TY - JOUR T1 - The Double Confrontation of Grassroots Unionism in Argentina: Union Democratization and Defense of Working Conditions JF - Latin American Perspectives Y1 - 2015 A1 - Cora Cecilia Arias A1 - Nicolás Diana Menéndez A1 - Paula Dinorah Salgado KW - Argentina KW - grassroots organizations KW - subway workers KW - union democratization KW - unionism KW - working conditions KW - workplace AB -

Social conflicts in Argentina over the past decade have retrieved the essence of the capitalist dispute: the struggle between capital and labor as situated in the workplace and no longer across urban space as it was in the 1990s. In this context, both institutionalized and alternative union expressions regained their centrality for analyzing social reality. The revitalization of collective bargaining and the consequent repositioning of unions on the labor and political scene activated grassroots dynamics that sometimes challenged existing union structures. Few experiences of resistance were able to alter the balance of power as much as the workers’ organization of the Buenos Aires subway. This organization was able to achieve such gains because of a combination of the strategic importance of the subway to the city’s production and reproduction, the fact that the privatization of the firm was a time-limited concession rather than a direct sale, the union tradition and workers’ awareness of lost rights, and the incorporation of new workers with a history of political militancy.

VL - 42 L2 - eng CP - 2 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - The Essence Of Trade Unions: Understanding Identity, Ideology And Purpose JF - Work, Employment & Society Y1 - 2015 A1 - Hodder, Andy A1 - Paul Edwards KW - industrial and labor relations KW - trade unionism KW - union organizing KW - unionism KW - work and labor AB -

Academics have long investigated trade union behavior through the complex interaction of identity, ideology and purpose. At the same time, there have been increasing calls to gain a deeper understanding of the purpose of strategies but the two bodies of literature seldom overlap. The article proposes a framework to help understand the essence of trade unions and to situate strategies (such as organizing) in this broader context and bridge the gap between the literature on union purpose and identity and on strategies for renewal. It is argued that the essence of unions framework can assist with the analysis of both historical and contemporary trade unionism and allows both clarification and consideration of the range of concepts and terms already in use in the industrial relations literature.

VL - April 2015 L2 - eng ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Between Consultation and Collective Bargaining? The Changing Role of Non-Union Employee Representatives: A Case Study from the Finance Sector JF - Industrial Relations Journal Y1 - 2014 A1 - Tuckman, Alan A1 - Jeremé Snook KW - collective bargaining KW - employment relations KW - labor relations KW - non-union employee representatives KW - trade unions KW - unionism AB -

This article reviews the roles and activities of non-union employee representatives (NERs) acting as forum officers in a large Internet finance company. Currently there is little academic coverage concerning NERs in this sector, including their contributions to employment relations, their motivations and orientations towards representative role and activities, or relations with management and fellow employees. An important precondition to answering one of the main questions asked of NERs is whether such representation constitutes the foundation of some nascent trade unionism, or whether by acting as forum representatives, they are positioning themselves to support management agendas and outlook? The range of data from this article's longitudinal case study, indicating time usage including individual and collective representation, suggests that NERs allegiances and roles remain ambiguous, existing as they do in the intersection between consultation and collective bargaining. An important factor may be their capacity for independent action and independence from senior management.

VL - 45 L2 - eng CP - 1 ER - TY - BOOK T1 - Only One Thing Can Save Us: Why America Needs a New Kind of Labor Movement Y1 - 2014 A1 - Thomas Geoghegan KW - anti-unionism KW - labor movement KW - organized labor growth KW - right-to-work KW - unionism AB -

Is labor’s day over or is labor the only real answer for our time? In his new book, National Book Critics Circle Award finalist and labor lawyer Thomas Geoghegan argues that even as organized labor seems to be crumbling, a revived—but different—labor movement is the only way to stabilize the economy and save the middle class. But the inequality now reshaping the country goes beyond money and income: the places we work have become ever more rigid hierarchies. Geoghegan makes his argument for labor with stories, sometimes humorous but more often chilling, about the problems working people like his own clients—from cabdrivers to schoolteachers—now face, increasingly powerless in our union-free economy. He explains why a new kind of labor movement (and not just more higher education) is the real program the Democrats should push—not just to save the middle class from bankruptcy but to revive Keynes’s original and sometimes forgotten ideas for getting the rich to invest and reducing our balance of trade, and to promote John Dewey’s vision of a “democratic way of life,” one that would start in the schools and continue in our places of work.

