Companeros De La Emigracion / Companions of emigration! Emigrated workers ! : Immigration and workers' struggles in French-speaking Switzerland (1968-1974).

The book "Compañeros de la emigración! Lavoratori emigrati! Immigration et luttes ouvrières en Suisse romande (1968-1974)" has just been published by Antipodes. Written by Alain Mélo and coordinated by Alda Degiorgi, the work examines labor struggles and immigration in Switzerland in the 1960s. It offers a wealth of illustrations and a clear, accessible presentation of the issues at stake. It will undoubtedly become a key reference for the history of this period. In the early 1970s, the large influx of Italian and Spanish workers played a role in the sudden surge of labor protests that erupted in French-speaking Switzerland. These workers—including locals—were confronting employers and unions unable to meet their demands. The protests manifested themselves in work stoppages and strikes that went beyond the "industrial peace" agreement that binds employers and unions in Switzerland. The sociologist of work and journalist Sergio Agustoni hypothesized that the variable and diverse flows of immigrant workers to Switzerland played a fundamental role in labor struggles in Geneva and French-speaking Switzerland in the early 1970s. He had personally observed several events in Geneva and offered an analysis of them in an article published in 1974. After describing and analyzing five major events from the period 1969-1974 – Murer (GE), the metallurgy industry (GE), Paillard (VD), Bobst & Sons (VD), Burger & Jacobi (BE) – the author addresses the morphology of the labor movement in French-speaking Switzerland: actors, repertoire of actions, chronology