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By Carlin Carr Building off the momentum of the New Urban Agenda, we’re focused on assisting local decision-makers in better understanding informal workers and how to incorporate them into cities. This article is the first in a series where we’ll provide practical ideas and examples as a resource to...
Domestic workers — those who cook, clean, sweep, and child-mind in private homes across the globe — face unusually challenging circumstances in their every day working lives. Those challenges have fuelled a movement by the workers themselves, and this week we’ll hear from those women on the...
16 June 2011 was a momentous day for domestic workers around the globe. After a long, worker-led struggle, the International Labour Organization (ILO) finally adopted the Domestic Workers Convention 2011 (No. 189) . Domestic workers celebrated their recognition as workers who are entitled to labour...
The deadly factory fire at Rana Plaza five years ago this week sparked global outrage about workers’ safety. The incident in Bangladesh prompted discussion on national and international levels. But it is not just at these levels that health and safety can be addressed. Many local governments wield...
The global movement of informal workers – led by worker organizations in Asia, Africa, Europe, and Latin America – made major strides this year, from developing women’s leadership and using international policy instruments on the local level, to challenging the privatization of waste in South Africa...
As a global research-policy-action network, WIEGO’s team members are in a unique position to lead debates and contribute grounded new ideas for improving the lives of informal workers across continents. Research units from our four core programmes – Law, Organization and Representation, Social...
Study shows informal workers in the Global South perceive regulations as being both positive and negative From street vending permits to permissions to collect waste from public spaces, regulating the vast and diverse informal workforce in cities in the Global South doesn’t have a simple solution...
WIEGO’s law team discusses how administrative law can empower and protect informal workers in urban public spaces Every day, street vendors face harassment from authorities — from evictions to confiscation of goods. Waste pickers, too, face the denial of access to landfills or space to sort their...
On July 13, hundreds of Johannesburg’s informal waste pickers (known locally as “reclaimers”) — men and women who have been collecting, separating, and selling the city’s reusable discards for generations — took to the streets to protest a municipal decision that could put them out of work...
WIEGO’s Organizing and Representation Programme and Urban Policies Programme works with waste picker organizations in South Africa and Brazil to identify the unique needs of women working in this sector and how those needs can be addressed. On this International Women’s Day, we go behind the scenes...
Videos / Slideshows / Audio
Millions of women work long hours, in dangerous conditions, for little pay. They are fighting for change, with the help of ILO Convention 189 on Decent Work for Domestic Workers. Watch this video to learn how.
Workers Education/Organizing Materials
This manual helps street vendors learn more about the regulations that govern public space and how to defend the right to work in public space. It describes successful actions taken by street vendor organizations. And it offers information to help you organize and negotiate with local government.
WIEGO Working Papers
Mike Rogan reviews how informal workers are taxed, why there is growing interest in taxing them, and whether they should be included in the tax net.