Session Organizers:  Holly Bartling, General Service Foundation
                                Anna Fink, New World Foundation
                                Hector Cordero-Guzman, Ford Foundation

Issues related to immigrant workers’ rights begin and end far beyond our national boundaries.  The global economic crisis has spurred high levels of unemployment in neighboring countries such as Mexico that drive migration to the United States. Multinational companies take advantage of this situation by bringing migrants to the United States who are open to exploitation.  Many migrants arrive in the U.S. heavily indebted, and guestworkers have a visa that binds them to a single employer. In the U.S., migrant workers often receive unlawfully low wages, work in unsafe conditions, and live in squalid housing.  Fearing deportation or retaliation, they are reluctant to enforce their legal rights. Many organizations work on only one side of the border, despite the fact that these labor rights violations continue as people cross borders. A new generation of organizations seeks to address these current challenges from a transnational perspective. Grounded in local organizing on both sides of the border, these groups are modeling innovative new strategies.  They are responding to violations of migrants’ rights at each stage in the cycle of migration—from recruitment in Mexico, to workplaces in the U.S., to their return home – and they are amassing important successes.

What role can funders play in supporting this exciting new work? For funders supporting community-based organizations in the U.S., it is important to understand the global forces that are pushing migration. This work is not given to easy segmentation by country borders, and we must think about the problem in all of its complexities. Is philanthropy positioned to respond to the complex nature of transnational labor rights work?

Presenters:
Hector Cordero-Guzman, Ford Foundation (Moderator)
Rachel Micah Jones, Center for Migrant Rights/ Centro de los Derechos del Migrante
Alejandra Ancheita, ProDESC (Economic, Social and Cultural Rights Project)
Ana Avendano, AFL-CIO

Sponsored by the Working Group on Labor and Community Partnerships