May Day, or International Labor
Day, is celebrated on May 1 to commemorate a rally in 1886, when hundreds of
thousands of union workers across the United States protested against poor
working conditions, including long and exhausting working hours. The event led
to the realization of the 8-hour working day, a legacy that most of us should
be grateful for.
More than a century after the protest, the world is seemingly
flabbergasted by Industry 4.0, the fourth industrial revolution. Like a
double-edged sword, with all these hopes and hypes come the worries.
Many people are anxious because substantial numbers of jobs
are predicted to vanish. The future of work as we know it might be disrupted
and at peril, experts have told us.
Nonetheless, in the Global South, the second and third
industrial revolutions are yet to be fully exper…
*) Victoria Fanggidae
Research fellow at the Institute of Resource Governance and Social Change, Kupang, and a social policy researcher at Perkumpulan Prakarsa, Jakarta.