PB - The New Press CY - New York L2 - eng ER - TY - JOUR T1 - The Role of Organized Labor in Civil Society JF - Sociology Compass Y1 - 2014 A1 - Brueggemann, John KW - anti-unionism KW - decline of organized labor KW - history KW - unionism AB -

Organized labor has served as a valuable element of civil society. The focus of this inquiry is how the decline of organized labor contributes to the weakening of the civil sphere. I first assess how unions have historically contributed to the positive functions of civil society. I then review the various factors that have led to the deterioration of organized labor and comment on the current state of the labor movement. I conclude with a discussion of the implications in terms of civil society and market culture.

VL - 8 L2 - eng CP - 8 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - American Labor and American Law: Exceptionalism and its Politics in the Decline of the American Labor Movement JF - Law, Culture and the Humanities Y1 - 2012 A1 - Friedman, Gerald KW - collective action KW - individual rights KW - labor law KW - labor movement KW - labor unions KW - unionism KW - values KW - workers’ rights AB -

Since Werner Sombart visited the United States at the beginning of the 20th century, scholars and activists have debated whether the American labor movement is “exceptionally” weak and conservative, and why. While some have accepted Exceptionalism and attributed it to the conservative values of American workers, others have attributed it instead to the power of business and the repressive posture of the American government. This article argues that the American legal tradition contributed to “exceptionalism” by privileging individual rights over collective action, and by limiting the power of organizations, including governments as well as unions, over individual choice. While this individualist bias was modified in the 1930s, the Supreme Court quickly restored the individual bias in American labor law, leading to the collapse of unions in the later 20th century.

L2 - eng ER - TY - JOUR T1 - The Changing Relationship Between Labor and the State in Contemporary Capitalism JF - Law, Culture and the Humanities Y1 - 2012 A1 - Howell, Chris KW - industrial relations KW - legal regulation KW - state activism KW - state power KW - unionism AB -

Over the course of the past quarter century, paralleling the decline of organized labor, there has been a marked increase in the role of the state in the industrial relations of advanced capitalist societies. This has come both in the form of state activism in the reconstruction of institutions, and through the replacement of collective self-regulation by employer and labor organizations with legal regulation. Unsurprisingly, these developments have failed to encourage a renewal of trade union collective power, leaving workers increasingly insecure, dependent upon markets, and vulnerable to the vagaries of state power.

L2 - eng ER - TY - JOUR T1 - The Representation of Non-Standard Workers: Theory and Culture of Collective Bargaining JF - Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research Y1 - 2012 A1 - Cella, Gian Primo KW - collective bargaining KW - collective bargaining theory KW - non-standard workers KW - representation KW - trade union cultures KW - unionism AB -

This article starts by looking at the intriguing similarities between the ends of the 19th and 20th centuries as far as the relationships between work and systems or structures of production are concerned. It considers the possible options for representing non-standard (or atypical) workers that can be usefully drawn from the past. Work is termed atypical as compared to the institutionalized forms dominant in the era of Taylorist-Fordist industrial production, although atypical work today has significant precedents in the 19th century. With regard to trade union cultures and policies, the thesis is that only by changing the logic and the practice of bargaining action, drawing inspiration from the theory of the Webbs, can suitable forms of representation be found for those components of non-standard labour more distant from the well-defined, stylized figure of the worker of the industrial age. This is a perspective that can represent both extremes of workers that offer their labour on the market: the highly skilled semi-independent worker, and the contingent worker with generic skills, who is possibly a member of the working poor. This could open the way for a unionism under which few would be excluded from collective representation, even if not ‘collective’ in the way understood in the past.

