Downturn: The Origins of the Employers' Offensive

In the early 1970s, the working class was confident and organized. In 1973, a sense of the period was given by striking railworkers.

"When an emergency sitting of Parliament was called for the usual back-to-work legislation, about 1,800 rail workers demonstrated in Ottawa. The demonstration led to an invasion of Parliament." A Toronto Globe and Mail reporter described the scene this way: "The limestone halls of the House of Commons echoed to the sounds of smashing glass and screamed slogans yesterday afternoon as 200 striking railway workers overran security guards and occupied the Hall of Honour in the Centre Block. As the strikers forced their way into the main Parliament building, they were cheered on by a further 1,600 demonstrators..."

In the years since, this has changed. There has been a downturn in the level of workers' struggle and an increase in confusion and demoralization.

In this pamphlet, Paul Kellogg argues that this downturn in struggle was not inevitable. It examines the critical years in the mid-1970s when Canadian employers' and their state began to turn the tide and launch an employers' offensive which dominates politics to this day.