General Strike - Notable general strikes

(4–12 May 1926) A national strike in Britain, organized by the Trades Union Congress (TUC) in support of the miners' campaign to resist the imposition by mine owners of wage cuts and longer hours. By April 1926 the dispute between miners and mine owners had intensified and a government subsidy had ended. The strike involved some 3 million workers from the transport, iron, steel, printing, and building industries. The government organized special constables and volunteers to counter the most serious effects of the strike, and issued an anti-strike propaganda journal, The British Gazette. The TUC called off the strike after nine days, though the miners' strike continued fruitlessly for three more months. In 1927, the government passed the Trade Disputes and Unions Act to curb the power of the trade unions.

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A general strike is a strike action by a critical mass of the labour force in a city, region or country.

The term "general strike" is sometimes also applied to large-scale strikes of all of the workers in a particular industry, such as the Textile workers strike (1934).

Notable general strikes

1820 Rising in Scotland 1842 General Strike in England organised by the Chartists Russian Revolution of 1905 1912 Brisbane General Strike Irish anti-conscription general strike of 1918 Winnipeg General Strike of 1919 Seattle General Strike of 1919 British General Strike of 1926 San Francisco's Big Strike of 1934 Toledo General Strike of 1934 Great Arab Revolt of 1936 Finnish General Strike of 1956 French general strike of May 1968 Uruguay general strike of 1973 Northern Ireland general strike of May 1974 Spanish general strike of 1988 Ontario, Canada's Days of Action in 1995 Italian general strike of 2002 Venezuelan general strike of 2002-2003 Ukraine's Orange Revolution of 2004