The Industrial Workers of the World is a union unlike any other. Founded in 1905 in Chicago, it rapidly gained members across the world thanks to its revolutionary, internationalist outlook. By using powerful organising methods including direct-action and direct-democracy, it put power in the hands of workers. This philosophy is labeled as ‘revolutionary industrial unionism’ and the members called, affectionately, ‘Wobblies’.
This book is the first to look at the history of the IWW from an international perspective. Bringing together a group of leading scholars, it includes lively accounts from a number diverse countries including Australia, Canada, Mexico, South Africa, Sweden and Ireland, which reveal a fascinating story of global anarchism, syndicalism and socialism.
Drawing on many important figures of the movements such as Tom Barker, Har Dayal, Joe Hill, James Larkin and William D. ‘Big Bill’ Haywood, and exploring particular industries including shipping, mining, and agriculture, this book describes how the IWW and its ideals travelled around the world.
Table of Content
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Part I: Transnational Influences on the IWW
1. ‘A Cosmopolitan Crowd’: Transnational Anarchists, the IWW and the American Radical Press – Kenyon Zimmer
2. Sabotage, the IWW and Repression: How the American Reinterpretation of a French Concept Gave Rise to a New International Conception of Sabotage – Dominique Pinsolle
3. Living Social Dynamite: Early Twentieth-Century IWW-South Asia Connections – Tariq Khan
4. IWW Internationalism and Interracial Organizing in the Southwestern United States – David M. Struthers
5. Spanish Anarchists and Maritime Workers in the IWW – Bieito Alonso
Part II: The IWW in the Wider World
6. The IWW and the Dilemmas of Labor Internationalism – Wayne Thorpe
7. The IWW in Tampico: Anarchism, Internationalism and Solidarity Unionism in a Mexican Port – Kevan Antonio Aguilar
8. The Wobblies of the North Woods: Finnish Labor Radicalism and the IWW in Northern Ontario – Saku Pinta
9. ‘We Must Do Away with Racial Prejudice and Imaginary Boundary Lines’: British Columbia’s Wobblies before the First World War – Mark Leier
10. Wobblies Down Under: The IWW in Australia – Verity Burgmann
11. Ki Nga Kaimahi Maori (‘To All Maori Workers’): The New Zealand IWW and the Maori – Mark Derby
12. Patrick Hodgens Hickey and the IWW: A Transnational Relationship – Peter Clayworth
13. ‘The Cause of the Workers Who Are Fighting in Spain is Yours’: The Marine Transport Workers and the Spanish Civil War – Matthew White
14. Edith Frenette: A Transnational Radical Life – Heather Mayer
Part III: Beyond the Union: The IWW’s Influence and Legacies
15. Jim Larkin, James Connolly and the Dublin Lockout of 1913: The Transnational Path of Global Syndicalism – Marjorie Murphy
16. Tom Barker and Revolutionary Europe – Paula de Angelis
17. P. J. Welinder and ‘American Syndicalism’ in Interwar Sweden – Johan Pries
18. ‘All Workers Regardless Of Craft, Race Or Color’: The First Wave of IWW Activity and Influence in South Africa – Lucien van der Walt
19. Tramp, Tramp, Tramp: The Songs of Joe Hill Around the World – Bucky Halker
Notes on Contributors
Index
About the author
Kenyon Zimmer is Associate Professor of History at the University of Texas at Arlington. He is the author of Immigrants Against the State (University of Illinois Press, 2015) and the editor of Wobblies of the World (Pluto, 2017).
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