Successful EMAR SEMINAR

The EMAR Seminar 1 has been given by Mark Bergfeld, as scheduled, on Friday February the 26th at Finsbury Park Trust conference room, in London

The title of the seminar was “They called for workers to come, but humans arrived”. Given the present circumstances of the labour migration in the world, the title was quite reflective. Around 30 academicians and workers have responded to our invitation and filled the Conference Room at Finsbury Park.

Seminar took up several problems the first generation Turkish workers in Germany faced with an emphasis on the two important wildcat strikes in 1973 where masses of migrant workers were proactively involved and trade unions were caught off-guard.
Mark Bergfeld is himself a “migrant” child. His father is Greek and mother German. He is working on his doctorate thesis on Marxism and Ethics at Uni. Essex. He is a research fellow at Queen Mary University of London. We think he is a bright and politically active young chap. He made the Powerpoint presentation on the topic mainly using German language resources.
Bergfeld presented the audience plenty of pictures from the period of essentially two wildcat strikes in Germany, the first being the strike at Pierburg  autospare-parts factory where women from several nationalities were in the forefront. This successful strike preceded the unsuccessful Ford strike in 1973 where many Turkish workers were involved.

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EFLR

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