RUTH AYLETT admires the blunt honesty with which a woman’s experience is recorded, but detects the unexamined privilege that underlies it
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Politically corrupt and morally bankrupt
HELEN MERCER welcomes an account of how US labour leadership collaborated with the state and betrayed their membership
nixon meany
IAN SINCLAIR draws attention to the powerful role that literature plays in foreseeing the way humanity will deal with climate crisis
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SCOTT ALSWORTH hears the call to burn down and rebuild the video game industry from the bottom up
The Chinese language only introduced a feminine pronoun in the 1920s. Now, it might adopt a gender-inclusive one, suggests JANET DAVEY
Blue Collar Empire: the untold story of US labour’s global anti-communist crusade
Jeff Schuhrke
Verso, £25
JEFF SCHUHRKE’s book is a history of the collaboration between trade union leaders and the US state through the Cold War up until the 2000s.
It provides a detailed account of the dealings of key figures in the leadership of the American Federation of Labour (AFL) and the Congress of Industrial Organisations (CIO) with the US political establishment and the CIA, earning the name “AFL-CIA.”
Schuhrke exposes the labyrinth of personal contacts, committees, and associations through which the US government channelled funds and shaped labour organisations across the world.
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