British factory occupations in the 1970s
Part One: History and background 1.History The occupation of their workplace by working people is certainly dramatic but it is not a new tactic of trade union struggle. The most dramatic occupations to occur were the seizure of factories by workers during the Russian revolution in 1917, and the widespread occupations that took place in Italy in 1920. Groups of British miners and railwaymen staged stay-down or stay-in strikes in the 1920s and 1930s. In America, also in the 1930s, car workers of the emerging CIO union organisation were involved in a number of sit-ins. In France around the same...