Industrial action (UK, Ireland and Australia) or job action (Canada and US) refers collectively to any measure taken by trade unions or other organised labour meant to reduce productivity in a workplace. Quite often it is used and interpreted as a euphemism for strike, but the scope is much wider. Industrial action may take place in the context of a labour dispute or may be meant to effect political or social change. Specifically industrial action may include one or more of the following:
- Strike
- Occupation of factories
- Work-to-rule
- General strike
- Slowdown (or Go-slow)
- Overtime ban
Famous quotes containing the words industrial and/or action:
“As to a thorough eradication of prostitution, nothing can accomplish that save a complete transvaluation of all accepted values—especially the moral ones—coupled with the abolition of industrial slavery.”
—Emma Goldman (1869–1940)
“For the child whose impulsiveness is indulged, who retains his primitive-discharge mechanisms, is not only an ill-behaved child but a child whose intellectual development is slowed down. No matter how well he is endowed intellectually, if direct action and immediate gratification are the guiding principles of his behavior, there will be less incentive to develop the higher mental processes, to reason, to employ the imagination creatively. . . .”
—Selma H. Fraiberg (20th century)