Projects> Stories of Solidarity

The Stories of Solidarity project arose from a “Hack-A-Thon” group formed for a conference organized by UC Davis Professors Chris Benner, Jesse Drew and Glenda Drew entitled “Social Media, Insecure Work and New Solidarities” held at the UCLA downtown labor center in the Fall of 2012. The “hack-a-thon” group came together to create a new social media platform beneficial to those organizing sectors of workers that suffer from low wages, poor healthcare, immigration problems and other aspects of much of the new economy. The original hack-a-thon team was comprised of students and faculty from Design, Computer Science, History, Community Development, Technocultural Studies, and Digital Humanities from both UC Davis and UC Los Angeles.

The project recognizes that social media has become a powerful means for connecting people and supporting social movement organizing. At the same time, rapid technological change, globalization and volatile competitive conditions have contributed to growing insecurity in work, in which the workplace is less frequently a site of long-term stability and collective conceptions of work have been eroded as a basis for solidarity. By building the Stories of Solidarity project, the developers seek to apply skill and talent to help solve an important social ill that plagues millions of workers in the US.

Links: portal page | working prototype