Class, Race and Migration

The far-right blames migrant workers for benefit fraud, welfare tourism and rising unemployment among native-born workers. When conservatives don’t demonise migrants, they simply view them as cheap labour to do the jobs that British workers no longer want to do. While liberals treat migrant workers as victims without agency, radicals often see them as the only way to renew bureaucratic unions.

Mark Bergfeld proposes a way to go beyond these simplifications and stereotypes by looking at how migrant workers’ position in the labour market affects trade unions’ responses and migrant workers’ self-organisation. Based on participant observation and in-depth interviews with trade unionists, migrant worker activists and organisations right before and after the EU referendum in 2016, Bergfeld shows how migrant workers develop agency and power in the workplace and community against all odds.