Labor Protests Since The Nineteenth Century

Labor protests since the nineteenth century

The working conditions were, since the beginning of this process (1880-1930), one of the central concerns of the workers and the cause of much of the social protest. That is, accidents at work, overcrowding, employment and exploitation of minors, long working hours, low wages, inequality of female work in relation to male, labor discipline, night work, regularity oreventuality of employment and the forms of contracting of labor were all issues that motivated the repeated protest of workers, with the aim of improving their working conditions and their quality of life. We must bear in mind that all these conditions varied considerably according to the different occupational items and the magnitude of the companies.

In 1880, countless resistance societies appeared in which workers of the same trade were organized: painters, bakers, masons, sawmills, plasters, carpenters, confectioners, among others. The central objective of these societies was the defense of their interests claiming improvements in working conditions, salaries and in the quality of life of their represented. In 1890, after the economic and social crisis unleashed in that year, it was when resistance societies gained strength, driven by anarchists and socialists, to whom revolutionary and communist trade unionists would later be added. These trends endowed workers and their institutions representing a clear ideological and political profile that aimed the defense of their interests and the recognition of class identity.

In 1909, the so -called "May Week" would occur, due to the police repression that caused the death of several protesters, in response they carried out one of the most significant solidarity protests of the period. Consequently to that event, the most significant symbolic and ritual construction was the celebration of May 1, a transcendental date of the calendar of the left and reason for the labor protest with the greatest degree of consciousness.

In 1916, with the arrival of Hipólito Yrigoyen to the Government a new relationship between the State and the labor movement oriented by trade unionism was generated, characterized by the predisposition to the dialogue of the parties. However, in 1919 the so -called "Tragic Week" would be.

The conflicts caused by workers and their organizations in Buenos Aires during the first decade of the twentieth century were not limited solely to the abandonment of work as a sign of protest, but also to the occupation of public space by workers through acts andRights on public roads. These actions caught the attention of the Government, highlighting the shortcomings of the organization of work, as well as the absence of state regulation, consequently these protests led the State towards the path of the construction of social policies.

In this way, workers’ organizations expressed in various ways their discontent and claims through a series of novel confrontation repertoires for the country: strikes, boycots, sabotages and street demonstrations. All these forms of protest served to exert their pressure on businessmen and state authorities both to improve their working conditions and to demand the right to the organization. However, it is worth noting that the strike was the fighting tool most used by workers and their organizations, and became the outgoing feature of the popular protest throughout the twentieth century.