Scott L. Cummings
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- February 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780190215927
- eISBN:
- 9780190936839
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190215927.003.0007
- Subject:
- Law, Employment Law, Legal Profession and Ethics
This concluding chapter considers how local movements to make Los Angeles a more equal place—one in which marginalized workers have greater protections, better wages and benefits, and a larger voice ...
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This concluding chapter considers how local movements to make Los Angeles a more equal place—one in which marginalized workers have greater protections, better wages and benefits, and a larger voice in the workplace and politics—have depended on a new generation of lawyers, embedded in local networks and committed to local action, who have negotiated an equal place of their own in advancing economic justice campaigns. It does so by exploring the larger contributions of the book’s five case studies: assessing what they teach about the meaning of equality both as a process and an outcome of legal advocacy in the contemporary American metropolis. To do so, the chapter offers two perspectives on local legal mobilization, one empirical and the other theoretical. First, from an empirical perspective, it synthesizes evidence from the case studies to evaluate the central role that lawyers have played in the struggle for economic justice in Los Angeles—and how their leadership has contributed to regulatory change strengthening workers’ economic rights and political representation. Second, from a theoretical perspective, the chapter reflects on the book’s lessons for the study of lawyering, labor, and local government law, drawing attention to how the L.A. campaigns inform critical normative aspirations within each field—the possibility of reviving progressive lawyering to address the challenges of neoliberalism, rehabilitating federal labor law to contest economic inequality, and reimagining local government law as a catalyst for national reform.Less
This concluding chapter considers how local movements to make Los Angeles a more equal place—one in which marginalized workers have greater protections, better wages and benefits, and a larger voice in the workplace and politics—have depended on a new generation of lawyers, embedded in local networks and committed to local action, who have negotiated an equal place of their own in advancing economic justice campaigns. It does so by exploring the larger contributions of the book’s five case studies: assessing what they teach about the meaning of equality both as a process and an outcome of legal advocacy in the contemporary American metropolis. To do so, the chapter offers two perspectives on local legal mobilization, one empirical and the other theoretical. First, from an empirical perspective, it synthesizes evidence from the case studies to evaluate the central role that lawyers have played in the struggle for economic justice in Los Angeles—and how their leadership has contributed to regulatory change strengthening workers’ economic rights and political representation. Second, from a theoretical perspective, the chapter reflects on the book’s lessons for the study of lawyering, labor, and local government law, drawing attention to how the L.A. campaigns inform critical normative aspirations within each field—the possibility of reviving progressive lawyering to address the challenges of neoliberalism, rehabilitating federal labor law to contest economic inequality, and reimagining local government law as a catalyst for national reform.
Katherine Stone and Scott Cummings
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199693610
- eISBN:
- 9780191729744
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199693610.003.0018
- Subject:
- Law, Employment Law, Philosophy of Law
Activism by labor and community coalitions at the local level is redefining labor law in the United States. Despite a drastic decline in union density and power in the United States, labor and ...
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Activism by labor and community coalitions at the local level is redefining labor law in the United States. Despite a drastic decline in union density and power in the United States, labor and community alliances have emerged at the local level that seek to influence labor conditions outside of the traditional collective bargaining framework. Unions and their community allies in some cities have had success in securing living wages, job training, local hiring preferences, workplace safety protections, health insurance benefits, and even job security for local workers. These achievements have been built on a new legal foundation: local government law. Labor-community alliances have leveraged different facets of local government power — contracting, land use, and general regulatory power — to achieve labor objectives through local ordinances and negotiated community benefit agreements. This chapter describes some of the ways in which these new labor-community alliances have exercised power at the local level. It pays particular attention to Los Angeles where local labor activism has achieved a series of remarkable successes through the robust use of local governmental levers. The chapter then addresses the question of whether, and to what extent, local labor initiatives can provide an adequate substitute for, or enhancement of, labor power at the national level.Less
Activism by labor and community coalitions at the local level is redefining labor law in the United States. Despite a drastic decline in union density and power in the United States, labor and community alliances have emerged at the local level that seek to influence labor conditions outside of the traditional collective bargaining framework. Unions and their community allies in some cities have had success in securing living wages, job training, local hiring preferences, workplace safety protections, health insurance benefits, and even job security for local workers. These achievements have been built on a new legal foundation: local government law. Labor-community alliances have leveraged different facets of local government power — contracting, land use, and general regulatory power — to achieve labor objectives through local ordinances and negotiated community benefit agreements. This chapter describes some of the ways in which these new labor-community alliances have exercised power at the local level. It pays particular attention to Los Angeles where local labor activism has achieved a series of remarkable successes through the robust use of local governmental levers. The chapter then addresses the question of whether, and to what extent, local labor initiatives can provide an adequate substitute for, or enhancement of, labor power at the national level.
