The Bosses’ Union
$30.00
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Trade Discount | 5 + | 25% |
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Description
At the opening of the twentieth century, labor strife repeatedly racked the nation. Union organization and collective bargaining briefly looked like a promising avenue to stability. But both employers and many middle-class observers remained wary of unions exercising independent power.
Vilja Hulden reveals how this tension provided the opening for pro-business organizations to shift public attention from concerns about inequality and dangerous working conditions to a belief that unions trampled on an individual's right to work. Inventing the term closed shop, employers mounted what they called an open-shop campaign to undermine union demands that workers at unionized workplaces join the union. Employer organizations lobbied Congress to resist labor's proposals as tyrannical, brought court cases to taint labor's tactics as illegal, and influenced newspaper coverage of unions. While employers were not a monolith nor all-powerful, they generally agreed that unions were a nuisance. Employers successfully leveraged money and connections to create perceptions of organized labor that still echo in our discussions of worker rights.
"With keen analysis and vivid prose, Vilja Hulden brilliantly illuminates how U.S. employers fought furiously to undermine unions and blunt demands for workplace democracy in the early twentieth century, creating a warped legacy that still haunts our labor relations and diminishes our politics. This powerfully argued book is essential reading for anyone who wishes to understand the long historical roots of today’s reawakened fights for worker justice.”–Joseph A. McCartin, author of Collision Course: Ronald Reagan, the Air Traffic Controllers, and the Strike that Changed America Vilja Hulden is a teaching assistant professor at the University of Colorado Boulder. AcknowledgmentsIntroduction
Chapter 1. The Invention of the Closed Shop: The NAM Weighs In on the Labor QuestionChapter 2. The Deep History of the Closed or Union ShopChapter 3. The Potential and Limitations of the Trade AgreementChapter 4. The Range and Roots of Employer Positions on LaborChapter 5. Employers, Unite? The Bases and Challenges of Employer Collective ActionChapter 6. The Battle over the StateChapter 7. The Battle over Public OpinionChapter 8. Defending the Status Quo Ante BellumChapter 9. The Gift That Keeps on Giving: Institutionalizing the Open-Shop Ideal in the 1920sCoda: The Working Class and the Prerequisites of PowerAbbreviationsA Note on Sources and MethodsNotesIndexAdditional information
Dimensions | 1 × 6 × 9 in |
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