Enacting solidarity - Unions and migrant youth in Thailand

This article examines the activities of some young migrant workers, partici pants in Thailand's labor movement, and their strategies for solidarity in the face of economic insecurity. Activities sponsored by some independent B angkok unions and labor solidarity groups draw upon both 'modern' urban com mercial forms as well as 'traditional' ritual practices to promote class-ba sed unity within a predominantly youthful and migrant labor force. Though l imited in both means and opportunity for effective oppositional expression, unionized migrants explore new ways of thinking about themselves and their experiences through creative enactments of solidarity. In the process, mig rant youth rework dominant symbols and practices in ways that contest hegem onic authority. Their grassroots actions reveal a dynamic struggle to produ ce and engage an alternative discourse of class-based identity by members o f a workforce widely deemed to have little potential for collective action.