The Dignity of Labour: Workers Caught Between Bulldozers and Digital Disruption
Today is International Workers’ Day — a day to raise voices worldwide for the dignity, rights, and respect of labour. A day to remember the struggle of workers who took to the streets in Chicago, America, in 1886 demanding an eight-hour workday. Yet, 140 years later, the question remains the same: has the dignity of labour truly been established?
This year’s May Day arrives at a time of particular concern for Nepali workers. On one side, bulldozers are rolling along the riverbanks of Kathmandu. Squatter families who have lived there for years are being displaced. The government has assured their “management,” but there is no concrete plan as to where and how. The Urban Development Ministry’s remark that “issuing a notice itself is preparation” reveals just how insensitive the state’s attitude is towards workers and the poor. The majority of these squatters belong to the working class — daily wage earners, dishwashers in hotels, brick carriers at construction sites. Their sweat runs this city. Yet, in the campaign to make the city “beautiful,” bulldozers roll over their very shelters.
Elsewhere, the world is entering the age of artificial intelligence. As machines begin to perform human tasks, concern over a jobs crisis has become global. However, just this week, a court in Hangzhou, China, delivered a significant verdict: “AI is not grounds for dismissal.” The ruling that an employee cannot be fired simply because AI has started doing their work has illuminated a path for protecting labour rights in the technological age. With China’s core AI industry surpassing 1.2 trillion yuan and projections that AI will penetrate over 90 percent of sectors by 2030, this verdict has proven to be a milestone.
Looking at Nepal’s situation, the fundamental problems of workers remain unaddressed. The number of Nepalis leaving for foreign employment is rising every day. The exploitation, inhumane working conditions, and the grim sequence of deaths among Nepali workers in Gulf countries and Malaysia continue unabated. Even at home, the enforcement of minimum wage is weak, informal sector workers remain outside the ambit of social security, and youth exodus is taking a devastating toll.
The march of technology will not stop. But technology should empower people, not displace them. This is precisely what the Chinese court’s verdict conveys — that the benefits of technology must be shared by workers, not just companies. This message is equally relevant for Nepal. The tendency to raze settlements with bulldozers and to disregard workers in the name of technology both spring from the same mindset — the devaluation of labour.
On this day, we must grasp one fundamental truth: labour is not a commodity; it is an integral part of human dignity. Ensuring the rights of workers amid the dual challenges of the bulldozer and the digital is the foremost duty of the state. Instead of destroying the shelters of the poor in a campaign to beautify the city, let us find ways to give them a dignified life. Let us embrace technology, but not as a weapon to push workers off a cliff.
Let the dignity of labour be established. This is our May Day wish.