VL - 18 L2 - eng CP - 2 ER - TY - JOUR T1 - Review of the Book 'What Do Unions Do? A Twenty-Year Perspective' JF - Industrial and Labor Relations Review Y1 - 2010 A1 - A. J. Colvin KW - labor movement KW - labor unions KW - research KW - unionism AB -

[Excerpt] The 1984 publication of Richard Freeman and James Medoff’s What Do Unions Do? was a landmark event in research on labor unions. It challenged existing negative economic conceptions of the role of unions by presenting a two-faced model of unionism in which the negative monopoly face of unions was counter-balanced by a positive collective voice face. For those in the labor movement, this book became a powerful source of academic support for their value to society and the economy. Among academics, WDUD was equally influential, as it encouraged a renewed, more data-intensive and methodologically sophisticated approach to research on unions.

In the present volume, James Bennett and Bruce Kaufman have brought together an impressive set of scholars to review the progress in research on unions in the two decades since the publication of WDUD. The volume, which originated as a series of special issues in the Journal of Labor Research, serves both as an evaluation of the arguments presented in WDUD in light of subsequent research and more generally as an overview of the current state of research on unions. On both of these levels, the book is a tremendous success, albeit with certain limitations. It will be useful for anyone wanting a sourcebook on recent research on unions. Although not quite as accessible to non-specialist readers as WDUD itself, the volume should be particularly useful to academic researchers and to public policy and practitioner experts in the labor area. It will also provide a useful set of readings for graduate courses on labor unions, particularly those focusing on the economic effects of unions.

VL - 63 L2 - eng UR - http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/articles/573/ CP - 1 ER - TY - BOOK T1 - I Just Got Elected – Now What? A New Union Officer’s Handbook Y1 - 2007 A1 - Bill Barry KW - leadership KW - union leadership KW - union organizing KW - unionism AB -

This is an aggressive guide to building a strong and effective local union. Don’t buy this book if your goal is simply to be a local union officer like "Old Joe" was before you, doing things the way they’ve always been done and skating by as things just bump along. That, the author says, is what has weakened unions and made them less the force than they once were, and can be again. Rather than one or maybe a handful of officers running your local from the top, Barry says, you’ve got to educate and involve your members at every level, using the organizing model of unionism – and he shows you how to do it.

In straightforward language the author explains how to create a union that can be strong, grow and thrive in any environment. Chapters explain the organizing model (vs. the servicing model) of unionism; how to do the kind of strategic planning needed to build your union; analyze the various functions of the union and its finances, and build a communications network that involves and rallies the members. It explains the laws you have to look out for, how to deal with other officers and union staff, and how to organize yourself to do what needs to be done to pull it together and make it all work.

Bill Barry is a veteran union activist and labor studies program director at the Community College of Baltimore County’s Dundalk campus, where he teaches leadership skills, organizing, labor law, political action and other core subjects. If you’re a local officer who seriously wants to see your union become more effective, this book is a good place to start. (publisher’s statement)

PB - UCS Inc. CY - Annapolis, MD L2 - eng ER - TY - BOOK T1 - L.A. Story: Immigrant Workers and the Future of the U.S. Labor Movement Y1 - 2006 A1 - Ruth Milkman KW - economics KW - immigrant workers KW - labor movement KW - Los Angeles KW - organizing KW - unionism AB -

Sharp decreases in union membership over the last fifty years have caused many to dismiss organized labor as irrelevant in today’s labor market. In the private sector, only 8 percent of workers today are union members, down from 24 percent as recently as 1973. Yet developments in Southern California—including the successful Justice for Janitors campaign—suggest that reports of organized labor’s demise may be exaggerated. In L.A. Story, sociologist and labor expert Ruth Milkman explains how Los Angeles, once known as a company town hostile to labor, became a hotbed of unionism, and how immigrant workers emerged as the unlikely leaders in the battle for workers’ rights.

