Labor Studies Journal articles from June 1999

Labor Studies Journal archives from June 1999

Leadership development and organizing: for what kind of union?
June 22, 1999... The initial analysis in this article of the current state of the labor movement is straightforward and well organized. However, the author then takes the leap that unions were once and should now be "working class social movement institutions."...

Leadership development and organizing: for what kind of union? - reply.(response to article by Michael Eisenscher in this issue, p. 3)
June 22, 1999... Michael Eisenscher's (1999) basic point, that unions need to mobilize the rank-and-file members rather than rely primarily on staff, is valid and important. There is a real danger that unions will atrophy if members view unions as businesses...

Leadership development and organizing: for what kind of union?(response to article by Michael Eisenscher in this issue, p. 3)
June 22, 1999... Scope of the Crisis Confronting Unions In the relatively short time since John Sweeney, Richard Trumka, and Linda Chavez-Thompson took the helm of the AFL-CIO, many unions have begun to make organizing a central focus of their attention....

Strike law and ADR in Hungary: a model for labor movements in Central and Eastern Europe?(Alternative Dispute Resolution)
June 22, 1999... Nearly ten years have passed since countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States as well as in Central and Eastern Europe have planned, developed and inaugurated their re-democratization strategies. During this period much has been...

Workers compensation reform past and present: an analysis of issues and changes in benefits.
June 22, 1999... Over the past decade, workers' compensation has undergone a period of reform initiated by business groups and focusing on cost containment. The AFL-CIO Department of Occupational Safety and Health describes these reforms as a Mean-spirited...

From "business unionism" to "social movement unionism": the case of AFL-CIO Milwaukee County Labor Council.
June 22, 1999... Shortly after the election of John Sweeney to the presidency of the AFL-CIO, the AFL-CIO News declared that "the revolutionary changes in the labor movement moved closer to the grassroots with the reorganization of the AFL-CIO's field...

Unions at the Crossroads: Strategic Membership, Financial, and Political Perspectives.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Marick F. Masters. Westport, CT: Quorum Books, 1997. 248 pp. $65 cloth. What can onlookers like us in labor education know about the financial condition and direction of organized labor? Given an on-going forty-yearlong drop in union...

Economic Development: A Union Guide to the High Road.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By AFL-CIO Human Resources Development Institute. Washington, D.C.: AFL-CIO Human Resources Development Institute, 1998. 131 pp. Price n/a, paper. The opening sentence of Economic Development states that its goal for a "people-first"...

Swings and Misses: Moribund Labor Relations in Professional Baseball.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Kenneth M. Jennings. Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997. 259 pp. $55 cloth. The title is an accurate indication of the author's opinion of labor relations in professional baseball. After summarizing approximately twenty-five years of...

Stee-rike Four! What's Wrong with the Business of Baseball?(Review)
June 22, 1999... Edited by Daniel R. Marburger. Westport, CT: Praeger Press, 1997. 218 pp. $55 cloth. This book, a collection of essays from a variety of authors, presents a number of perspectives, some contrary, in an attempt to show how the business of...

The International Labor Organization: The International Standards System and Basic Human Rights.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Hector G. Bartolomei De La Cruz, Geraldo Von Potobsky and Lee Swepston. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996. 296 pp. $69.95 cloth. At last in English, a book on the International Labor Organization that includes its history, mechanism, and...

Japan Works: Power and Paradox in Postwar Industrial Relations.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By John Price. Ithaca, NY: ILR Press, 1997. 315 pp. $45 cloth, $17.95 paper. This important volume presents a revisionist account of postwar Japanese Industrial Relations (IR). Its significance lies in its careful reconstruction of the...

Worker Rights and Labor Standards in Asia's Four New Tigers: A Comparative Perspective.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Marvin J. Levine. New York, NY: Plenum Publishing, 1997. 470 pp. $69.50 cloth. This volume surveys worker rights and labor standards across China, Indonesia, Thailand, and Malaysia. These four countries were, until very recently, dubbed...

The Welfare State in Transition: Reforming the Swedish Model.(Review)
June 22, 1999... Edited by Richard B. Freeman, Robert Topel, and Birgitta Swedenborg. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997. 488 pp. $74 cloth. This volume is the product of a joint research project conducted by the National Bureau of Economic...

Trade Unionism in Recession.(Review)
June 22, 1999... Edited by Duncan Gallie, Roger Penn, and Michael Rose. New York: Oxford University Press; 1996. 360 pp. $80 cloth. Trade Unionism in Recession looks at the decline of the British labor movement in the 1980s and asks whether the reversals...

The Business of Benevolence: Industrial Paternalism in Progressive America.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Andrea Tone. Cornell University Press: Ithaca, NY, 1997. 264 pp. $39.95 cloth. Much has been written about the changing workplace and the breakup of the old implicit workplace social contract. The 1996 presidential campaign provided a...

The Challenge of Interracial Unionism: Alabama Coal Miners, 1878-1921.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Daniel Letwin. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 1998. 289 pp. $49.95 cloth, $19.95 paper. From our vantage in the late twentieth century, it is hard to imagine a movement for interracial unionism in Alabama a century...

Power at Odds: The 1922 National Railroad Shopmen's Strike.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Colin J. Davis. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1997. 244 pages. $49.95 cloth, $19.95 paper. Many comparisons have been drawn between the attacks on organized labor during the 1920s and those of the 1980s - the use of permanent...

The Quest for a Living Wage: The History of the Federal Minimum Wage Program.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By Willis J. Nordlund. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1997. 240 pp. $57.95 cloth. Sixty years have passed since the United States Congress enacted the first federal minimum wage law, the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Early attempts at a...

Corporate Business and Capitalist Classes.(Review)
June 22, 1999... By John Scott. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997. 371 pp. $85 cloth, $24.95 paper. Corporate Business and Capitalist Classes is probably the most thorough examination ever conducted of the organizational form of large business...