workers' movements

Collective bargaining efforts

Workers' movements are organized efforts by laborers to improve their conditions—wages, hours, safety, and rights.

The term encompasses trade unions, labor parties, strikes, and broader campaigns for workplace reform.

Historically associated with industrial capitalism and socialist politics: The workers' movement gained strength in the late nineteenth century.

The possessive apostrophe marks these as movements belonging to workers themselves.

Related

Industrial Revolution · guilds · syndicalism · Marxism · public demonstrations · slowdowns · anarchism · picketing · sit-ins · shop floor · anti-capitalism · labor councils · petitions · solidarity · class struggle · strike funds · May Day · wildcat strike

Opposites
class/economic interest

workers' movementscapital

Wealth used for investment

management · corporate interests · bourgeoisie · industrialists · plutocracy

collective vs. individual action

workers' movementsat-will employment

Job without guaranteed duration

free agency · gig economy · right-to-work · atomization · self-reliance

stance toward labor organization

workers' movementsunion busting

Disrupting worker organizing efforts

strikebreaking · right-to-work laws · Pinkertons · scabs · blacklisting

Family

worker, workers, work, works, worked, working, workable, unworkable, workman

Familiarity
Top 500,000
Profile
Used worldwide · Timeless · Rated G