James M. Beeby
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- March 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781604730012
- eISBN:
- 9781604733242
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781604730012.003.0010
- Subject:
- History, Political History
This chapter discusses the demise of the People’s Party between 1899 and 1901. Democrats in the state legislature sought to permanently defeat the Populist Party and end the opportunity for the ...
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This chapter discusses the demise of the People’s Party between 1899 and 1901. Democrats in the state legislature sought to permanently defeat the Populist Party and end the opportunity for the triumph of cooperation by overturning cooperationists’ election law and local government law. They also introduced a law to put before the voters of North Carolina a constitutional amendment redefining the right of suffrage.Less
This chapter discusses the demise of the People’s Party between 1899 and 1901. Democrats in the state legislature sought to permanently defeat the Populist Party and end the opportunity for the triumph of cooperation by overturning cooperationists’ election law and local government law. They also introduced a law to put before the voters of North Carolina a constitutional amendment redefining the right of suffrage.
Scott L. Cummings
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- February 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780190215927
- eISBN:
- 9780190936839
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190215927.003.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Employment Law, Legal Profession and Ethics
Chapter 1 introduces the book’s goals, methods, and contributions. It sets forth the book’s central aim—to deepen scholarship on lawyers and social movements by closely attending to the richness and ...
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Chapter 1 introduces the book’s goals, methods, and contributions. It sets forth the book’s central aim—to deepen scholarship on lawyers and social movements by closely attending to the richness and complexity of contemporary practice at the local level—and then describes the L.A. low-wage worker organizing campaigns through which this aim is pursued. The campaigns are situated within theoretical perspectives on movement lawyering, labor studies, and local government law, and then placed in historical context. Tracing the history of Los Angeles’s economic and political transformation—from the postwar era to the 1992 civil unrest sparked by the Rodney King verdict through the 2008 recession—the chapter shows how the campaigns grew out of trends producing greater inequality while also creating the organizational foundation of community–labor activism to challenge it. The concluding section provides a demographic overview of the industries targeted by the L.A. campaigns—garment, day labor, retail, hospitality, grocery, and trucking—and a road map of the chapters that follow.Less
Chapter 1 introduces the book’s goals, methods, and contributions. It sets forth the book’s central aim—to deepen scholarship on lawyers and social movements by closely attending to the richness and complexity of contemporary practice at the local level—and then describes the L.A. low-wage worker organizing campaigns through which this aim is pursued. The campaigns are situated within theoretical perspectives on movement lawyering, labor studies, and local government law, and then placed in historical context. Tracing the history of Los Angeles’s economic and political transformation—from the postwar era to the 1992 civil unrest sparked by the Rodney King verdict through the 2008 recession—the chapter shows how the campaigns grew out of trends producing greater inequality while also creating the organizational foundation of community–labor activism to challenge it. The concluding section provides a demographic overview of the industries targeted by the L.A. campaigns—garment, day labor, retail, hospitality, grocery, and trucking—and a road map of the chapters that follow.
Scott L. Cummings
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780262036986
- eISBN:
- 9780262343213
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262036986.003.0005
- Subject:
- Political Science, Public Policy
This chapter analyses the policy campaign to change LA law to reform the port trucking industry by requiring clean fuel trucks operated by employee drivers.
This chapter analyses the policy campaign to change LA law to reform the port trucking industry by requiring clean fuel trucks operated by employee drivers.
Scott L. Cummings
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780262036986
- eISBN:
- 9780262343213
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262036986.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Public Policy
This chapter outlines the regulatory framework within which the ports operate, highlighting the relation between the ports as local government entities and federal labor and environmental regulatory ...
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This chapter outlines the regulatory framework within which the ports operate, highlighting the relation between the ports as local government entities and federal labor and environmental regulatory schemes.Less
This chapter outlines the regulatory framework within which the ports operate, highlighting the relation between the ports as local government entities and federal labor and environmental regulatory schemes.
Scott L. Cummings
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- February 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780190215927
- eISBN:
- 9780190936839
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190215927.001.0001
- Subject:
- Law, Employment Law, Legal Profession and Ethics
This book is about the role of lawyers in the movement to challenge economic inequality in one of America’s most unequal cities: Los Angeles. Covering a transformative period of city history—from the ...