L.A. Story shatters many of the myths about modern labor with a close look at workers in four industries in Los Angeles: building maintenance, trucking, construction, and garment production. Though many blame deunionization and deteriorating working conditions on immigrants, Milkman shows that this conventional wisdom is wrong. Her analysis reveals that worsening work environments preceded the influx of foreign-born workers, who filled the positions only after native-born workers fled these suddenly undesirable jobs. Ironically, L.A. Story shows that immigrant workers, who many union leaders feared were incapable of being organized because of language constraints and fear of deportation, instead proved highly responsive to organizing efforts. As Milkman demonstrates, these mostly Latino workers came to their service jobs in the United States with a more group-oriented mentality than the native-born workers they replaced. Some also drew on experience in their native countries with labor and political struggles. This stock of fresh minds and new ideas, along with a physical distance from the east-coast centers of labor’s old guard, made Los Angeles the center of a burgeoning workers’ rights movement.

L.A.’s recent history highlights some of the key ingredients of the labor movement’s resurgence—new leadership, latitude to experiment with organizing techniques, and a willingness to embrace both top-down and bottom-up strategies. L.A. Story’s clear and thorough assessment of these developments points to an alternative, high-road national economic agenda that could provide workers with a way out of poverty and into the middle class. (publisher's statement)

PB - Russell Sage Foundation CY - New York SN - 0871546353 L2 - eng ER - TY - JOUR T1 - The Revitalization of the CWA: Integrating Collective Bargaining, Political Action, and Organizing JF - Industrial and Labor Relations Review Y1 - 2003 A1 - H. C. Katz A1 - Batt, R. A1 - Keefe, J. KW - collective bargaining KW - Communication Workers of America KW - contingency organizational theory KW - CWA KW - organization theory KW - organizing KW - resource dependence theory KW - unionism AB -

This case study of the Communications Workers of America (CWA) demonstrates the value of resource dependence and contingency organizational theories— two branches of organization theory, which has most commonly been used to interpret firm behavior—for analyzing union revitalization. Consistent with predictions of those theories, the CWA responded to a changed environment by abandoning strategies that no longer achieved organizational objectives, but retaining and bolstering strategies that continued to be effective. Furthermore, like the organizations analyzed in Jeffrey Pfeffer and Gerald Salancik's classic exposition of resource dependency theory, in the face of heightened environmental complexity and uncertainty the CWA used political action, growth strategies, and inter-organizational linkages to gain advantage. The CWA conformed to another prediction of contingency theory by using an integration strategy—specifically, by making simultaneous and interactive use of activities in collective bargaining, politics, and organizing—to spur innovation and respond to environmental complexity and uncertainty.

VL - 56 L2 - eng UR - http://digitalcommons.ilr.cornell.edu/hrpubs/1/ CP - 4 ER - TY - BOOK T1 - American Workers, American Unions: The 20th Century (3rd Edition) Y1 - 2002 A1 - Zieger, R. A1 - Gregor Gall KW - American workers KW - anti-unionism KW - labor movement KW - labor politics KW - labor unions KW - organizing KW - unionism AB -

Provides a concise and compelling history of American workers and their unions in twentieth-century America. This new edition features new chapters on the pre–1920 period, as well as an entirely new final chapter that covers developments of the 1980s and 1990s in detail. There the authors explore how economic change, union stagnation, and antilabor policies have combined to erode workers' standards and labor's influence in the political arena over the last two decades. They review current "alternatives to unionism" as means of achieving fair workplace representations but insist that strong unions remain essential in a democratic society. They argue that labor's new responsiveness to the concerns of women, minority groups, and low-wage workers, as well as its resurgent political activism, offer new hope for trade unionism. Also included in this third edition is new bibliographical material and a regularly updated on-line link to an extended bibliographical essay. (publisher's statement)

PB - Johns Hopkins University Press CY - Baltimore, MD L2 - eng ER - TY - BOOK T1 - Understanding European Trade Unionism: Between Market, Class and Society Y1 - 2001 A1 - Richard Hyman KW - Europe KW - globalization KW - trade unionism KW - trade unions KW - unionism AB -

In this comprehensive overview of trade unionism in Europe and beyond, Richard Hyman offers a fresh perspective on trade union identity, ideology and strategy. He shows how the varied forms and impact of different national movements reflect historical choices on whether to emphasize a role as market bargainers, mobilizers of class opposition or partners in social integration. The book demonstrates how these inherited traditions can serve as both resources and constraints in responding to the challenges which confront trade unions in today's working world.

