The Union Makes Us Strong

By David Wellman and Wellman, David Wellman, David

Book Overview

American labour history is typically interpreted by scholars as a history of defeat. Hidden by this conventional wisdom are a handful of militant unions that did not follow the putative Congress of Industrial Organizations trajectory. Based on three years of ethnographic research, this book examines a union that organised itself to systematically challenge management's rule on the shopfloor: San Francisco's longshore union. American unionism looks quite different than conventional wisdom suggests when everyday union practices are observed. American labour's trajectory, this book argues, is neither inevitable nor determined; militant, democratic forms of unionism are possible in the United States; and collective bargaining does not automatically eliminate contests for workplace control. The contract is a bargain that reflects and reproduces fundamental disagreement; it states how production and conflict will proceed.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0521450055
• ISBN13: 9780521450058
• Release Date: August 1970
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 386 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 6.3" x 9.3"