Bellagio Residency: October 2023
Project: “Effective Strategies to Build Worker Power (and Democracy) in a Fissured Global Economy”
Erica Smiley is a veteran movement-leader and widely-published author working to prioritize the demands of vulnerable working people in socio-economic and political decisions that impact their lives, families, and communities. She came to Bellagio in October 2023 to explore how workers’ movements around the globe have attempted to collectively bargain with multinational companies. Erica is the Executive Director of Jobs With Justice, an organization dedicated to expanding collective bargaining power as a critical path to democracy. She also serves on the board of the SEIU Education and Support Fund and on the State Advisory Committee for the School of Management and Labor Relations at Rutgers University.