Colombian oil workers and la Unión Sindical Obrera (USO) are leading the charge for a just transition. Here's what Canada can learn from their worker-led climate plan.

Lala Peñaranda of Trade Unions for Energy Democracy Matt Kirkegaard of Progressive International present the Colombian Oilworkers' Plan — a bold strategy for a worker-led public pathway to transition off fossil fuels, with vital lessons for the Canadian labour and climate movements.

Colombian oil workers are at the forefront of this strategy. Peñaranda and Kirkegaard explain why workers, not corporations or the profit motive, are leading substantive climate action in Colombia and what that means for Canadian workers.

This is the seventh episode of Class & Climate: Perspectives on a Green Economy, a short series from Perspectives Journal and the Green Economy Network mapping how climate action can deliver jobs and long-term affordability for workers—while debunking myths that these goals are a zero-sum trade-off with a clean environment. In this episode, Peñaranda and Kirkegaard survey the history and class interests surrounding Colombia's worker-led climate strategy.

Notes and further reading:

• PI Briefing | No. 17 | The Oilworkers’ Plan
• Petro-Politics | Interview with César Loza, President of la Unión Sindical Obrera (USO)
• Colombia Wants to Phase Out Fossil Fuels

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The fight for better workplace conditions doesn’t stop at renewable energy. Workers in renewable energy need union representation, collective bargaining and a voice in their workplace for the energy transition to benefit all Canadians.

Alex Connolly, a renewable energy worker in Nova Scotia, compares the workplace conditions from his time in the oil sands to his current work putting up wind turbines. He shares how quality wages and work closer to home aren’t at odds with lower emissions.

But the fight for better workplace conditions doesn’t stop at renewable energy. Workers in renewable energy need union representation, collective bargaining and a voice in their workplace for the energy transition to benefit all Canadians.

This is the sixth episode of Class & Climate: Perspectives on a Green Economy, a short series from the Perspectives Journal and the Green Economy Network mapping how climate action can deliver jobs and long-term affordability for workers—while debunking myths that these goals are a zero-sum trade-off with a clean environment. In this episode, Connolly answers what it’s like working in the oilsands and discusses the opportunities for workers in renewable energy.

Notes and further reading:

• ‘Fly-in, fly-out’ oilsands workers face significant mental health challenges, report suggests
• Heads in the sands: Understanding the social and economic risks of declining global demand for Alberta oil
• How Canada can equip workers for a low-carbon future

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2025 Ellen Meiksins Wood Lecturer Grace Blakeley sits down with Luke Savage in Toronto, Canada, for a conversation on the failures of neoliberal capitalism, the age of individualism it has produced, and what the left must do if it is to win the working-class.

Blakeley and Savage examine how the far-right have taken advantage of the gaps and inequities made under individualism and why organizing is needed to fight for working-class democratic power.

Watch the full conversation on YouTube and listen to Grace Blakeley's full 2025 Ellen Meiksins Wood Lecture, 'Genuine Democracy in an Age of Hyper-Individualism' in Perspectives Journal.

Buy Grace Blakeley's latest book Vulture Capitalism: Corporate Crimes, Backdoor Bailouts, and the Death of Freedom and subscribe to her Substack for more writing and ideas.

Buy Seeking Social Democracy, Ed Broadbent's book co-authored by Luke Savage, Frances Abele, and Jonathan Sas, and subscribe to Luke Savage's Substack.

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