Mark Hearn

The Australian Workers Union (AWU), formed in 1886, has been one of the most influential unions in Australia's political and industrial history. This comprehensive and compelling book, first published in 1996, is a national history of the AWU. It shows that the union has been a player in key events and crises in Australian history, including the great strikes of the 1890s, the 1916–17 conscription crisis, Labor's splits in the 1950s and the 1956 shearers' strike. The book features vivid portraits of the tempestuous and talented individuals who matched these great issues. Unique as a union whose industrial and political power was unrivalled for over sixty years, few unions in Great Britain or the United States have had such influence as the AWU. This book will be an important addition to labour history, but it is also a work of general appeal.

This book explores the fin de siècle, an era of powerful global movements and turbulent transition, in Australia and beyond through a series of biographical microhistories. From the first wave feminist Rose Summerfield and the working class radical John Dwyer, to the indigenous rights advocate David Unaipon and the poet Christopher Brennan, Hearn traces the transnational identities, philosophies, ideas and cultures that characterised this era. Examining the struggles and aspirations of fin de siècle lives; respect for the rights of women and indigenous peoples, the injustices and hardship inflicted on working men and women, and the ways in which they imagined a better world, this book examines the transformation and renewal brought about by fin de siècle ideas. It examines the distinctive characteristics of this ‘great acceleration’ of economic, technological and cultural forces that swept the globe at the turn of the 19th century both within an Australian context and on the world stage. Asserting that the fin de siècle was significant for the making of modern Australia, and demonstrating the impact Australian fin de siècle lives had on the transnational and global movements of the era, Mark Hearn traces the turbulent nature of the fin de siècle imagination in Australia, and its response to these dynamic forces.

This book explores the fin de siècle, an era of powerful global movements and turbulent transition, in Australia and beyond through a series of biographical microhistories. From the first wave feminist Rose Summerfield and the working class radical John Dwyer, to the indigenous rights advocate David Unaipon and the poet Christopher Brennan, Hearn traces the transnational identities, philosophies, ideas and cultures that characterised this era. Examining the struggles and aspirations of fin de siècle lives; respect for the rights of women and indigenous peoples, the injustices and hardship inflicted on working men and women, and the ways in which they imagined a better world, this book examines the transformation and renewal brought about by fin de siècle ideas. It examines the distinctive characteristics of this ‘great acceleration’ of economic, technological and cultural forces that swept the globe at the turn of the 19th century both within an Australian context and on the world stage. Asserting that the fin de siècle was significant for the making of modern Australia, and demonstrating the impact Australian fin de siècle lives had on the transnational and global movements of the era, Mark Hearn traces the turbulent nature of the fin de siècle imagination in Australia, and its response to these dynamic forces.

By the year 2040, no major city in the United States will have a majority ethnic group. Every major city will be majority-minority. This future nationwide reality has already been a present reality in several cities, including many in the urban south, for nearly a decade. In a 2011 State of the City Address, the mayor of pastor and author Mark Hearn's city said there were fifty-seven languages spoken at the local high school. Hearn left asking himself, "How should our church respond?" In the years that have followed, a phenomenal transformation has taken place. This transition has been chronicled in the Gwinnet Daily Post, the Christian Index, the Wall Street Journal, LifeWay's Facts and Trends, and the Atlanta Magazine. Now, Hearn shares the life-changing story through his own lens. By reading his firsthand experience of this transition as a pastor, you too can be equipped to make the shift to church in technicolor.

Between 1989 and 2013 every industry sector covered by the Transport Workers Union in New South Wales was utterly transformed by processes of globalisation and technological and market change. Large players consumed small firms; in turn, the bigger companies were often acquired by global players. The lesson that emerges from Organising Union is simple: the value of solidarity. In 2001 redundant Ansett workers were told they would never see their entitlements. In 2006 Tooheys owner-drivers were suddenly terminated by the company; the goodwill invested in their trucks and business was declared worthless. Ansett workers received almost all their entitlementsâ??an unprecedented 95 cents in the dollar. The Tooheys drivers' jobs were saved, the value of their goodwill upheld. Those outcomes were possible only because of the solidarity of transport workers and the support of their union. No one else stood alongside the workers at Ansett and Tooheys as consistently and tenaciously as their own union. Organising Union explores the relationship between the union and key industry players, and between the union and governments. The TWU has often been at the centre of controversy: the turbulent 1989 union election punctuated by accusations of rorts and fist fights; the clashes with the Hawke and Keating governments over the Accord and enterprise bargaining, resulting in the TWU disaffiliating from the ACTU and a truck blockade of the Reserve Bank's Sydney headquarters; the devastating 2001 Ansett closure and the long industrial war with Qantas culminating in the dramatic 2011 airline shutdown; the struggle to achieve 'safe rates' for truckies against the resistance of employers and governments. In the face of these challenges solidarityâ??the strength of an organising unionâ??has held the TWU together.