Queer Activism, Feminism and the Transnational Labor Movement

Article notes¹

Globalization has reconfigured the opportunities for politics and the repertoire for collective action available to transnational activist movements concerned with economic and sexual justice. Transnational forms of activism depend on domestic political contexts, the availability of local actors, the existence of mobilizing structures, the mobility of ideas and people, and the available discourses with the power to frame the opportunities for activism.² Transnational activism can occur at various levels, at multiple sites both virtual and physical, and take a variety of forms including networks, coalitions, organizations, and movements. Some activists travel extensively, while others can participate in transnational movements and campaigns without leaving home. Elsewhere we have written extensively about the constraints and opportunities globalization presents to union feminists whose transnational activism is helping to build new political alliances between women’s movements and organized labor.³ Now we turn our attention to transnational queer labor activism by focusing on how lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) activists are capturing the resources, networks, and discourses of the transnational labor movement to mobilize for labor rights in a global economy.

Much like women and other marginalized workers who are underrepresented in “the House of Labor,” LGBT workers are using self-organizing as a strategy to build political spaces within unions from which they can make claims for representation and participation. Like feminism, queer activism has the potential to revitalize the labor movement; but to do so, it will need to challenge the homophobia, transphobia and sexual politics of organized labor and insist that unions live up to their democratic ideals. In the past, feminist and civil rights activists within labor had to leverage their alliances with other activists, advocacy groups and grassroots organizations outside the formal boundaries of unions in order to make their case for greater representation and equity. Queer labor activists are borrowing these strategies, but are also creating new approaches and discourses that challenge unions to rethink how they mobilize their members for collective action. In this paper, we draw on notions of sexual politics, self-organizing, discursive frames, and mobilizing structures to help us understand transnational queer labor activism, and to argue for the value and necessity of queer organizing in the labor movement.

Sexual Politics and Self-Organizing

The political opportunities available in the labor movement cannot be realized without analyzing and challenging the obstacles of sexual politics. We adopt the concept of sexual politics in this context in order to re-engage with gender as relational and political, in the sense of Kate Millet’s early conceptual formulations (1969). Millet redefined politics as “power-structured relationships, arrangements whereby one group of persons is controlled by another,” and advanced the then new claim that the sexes (as well as races, castes and classes) should be seen as well-defined and coherent groups and thus subject to politics.⁴

In analyzing the sexual politics of the labor movement, we aim to sidestep the way that gender has since become coded to refer almost exclusively to women. Instead we acknowledge that gender is an ever-present relation of power, and thus best conceived in terms of a sexual politics that engages and challenges power as domination, resistance, alliances and pleasures. This conceptualization of gender and sexual politics allows recognition, in the contemporary climate, of the centrality and dominance of masculine, heteronormative sexualities/identities, and reframes the analysis away from an arithmetical “gender inclusivity” where women are merely slotted in and LGBT people disappear.⁵ It is the dynamic and changing circumstances of sexual politics, in which gender relations contest and shape political opportunities and social identities, that produces the resources and capacities for political action.

The sexual politics of trade unions is clearly challenged by the interests and concerns of LGBT workers. Trade unions are dominated by masculine heterosexuality—indicated by the alarming rates of discrimination and prejudice in the workplace faced by lesbians, gay men and transgender people. In the Australian study, The Pink Ceiling is Too Low, over half of the respondents said they suffered from homophobic behaviour or harassment, and eleven percent experienced verbal abuse, including threats of physical and sexual abuse.⁶ Studies elsewhere also find that LGBT workers’ careers are affected by the culture of work organizations and policies.⁷ Where trade unions themselves have begun to collect data on the experiences of LGBT workers, they find that breaches of labor rights are common.⁸

1. This paper draws on our research for our book, Making Feminist Politics in Global Labor Movements: Transnational Alliances between Women and Labor, under contract with the University of Illinois Press. [↩]
2. Suzanne Franzway & Mary Margaret Fonow, “An Australian Feminist Twist on Transnational Labor Activism.” Signs 33: 3 (2008): 537-544. [↩]
3. See Mary Margaret Fonow & Suzanne Franzway, “Transnational Union Networks, Feminism and Labour Advocacy.” Trade Union Responses to Globalization. Ed. Verena Schnidt. Geneva: ILO Press, 2007. 165-176. Also Suzanne Franzway & Mary Margaret Fonow, “An Australian Feminist Twist on Transnational Labor Activism,” Signs 33: 3 (2008). 537-544. [↩]
4. Kate Millet, Sexual Politics. New York: Avon Books, 1969: 23-4. [↩]
5. Suzanne Franzway, Sexual Politics and Greedy Institutions: Union Women, Commitments and Conflicts in Public and in Private. Sydney: Pluto Press Australia, 2001. [↩]
6. Jude Irwin, ‘The pink ceiling is too low’: workplace experiences of lesbians, gay men and transgender people, 1999. http://www.arts.usyd.edu.au/Arts/departs/social/jirwinpub. [↩]
7. Fiona Colgan, Chris Creegan, Aidan McKearney, & Tessa Wright, Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Workers Equality, Diversity and Inclusion in the Workplace. A Qualitative Research Study. London: Comparative Organisation and Equality Research Centre [COERC], London Metropolitan University, 2006. [↩]
8. See report by Education International, The Rights of Gay and Lesbian Education Personnel, Triennial Report. Education International, 2001. [↩]