Provincial Solidarities: A History of the New Brunswick Federation of Labour

Abstract

During this period, some of the NBFL's key challenges came from within the movement itself, from fishers, loggers and other primary workers in the Acadian northeast, as well as from the growing number of women in public sector unions, both of whom sought greater attention to their interests. The final two chapters examine the sticky problem of underdevelopment in the province and the federation's challenges in building a Common Front to defend its hard-won gains in the face of state austerity and pressures for more 'flexible' labour relations. Frank's focus on the provincial organisation is also instructive, since in Canada provincial governments control the legal regimes under which working peoples' organisations operate (p. 9). [...]New Brunswick's unique demographic (Acadian/ Anglophone), geographic (rural northeast/industrial southwest) and history of economic underdevelopment, also afford historians an opportunity to better analyse how these forces have impacted the traditional divisions within the labour movement and, in turn, have shaped its strategies to protect and promote the interests of working people.