What is it about?
This interview with Karen Nussbaum positions the founders of the Boston clerical organization, 9to5, as the "foremothers" of today's alt-labor movement. I offer a robust history of Nussbaum's years with 9to5 and its union counterpart, SEIU District 925. I then discuss with Nussbaum the founding and mission of Working America, the AFL-CIO's organization for working people who do not have a union.
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Why is it important?
This article explores how women in the 1970s built a new form of labor organization, based in part on ideas grew out of the burgeoning women's movement. This is especially important today as the union movement is exploring new avenues for building working people's power - - such as through associational membership in Working America.
Perspectives
This article is one of the few in-depth interviews with Karen Nussbaum about her current work with Working America, and includes her thoughts on how it both builds from and is different than her work with 9to5, the Organization for Women Office Workers.
Dr Lane Windham
Pennsylvania State University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: “A Sense of Possibility and a Belief in Collective Power”: A Labor Strategy Talk with Karen Nussbaum, Labor Studies in Working-Class History of the Americas, August 2015, Duke University Press,
DOI: 10.1215/15476715-2920388.
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