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Spencer Woodman: Can Walmart Be Unionized?

Faced with the retail giant's continued suppression and intimidation, Walmart workers have found untraditional ways to unionize.

The Nation

January 5, 2012

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Faced with the retail giant's continued suppression and intimidation, Walmart workers have found untraditional ways to unionize.

Walmart has a long track record of suppressing efforts to unionize its employees. But over the past year, Walmart workers have tried a new method of organizing in informal groups that are not union-certified but still function as instruments for workers to negotiate with management and assert their rights. In this episode of Nation Conversations, Spencer Woodman sits down with Executive Editor Betsy Reed to explain how this campaign, known as OUR Walmart, has succeeded where others have failed and the implications of such campaigns for the retailer and its employees.

For more on Walmart workers’ new unionization campaigns, read Spencer Woodman’s article “Labor Takes Aim at Walmart—Again,” which appears in the January 23, 2012 issue of The Nation magazine.

Subscribe to Nation Conversations on iTunes for exclusive audio of Nation editors and writers digging into the topics and issues that shape the magazine. Check back for a new episode each Thursday.

Jin Zhao

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