Sweatshop

We as labor activists must begin to think about how to build international labor solidarity by fighting for legislation that would create this accountability—specifically giving workers around the world the right to sue in American courts if companies or their subcontractors violated basic labor rights such as workplace violence, avoiding paying a nation’s minimum wage, or pollution discharges that sicken and kill people. Despite recent Supreme Court decisions reducing the power of international agencies to sue in U.S. courts under the Alien Tort Statute of 1789, empowering workers to demand accountability through this law is our best bet to working toward better labor conditions worldwide. This law gives foreigners the right to sue if they have suffered from actions “in violation of the law of nations or a treaty of the United States.”