PB - Sage Publications CY - London L2 - eng ER - TY - BOOK T1 - We Can't Eat Prestige: The Women Who Organized Harvard Y1 - 1997 A1 - Hoerr, J. KW - Harvard KW - organizing KW - unionism KW - unionization KW - women KW - workers’ rights AB -

This story explodes the popular belief that women white-collar workers tend to reject unionization and accept a passive role in the workplace. On the contrary, the women workers of Harvard University created a powerful and unique union - one that emphasizes their own values and priorities as working women and rejects unwanted aspects of traditional unionism. The workers involved comprise Harvard's 3,600-member "support staff," which includes secretaries, library and laboratory assistants, dental hygienists, accounting clerks, and a myriad of other office workers who keep a great university functioning. Even at prestigious private universities like Harvard and Yale, these workers - mostly women - have had to put up with exploitive management policies that denied them respect and decent wages because they were women.But the women eventually rebelled, declaring that they could not live on "prestige" alone. Encouraged by the women's movement of the early 1970's, a group of women workers (and a few men) began what would become a 15-year struggle to organize staff employees at Harvard. The women persisted in the face of patronizing and sexist attitudes of university administrators and leaders of their own national unions. Unconscionably long legal delays foiled their efforts. But they developed innovative organizing methods, which merged feminist values with demands for union representation and a means of influencing workplace decisions. Out of adversity came an unorthodox form of unionism embodied in the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers (HUCTW). Its founding was marked by an absorbing human drama that pitted unknown workers, such as Kris Rondeau, a lab assistant who came to head the union, against famous educators such as Harvard President Derek Bok and a panoply of prestigious deans.Other characters caught up in the drama included Harvard's John T. Dunlop, the nation's foremost industrial relations scholar and former U.S. Secretary of Labor. The drama was played out in innumerable hearings before the National Labor Relations Board, in the streets of Cambridge, and on the walks of historic Harvard Yard, where union members marched and sang and employed new tactics like "ballooning," designed to communicate a message of joy and liberation rather than the traditional "hate-the-boss" hostility.John Hoerr tells this story from the perspective of both Harvard administrators and union organizers. With unusual access to its meetings, leaders, and files, he examines the unique culture of a female-led union from the inside. Photographs add to the impact of this dramatic narrative. John Hoerr, a freelance writer, has been a journalist for more than thirty years at newspapers, magazines, public television, and United Press International. A specialist in labor reportage, he is the author of "And the Wolf Finally Came: The Decline of the American Steel Industry". (publisher's statement)

PB - Temple University Press CY - Philadelphia L2 - eng ER - TY - BOOK T1 - Coping With the Miracle: Japan's Unions Explore New International Relations Y1 - 1994 A1 - Williamson, H. KW - human rights KW - Japan KW - Japanese Trade Union Confederation KW - unionism KW - workers’ rights AB -

Assesses the Japanese Trade Union Confederation's actions since its 1991 commitment to promote human and trade union rights in Asia. Williamson argues that Japan's unions should and can do more to develop international solidarity and to support independent unionism, in Asia in particular.

PB - Pluto Press CY - Boulder, CO L2 - eng ER - TY - BOOK T1 - Robust Unionism: Innovations in the Labor Movement Y1 - 1991 A1 - Shostak, A. KW - anti-unionism KW - collective bargaining KW - grassroots activism KW - labor unions KW - organizing KW - unionism AB -

By examining labor union activities at the cutting edge, particularly at the grassroots level, Shostak provides a healthy corrective to the popular image that organized labor is all but moribund. Taking into account a wealth of novel experiments and innovative activities, he finds that organized labor is "robust," with a remarkable will to survive and the ability to flourish. Nevertheless, he cautions that trade unionism may still be overwhelmed by die-hard employer opposition, a hostile legal and legislative climate, lack of popular support, and internal conflicts over ends and means. This is a useful guide to how many unions function on a day-to-day basis in organizing workers and in collective bargaining. (from Library Journal)

PB - ILR Press CY - Ithaca, NY L2 - eng ER -