Kategoria BISAC: Political Science >> Labor & Industrial Relations

From gloomy times in the 1980s, the American labor movement has returned to apparent prominence through the efforts of a new generation of energetic and progressive leaders. A distinguished group of authors examines this resurgence and the potential of American unions with sympathetic yet critical eyes. Experts from a wide variety of disciplines industrial relations, political science, economics, and sociology identify the central developments, analyze the strengths and weaknesses of the new initiatives, and assess the progress made and the prospects for the future. Though all agree on the...

Although labor unions have faced a decline in membership in recent decades, they have not necessarily lost their political clout. The Unions and the Democrats illuminates the inner dynamics of labor's relationship to the American political system over the past generation. It examines organized labor from the Johnson administration through the 2000 elections, showing that labor's alliance with the Democratic Party has endured despite changes in the economy and the revival of conservatism.

Drawing on extensive interviews with union leaders and lobbyists, Taylor E. Dark...

In a dark departure from our standard picture of whistleblowers, C. Fred Alford offers a chilling account of the world of people who have come forward to protest organizational malfeasance in government agencies and in the private sector. The conventional story high-minded individual fights soulless organization, is persecuted, yet triumphs in the end is seductive and pervasive. In speaking with whistleblowers and their families, lawyers, and therapists, Alford discovers that the reality of whistleblowing is grim. Few whistleblowers succeed in effecting change; even fewer are regarded as...

Women now comprise the majority of the working class. Yet this fundamental transformation has gone largely unnoticed. This book is about how the sex of workers matters in understanding the jobs they do, the problems they face at work, and the new labor movements they are creating in the United States and globally. In The Sex of Class, twenty prominent scholars, labor leaders, and policy analysts look at the implication of this "sexual revolution" for labor policy and practice.

The Sex of Class introduces readers to some of the most vibrant and forward-thinking...

Once a fundamental civic right, strikes are now constrained and contested. In an unusual and thought-provoking history, Josiah Bartlett Lambert shows how the ability to strike was transformed from a fundamental right that made the citizenship of working people possible into a conditional and commercialized function. Arguing that the executive branch, rather than the judicial branch, was initially responsible for the shift in attitudes about the necessity for strikes and that the rise of liberalism has contributed to the erosion of strikers' rights, Lambert analyzes this transformation in...

The recent emergence of joint business-labour sector councils represents a major innovation in Canadian industrial relations. The federal government and certain provincial governments have developed these councils as a key component of their human-resource development initiative. This collection brings together the views of economists, political scientists, and industrial-relations specialists on this important experiment.

The authors suggest that, despite its innovative spirit, the sectoral initiative is fragile. Its future viability and wider diffusion depend on mutual trust and...

While the unemployment rate for young people has always tended to be well above the average, this tendency has been greatly accentuated in recent years. There is a large turnover in the youth labour force, and the employment of experience of those between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five has been marked by seasonal variations. This study discusses the factors which contribute to the high youth unemployment rate, examines the historical record of labout force participation, and provides some projections into the future.

The first in-depth analysis of temporary work in Canada, Leah F. Vosko's important new book examines a number of important trends, including the commodification of labour power; the decline of the full-time, full-year job as a norm; and the gendered character of prevailing employment relationships. Spanning the period from the late nineteenth to the late twentieth century, Temporary Work traces the evolution of the temporary employment relationship in Canada and places it in an international context. It explores how, and to what extent, 'temporary work' is becoming a norm for a diverse...

In the first half of the twentieth century, many of Toronto's immigrant Jews eked out a living in the needle-trade sweatshops of Spadina Avenue. In response to their expliotation on the shop floor, immigrant Jewish garment workers built one of the most advanced sections of the Canadian and American labour movements. Much more than a collective bargaining agency, Toronto's Jewish labour movement had a distinctly socialist orientation and grew out of a vibrant Jewish working-class culture.

Ruth Frager examines the development of this unique movement, its sources of strength, and its...

The growth of the United Auto Workers in Canada dramatically improved the lives of thousands of workers. Not only did it achieve impressive bargaining gains, but the UAW was regarded as one of the most democratic and socially progressive of the major industrial unions in North America. However, workers in the automotive sector, who constituted the largest segment of the UAW membership, witnessed blatant gender inequalities. From 1937 to 1979, UAW leaders did little to challenge these inequalities. Both the union and the workplace remained highly masculine settings in which male workers and...