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:
“Predatory capitalism created a complex industrial system and an advanced technology; it permitted a considerable extension of democratic practice and fostered certain liberal values, but within limits that are now being pressed and must be overcome. It is not a fit system for the mid- twentieth century.”
—Noam Chomsky (b. 1928)
“Strange goings on! Jones did it slowly, deliberately, in the bathroom, with a knife, at midnight. What he did was butter a piece of toast. We are too familiar with the language of action to notice at first an anomaly: the ‘it’ of ‘Jones did it slowly, deliberately,...’ seems to refer to some entity, presumably an action, that is then characterized in a number of ways.”
—Donald Davidson (b. 1917)