The Changing Political Economy of Occupational Health and Safety in Fisheries: Lessons from Eastern Canada and South Africa

Abstract

Growing literatures on the political economy of occupational health and safety and on the political economy of contemporary fisheries need to be better integrated to help us see how neoliberal globalization and overfishing are interacting with gender, race and class relations in regional fish harvesting and processing workplaces to affect occupational health risks and the consequences. This contribution uses findings from occupational allergy and asthma (OAA) research among seafood processing workers in Eastern Canada and the west coast of South Africa to enhance our understanding of the political economy of occupational health and safety concerns in contemporary fisheries. Expanding features of global fisheries, mediated by regional histories, are changing the vulnerabilities of processing workers to OAA by influencing production volumes and products; local, regional and international divisions of labour; employment precariousness and access to prevention, health and compensation services. Affected workers' common perception that they must choose between their livelihoods and their health is to some degree a reality in these fisheries.

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