing to win safer conditions for themselves and the public they serve.