An HRDF migrant worker training in Thailand. Photo: Jeanne Hallacy

The Solidarity Center stands with workers as they defend their right to freedom of association, supporting them as they organize, advocate and build worker voice. Our 221 professional staff work in about 60 countries with 400-plus labor unions, pro-worker nongovernmental organizations, legal-aid groups, human rights defenders, women’s associations, advocacy coalitions and others to support workers—in garment factories, home service, seafood processing, mining, agriculture, informal marketplaces, manufacturing, the public sector and beyond—as they exercise their rights, including organizing for safer work sites, demanding living wages and improving laws (and the enforcement of existing laws) that protect working people, and fighting exploitation and abuse.

Specifically, we:

• Provide training and technical expertise that can help workers take on societal ills such as child labor, human trafficking, unfair labor laws, infringement of women’s rights, dangerous workplaces and the exploitation of the vulnerable.
• Assist unions trying to strengthen internal structures, including achievement of gender parity.
• Work with women as they challenge the systems and organizations that deny them voice.
• Conduct health and safety trainings for factory and other workers, and support networks of workers injured on the job.
• Implement legal assistance programs, including training paralegals, to help workers recover stolen wages or benefits illegally denied them.
• Connect migrant workers to protective networks, decreasing their vulnerability.
• Link workers and their unions with others sharing similar struggles and experiences.
• Boost advocacy efforts so that campaigns resonate beyond borders.
• Stand in solidarity with social-change activists around the world as we strive to build a global network of worker rights defenders.