More
This book is about the role of lawyers in the movement to challenge economic inequality in one of America’s most unequal cities: Los Angeles. Covering a transformative period of city history—from the 1992 riots to the 2008 recession—the book examines how law has been used, and what it has achieved, in the struggle to make Los Angeles a more equal place. The backdrop is the dramatic growth of low-wage work powered by global outsourcing, declining unionism, increasing labor contingency, and surging immigration. The book’s narrative focus is on five pivotal campaigns in which lawyers allied with the city’s dynamic labor, immigrant rights, and environmental movements mobilize law to transform key sectors of the regional economy. These campaigns, analyzed through in-depth case studies, reveal how law has shaped low-wage work in Los Angeles—and at times provided a potent weapon to contest it. Drawing upon archival research, extensive interviews with key actors, and a review of court files, this book explores the role of lawyers in defining the city as a space for redefining work. Challenging critical accounts of lawyers in social movements, its central claim is that by advancing an innovative model of legal mobilization, the L.A. campaigns have achieved meaningful regulatory reform, while strengthening the position of workers in the field of local politics. Through multidimensional advocacy to promote worker organizing, lawyers and activists have succeeded in converting policy change into greater interest group power—forging a new model of progressive city-building for the twenty-first century.Less
This book is about the role of lawyers in the movement to challenge economic inequality in one of America’s most unequal cities: Los Angeles. Covering a transformative period of city history—from the 1992 riots to the 2008 recession—the book examines how law has been used, and what it has achieved, in the struggle to make Los Angeles a more equal place. The backdrop is the dramatic growth of low-wage work powered by global outsourcing, declining unionism, increasing labor contingency, and surging immigration. The book’s narrative focus is on five pivotal campaigns in which lawyers allied with the city’s dynamic labor, immigrant rights, and environmental movements mobilize law to transform key sectors of the regional economy. These campaigns, analyzed through in-depth case studies, reveal how law has shaped low-wage work in Los Angeles—and at times provided a potent weapon to contest it. Drawing upon archival research, extensive interviews with key actors, and a review of court files, this book explores the role of lawyers in defining the city as a space for redefining work. Challenging critical accounts of lawyers in social movements, its central claim is that by advancing an innovative model of legal mobilization, the L.A. campaigns have achieved meaningful regulatory reform, while strengthening the position of workers in the field of local politics. Through multidimensional advocacy to promote worker organizing, lawyers and activists have succeeded in converting policy change into greater interest group power—forging a new model of progressive city-building for the twenty-first century.
Scott L. Cummings
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780262036986
- eISBN:
- 9780262343213
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- The MIT Press
- DOI:
- 10.7551/mitpress/9780262036986.001.0001
- Subject:
- Political Science, Public Policy
This book is about the struggle over the future of work and the environment on the edge of the global economy. It traces the history of conflict in an industry that is not widely known, but sits at ...
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This book is about the struggle over the future of work and the environment on the edge of the global economy. It traces the history of conflict in an industry that is not widely known, but sits at the epicentre for the global supply chain: short-haul trucking responsible for moving the mass of imports from enormous cargo ships to warehouses and retailers around the country. The book’s specific focus is on the largest and most important campaign at the nation’s largest and most important port complex, which straddles the border of Los Angeles and Long Beach, California. Over nearly two decades, labor and environmental groups—bound together in a pivotal “blue-green” alliance—carried forward a monumental campaign to transform working conditions for drivers and environmental conditions for communities. At bottom, the book tells a story of the unceasing resolve of courageous people seeking to make lives better for some of the most marginalized members of society: immigrant truck drivers barely scrapping by as they deliver goods to be sold by some of the richest and most powerful companies in the world; residents of neighbourhoods whose poverty consigns them to inhale the noxious residue of global trade. How law serves as a tool in their struggle is the book’s central question.Less
This book is about the struggle over the future of work and the environment on the edge of the global economy. It traces the history of conflict in an industry that is not widely known, but sits at the epicentre for the global supply chain: short-haul trucking responsible for moving the mass of imports from enormous cargo ships to warehouses and retailers around the country. The book’s specific focus is on the largest and most important campaign at the nation’s largest and most important port complex, which straddles the border of Los Angeles and Long Beach, California. Over nearly two decades, labor and environmental groups—bound together in a pivotal “blue-green” alliance—carried forward a monumental campaign to transform working conditions for drivers and environmental conditions for communities. At bottom, the book tells a story of the unceasing resolve of courageous people seeking to make lives better for some of the most marginalized members of society: immigrant truck drivers barely scrapping by as they deliver goods to be sold by some of the richest and most powerful companies in the world; residents of neighbourhoods whose poverty consigns them to inhale the noxious residue of global trade. How law serves as a tool in their struggle is the book’s central question.
