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Key Players on the International Programs Committee
Members of ILR’s International
Programs Committee want
their work, not who they
are, to be the focal point for discussion
on enhancing the results of ILR’s
international efforts. Each member’s
particular background has led him or
her to focus much time and talent on
international issues. The International
Programs Committee does not reflect all
the people who do international research
and teaching; many faculty at ILR and in
Extension are engaged in international
work. This ever-expanding collection of
backgrounds and perspectives provides
the School with a wealth of intellect and
energy.
Stuart Basefsky, senior
reference librarian
and director of the
IWS News Bureau,
originally was trained
for the foreign service
and characterizes his
international involvements on behalf of
the School with the statement “I am not
a researcher, but I facilitate research.”
Basefsky has facilitated ILR’s international
visibility and cooperation in many
ways, including arranging for two visits
from Jean-Pierre Laviec, director of the
International Institute for Labor Studies;
expediting the creation of a complete
mirror of the ILO web site residing at
Cornell that provides for enhanced access
to ILO materials for Cornell programs and
for Latin American countries in particular;
helping to gain ILO depository status for
the Catherwood Library; working with the
European Trade Union Institute (ETUI)
on developing internship possibilities for
ILR students in Brussels; and helping to
develop a memorandum of understanding
with the European Foundation for the
Improvement of Living and Working
Conditions in Dublin, Ireland (an official
agency of the European Union), based
on the ILO model currently in effect (see
sidebar, p. 11).
The research interests
of Rosemary Batt, ILR
associate professor
of human resource
studies, often focus on
the wages and working
conditions of women
and minorities in low-wage service work.
These interests include strategic human
resource management, service sector
productivity and competitiveness, work
organization and teams, and labor market
analysis. Batt worked and studied in
Mexico; she credits her anthropological
research there with developing a belief
in following her passion and pursuing
the issues that compel her. Observing,
understanding, and connecting with other
cultures is her avocation. She makes it a
priority to get outside the United States
on a regular basis to experience other
cultures and observe how people live.
Maria Cook has chaired
the International
Program Committee
since its inception
and serves as faculty
coordinator of ILR
International Programs.
She is an associate professor in the
Department of Collective Bargaining, Labor
Law, and Labor History. As a child she lived
in Peru, and this experience as well as her
bilingual upbringing (her mother is from
Spain) influenced her decision to study
Latin American politics in college. Cook’s
expertise is in comparative labor law reform
and industrial relations in Latin America
as well as labor politics, democratization,
and political economy in Mexico. She is
also interested in regional integration and
transnational social movements and has
published articles on cross-border union
cooperation under NAFTA. She was
resident director of Cornell’s study abroad
program in Seville, Spain, in 2001–2002
and currently chairs the university’s faculty
advisory board for Cornell Abroad. She also
represents ILR on the International Studies
Advisory Council, which was formed to
advise Cornell president Jeffrey Lehman on
the internationalization of Cornell.
Clete Daniel, professor
of labor history, is
probably best known
for his guidance of
ILR’s credit internship
program, which he has
directed since 1989,
and his tutelage of undergraduates in
two critical introductory courses: ILRCB
100 and 101, Nineteenth- and Twentieth-
Century American Labor History.
International internships are becoming
more popular and available at ILR; during
the 2003–3004 academic year, eight ILR
undergraduates successfully completed
internships with the International Labour
Organization, and one intern has been
placed with a leading British trade union
in London for the fall semester. Daniel
characterizes the ILR faculty as being very
supportive of the internship program;
during the past year 20 faculty members,
representing every department in the
School including extension, supervised
credit internships. Daniel’s own research
is currently focused on collecting material
and conducting numerous oral interviews
for a book-length biography of United
Farm Workers’ founder and president
Cesar Chavez.
Gary S. Fields, professor
of labor economics,
believes that “Advancing
the World of Work”
is appropriate and
descriptive for ILR
because it illuminates
the effort on behalf of both the extension
and resident divisions to facilitate research
and teaching on all issues of importance
to the international workplace. His major
interests are bottom-line workplace
management; labor economics for
managers; economic mobility; and poverty,
inequality, and economic development
in the developing world. While teaching
graduate and undergraduate classes Fields
is continually posing the question, “What
do we mean by development and what
are its effects?” He enjoys examining
the related policy issues with his Cornell
students on the Ithaca campus and in
6 ■ ILR Connections/Fall 2004 www.ilr.cornell.edu