The Labor, Environment, and Sustainable Development Initiative advances knowledge, policies, and practices to enhance the role of labor and working people in addressing the environmental and climate crises. The initiative's efforts focus on building a truly sustainable society and economy.

The initiative also helps workers’ rights advocates to better understand the employment and labor implications of environmental, climate and sustainability issues through a variety of activities:

• Engages in research and produces scholarly articles and reports
• Assists with leadership development and strategy design
• Conducts training sessions and develops training materials
• Offers technical assistance to unions, worker organizations and policy organizations
• Offers undergraduate/graduate courses on the intersection of labor-environmental issues

The initiative helps unions, workers’ organizations and other advocates of workers’ rights respond to the following questions:

• What does the transition to a truly sustainable, low-carbon society and economic model mean for unions, workers and their workplaces, communities and industries?
• In a time of high unemployment, can environmental sustainability and climate protection policies drive job creation and promote greater equality?
• What type and how many “green” or “climate” jobs are needed in the new Green Economy?
• How can a “just transition” to new sources of stable employment be ensured for workers who today work in environmentally harmful industries?
• What role do labor-environmental alliances have in building an equitable, low-carbon and sustainable society?

Selected Research

• Climate Jobs for New York State
• Emerald Cities in the Age of Obama: A New Social Compact Between Labor and Community. Jeff Grabelsky and Phil Thompson (in, Perspectives at Work, Winter 2010)
• Impact of Tar Sands Pipeline Spills on Employment and the Economy. Lara Skinner and Sean Sweeney
• Pipe Dreams? Jobs Gained, Jobs Loss by Construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline. Lara Skinner and Sean Sweeney
• Labor’s Route to a New Transportation System: How Federal Transportation Can Create Good Jobs, First-Rate Mobility, and Environmentally Sustainable Communities. Lara Skinner
• Transport Workers and Climate Change: Towards Sustainable, Low-Carbon Mobility. Lara Skinner and Sean Sweeney
• Greener and Safer Purchasing Guide. Nellie Brown
• Green Jobs: Toward Decent Work in a Sustainable, Low-Carbon World. Michael Renner, Sean Sweeney and Jill Kubit

Contact

Lara Skinner, lrs95@cornell.edu
Alex Colvin, ajc22@cornell.edu