Domestic worker organizing: building a contemporary movement for dignity and power.

AuthorShah, Hina
PositionProtecting Workers' Rights in a Post-Wisconsin World: Strategies for Organizing and Action in an Era

We have read in history books and other books about slavery of long ago, but the way the housemaids must work now from morning till night is too much for any human being. I think we girls should get some consideration as every other labor class has, even though it is housework ('Fifteen weary housemaids' to Mrs. Roosevelt, February 1938 ... ). (1)

With the passage of this International Convention and Recommendation, I am emotional thinking of all of the domestic workers--their sweat, their hard work, the abuses they've endured--and I myself have lived this experience.

Today, at a global level, the work of cleaning houses, caring for children, the elderly, and disabled is recognized as work-work like any other. (Juana Flores, domestic worker delegate to the International Labour Conference, June 16, 2011). (2)

  1. INTRODUCTION

    In the past decade, domestic workers have created a robust worker movement and sustained organizing in states like New York and California, as well as nationally and internationally. (3) Their labor has borne fruit in the passage of the New York Domestic Workers Bill of Rights ("New York Bill of Rights") and the International Labour Organization's CILO") adoption of the ILO Convention and Recommendation Concerning Decent Work for Domestic Workers. (4) California is poised to pass its own bill of rights and nationally, the Department of Labor has proposed regulations greatly expanding wage entitlements for live-in domestic workers and workers providing companionship services. (5) It seems at last that domestic workers are gaining visibility and legal rights.

    The success of domestic worker organizing in the twenty-first century may seem like an anomaly against the backdrop of increased hostility towards unionized labor and an overall decline in wages and benefits for workers. (6) The contemporary domestic worker movement, beginning in the 1990s, builds upon centuries of organizing and agitation by domestic workers and others for a cultural shift that values domestic labor as real work. (7) The current movement fundamentally alters past organizing models, linking the struggle to a broader movement for social justice. Unlike past organizing efforts, domestic workers are at the helm of the contemporary movement. They have made significant strides, through their leadership and visibility, moving the cultural paradigm and building a broad-based alliance with labor, social justice activists, faith-based organizations, women's groups, and students. (8)

    Using a historical lens, this article analyzes the contemporary domestic worker movement's success and momentum in transforming cultural attitudes toward favoring the legal protection of domestic workers. Part II will discuss the reasons why domestic work has not been valued historically. Part III will trace the history of domestic worker organizing, focusing on three organizing models that helped alter the societal framework. Part IV analyzes the contemporary organizing models used in New York and California for domestic labor reform. Part V discusses the next frontier in domestic worker organizing: building transnational unity and power.

  2. THE VALUE OF REAL WORK

    The historic devaluation of domestic labor stems from a complex societal framework that is rooted in the gendered and racial makeup of the workforce. The low status of domestic labor was firmly intertwined with both the status of those who predominately served and the history of slavery. African-American women dominated the domestic services both during and after slavery in the South. (9) They soon came to supply domestic labor in northern cities as well, as African-Americans migrated in overwhelming numbers during the Great Migration. (10)

    During this period, "black women ... formed a servant and laundress class, as no white group had ever done before." (11) By the 1940s, African-American women held close to half of domestic service jobs, nationally. (12) Not surprisingly, the mammy image--a large, maternal figure with a headscarf and almost always a wide-toothed grin--persists as the most enduring racial caricature of African-American women. (13) The racial disdain for the black servant--"a despised race to a despised calling"--justified labeling the work as "nigger's work." (14) As such, society easily disregarded domestic labor as not being real work, worthy of fair and equal treatment. (15)

    Furthermore, domestic labor was seen as woman's work, a "labor of love" having no economic currency. (16) There was an ideological divide between the concept of family and the market, a divide along gender lines that valued men's labor over women's. (17) Because it takes place in the home and benefits the employer's family, the work was considered "outside the boundary of the world's economy." (18) As non-commercial and non-productive work, the role of the homemaker was cloaked in the private sphere, justifying exclusion from labor protections. (19)

    The gender battle also stratified the relationship between women along race and class lines. Industrialization altered the home from a place of production to a place of consumption. (20) White middleclass women increasingly embraced a life of leisure--"the 'cult of domesticity." (21) The work of the home was "haloed with maternal imagery"--the mistress charged with the spiritual and moral health of the family. (22) Yet, this cult excluded poor women, especially immigrants and African-American women, who were increasingly called upon to do the menial housework. (23) This inequality among women became a barrier to providing equal treatment for those who served.

