Made in Indonesia: Indonesian Workers Since Suharto
by Dan La BotzAVAILABILITY: Usually ships within 2-5 days
Publication Date: 2001
Publisher: South End Press
Binding: Paperback
Topics: Corporate Rule, Democracy: Theory & Practice, Economics, Education, Labor & Work / Classism, Militarism, Social Movements, Third World Peoples, United States
Condition: Close-out
Description: A dynamic new labor movement emerged in Indonesia in the 1990's, helping to bring down the brutal Suharto dictatorship in 1998. Through rare personal interviews with the activists who are leading the rebirth of struggle for democratic rights in the world's fourth-largest country, La Botz draws valuable lessons for workers in the United States seeking to build international labor solidarity.
In Reform or Revolution? independent researcher Dan La Botz gives us a personal look at the Indonesian workers who are taking on global corporate giants and igniting a multinational labor solidarity movement.
Through rare personal interviews with Indonesian workers, La Botz describes the inspiring, powerful events that are transforming the world's fourth-largest country. He shows us how workers earning the equivalent of $2 a day are challenging the sweatshop conditions of factories run by U.S.-based multinationals such as Nike and Reebok. Their dynamic new labor movement emerged in Indonesia in the 1990s, helping to bring down the brutal dictatorship of the U.S.-backed General Suharto in May 1998.
When Indonesian workers toured U.S. campuses and trade union halls in 1999 and 2000, a new generation of student activists in the United States was awakened. Reform or Revolution? will be required reading for those activists and for all those interested in building international labor solidarity.
Dan La Botz is a researcher and organizer with Global Exchange and currently lives in Cincinnati, Ohio. He is the author of Mask of Democracyand Democracy in Mexico, both published by South End Press, and Rank-and-File Rebellion. La Botz is the editor of Mexican Labor News and Analysis. His writing appears regularly in Against the Current, Labor Notes, and Z Magazine. He has traveled to Indonesia several times to report on the Indonesian labor movement.
Review(s): "This highly informative and penetrating study of the "fight for freedom" of Indonesian workers, and the background in which it has developed, could hardly be more timely or significant. It is an inspiring story of struggle and achievement, with important lessons for people dedicated to elementary human rights. It is also a valuable corrective to the propaganda assault that seeks to justify investor-rights agreements by portraying support for working people as an attack against them." - Noam Chomsky
"If you feel outraged by the fact that big foreign firms are still not bargaining with Indonesia's independent unions, read this book. After you read it, you'll know who to connect with. Consumer groups and human rights activists can help these courageous people win justice." - Jeff Ballinger, Press for Change