    Finally, domestic labor was firmly part of the social structure that existed in America, especially in the home. (24) The traditional status of the non-slave domestic worker was as a menial servant within the household. (25) The master exercised complete control over the servant and thus set her apart from other labor. (26)

    The confluence of these factors hampered efforts to legitimize domestic service as real works. (27) This in turn justified the exclusion of domestic workers from government regulation. (28) While other workers gained labor protection at the turn of the twentieth century, domestic workers--by the 1930s numbering as many as those in "the railroads, coal mines, and automobile industry combined"--were categorically excluded. (29) Today's movement seeks to rectify the historical exclusions.

  3. PAST MODELS OF DOMESTIC WORKER ORGANIZING

    For centuries, domestic workers have struggled to gain recognition for their work and to improve the feudal working conditions they continued to face even into the post-industrial era. While much work remains, incremental progress was made to change society's attitudes towards the value of domestic labor-from the roots of slavery to a modern, business relationship. (30) Historically, from the 1870s to the 1970s, this change was a result of three distinct organizing strategies: collective action, standardization of the industry through voluntary efforts, and lobbying for government regulation. Much of the organizing centered on the need to ensure a supply of domestic labor and was often led by white, middle-class women. (31) The historical organizing did not necessarily seek economic and social justice for workers. Domestic workers, for the most part, remained invisible and unprotected. (32) While these strategies contributed to the changes in the industry, they failed to alter the gendered, racial, and caste-based cultural attitudes towards domestic workers. (33)

    1. "The Maid's fiance"--Joining the Union (34)

      Domestic workers had long been viewed as "unorganizable" because they work in isolated work units, each alone for a different employer. (35) The decentralized and multi-employer nature of the industry does not lend itself to the industrial union organizing model. (36) In addition, they were traditionally hidden in the home and thus, did not have access to others to form groups or take collective action. (37) They also have no legal protection when they do try to organize and join a union, as they are excluded from the National Labor Relations Act ("NLRA"). (38)

      Nonetheless, many domestic workers did exactly that--they formed unions and associations to better their working conditions and to lend solidarity to their struggle. At the turn of the twentieth century, there were efforts to organize domestic workers into unions, even though the early labor movement was generally hostile to female membership. (39)

      From 1870 to 1940, the American Federation of Labor ("AFL") reported twenty domestic workers unions in various parts of the country affiliated with the AFL. (40) Domestic workers also joined the Knights of Labor and the Industrial Workers of the World ("IWW"). (41)

      One of the most successful efforts to unionize domestic workers was led by Jane Street and the Domestic Worker's Industrial Union, IWW Local No. 113, founded in 1916 in Denver, Colorado. (42) Street's vision for the union was larger than the traditional union demands for better wages and shorter hours; (43) she saw the union as a vehicle to rebalance the power "dynamic between mistress and servant." (44) With its innovative strategies, including creation of an alternative placement agency, the IWW Local made real gains in increasing wages and reforming the working conditions. (45)

      Outside of formal unions, domestic workers formed clubs and associations for mutual support as well as for collective action to raise working standards. (46) Many of these clubs and associations provided a social space for domestic workers to congregate and often ran an employment agency. (47) These groups focused on professionalizing the industry, including skills training for workers. (48) Similar organizing strategies are currently being used by domestic worker organizations as incubators for worker leadership. (49)

      Traditional unions reentered the domestic service arena as a result of the...

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