Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950

Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 PDF Author: Rosemary Feurer
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 0252073193
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 360

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Book Description
In Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 Rosemary Feurer examines the fierce battles between Midwestern electrical workers and bitterly anti-union electrical and metal industry companies during the 1930s and 40s. Organized as District 8 of the United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers (UE) and led by open Communist William Sentner, workers developed a style of unionism designed to confront corporate power and to be a force for social transformation in their community and nation. Feurer studies District 8 through a long lens, establishing early twentieth century contexts for these conflicts. Exploring the role of radicals in local movement formation, Feurer argues for a "civic" unionism that could connect community and union concerns to build solidarity and contest the political economy. District 8's spirited unionism included plant occupations in St. Louis and Iowa, campaigns to democratize economic planning, and local strategies for national bargaining that were depicted as a Communist conspiracy by a corporate influenced Congressional committee in Evansville, Indiana. District 8 was destroyed through reactionary networks and the anti-Communist backlash of the mid-twentieth century, but Feurer argues that its history tells another side of the labor movement s formation in the 1930s and 40s, and can inform current struggles against corporate power in the modern global economy. A website with more photographs and documents is available at www.radicalunionism.niu.edu "

Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950

Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 PDF Author: Rosemary Feurer
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 0252073193
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 360

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Book Description
In Radical Unionism in the Midwest, 1900-1950 Rosemary Feurer examines the fierce battles between Midwestern electrical workers and bitterly anti-union electrical and metal industry companies during the 1930s and 40s. Organized as District 8 of the United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers (UE) and led by open Communist William Sentner, workers developed a style of unionism designed to confront corporate power and to be a force for social transformation in their community and nation. Feurer studies District 8 through a long lens, establishing early twentieth century contexts for these conflicts. Exploring the role of radicals in local movement formation, Feurer argues for a "civic" unionism that could connect community and union concerns to build solidarity and contest the political economy. District 8's spirited unionism included plant occupations in St. Louis and Iowa, campaigns to democratize economic planning, and local strategies for national bargaining that were depicted as a Communist conspiracy by a corporate influenced Congressional committee in Evansville, Indiana. District 8 was destroyed through reactionary networks and the anti-Communist backlash of the mid-twentieth century, but Feurer argues that its history tells another side of the labor movement s formation in the 1930s and 40s, and can inform current struggles against corporate power in the modern global economy. A website with more photographs and documents is available at www.radicalunionism.niu.edu "

Radical Unionism

Radical Unionism PDF Author: Ralph Darlington
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781608463305
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Traces the entwined international legacy of revolutionary syndicalism and the communist movement. --From publisher description.

The Union Makes Us Strong

The Union Makes Us Strong PDF Author: David Wellman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521629683
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 386

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Book Description
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.

Radical Unions in Europe and the Future of Collective Interest Representation

Radical Unions in Europe and the Future of Collective Interest Representation PDF Author: Heather Connolly
Publisher: Peter Lang Gmbh, Internationaler Verlag Der Wissenschaften
ISBN: 9783034308038
Category : Europe
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
This book analyses contemporary trends in radical unionism in Europe. It contains nine country case-studies that probe the limits and possibilities of trade union renewal and focus on radical activity. It assesses the degree to which we are witnessing the emergence of 'radical political unionism' as an alternative model of European trade unionism.

Reds or Rackets?

Reds or Rackets? PDF Author: Howard Kimeldorf
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520912779
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
Why is the American working class different? For generations, scholars and activists alike have wrestled with this question, with an eye to explaining why workers in the United States are not more like their radicalized European counterparts. Approaching the question from a different angle, Reds or Rackets? provides a fascinating examination of the American labor movement from the inside out, as it were, by analyzing the divergent sources of radicalism and conservatism within it. Kimeldorf focuses on the political contrast between East and West Coast longshoremen from World War I through the early years of the Cold War, when the difference between the two unions was greatest. He explores the politics of the West Coast union that developed into a hot bed of working class insurgency and contrasts it with the conservative and racket-ridden East Coast longshoreman's union. Two unions, based in the same industry—as different as night and day. The question posed by Kimeldorf is, why? Why "reds" on one coast and racketeers on the other? To answer this question Kimeldorf provides a systematic comparison of the two unions, illuminating the political consequences of occupational recruitment, industry structure, mobilization strategies, and industrial conflict during this period. In doing so, Reds orRackets? sheds new light on the structural and historical bases of radical and conservative unionism. More than a comparative study of two unions, Reds or Rackets? is an exploration of the dynamics of trade unionism, sources of membership loyalty, and neglected aspects of working class consciousness. It is an incisive and valuable study that will appeal to historians, social scientists, and anyone interested in understanding the political trajectory of twentieth-century American labor.

The Rise & Repression of Radical Labor in the United States, 1877-1918

The Rise & Repression of Radical Labor in the United States, 1877-1918 PDF Author: Daniel Roland Fusfeld
Publisher: Charles Kerr
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 60

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Book Description
A short, but packed, history of the radical labor movements in the US. "The great virtue of this splendid little book is that it reminds us that there was radicalism in working class America and that it was defeated by means neither democratic nor even decent. From the brutality of the Pinkertons and the National Guard to the paternalism of the National Civic Federation, from the judicial murders of the Haymarket martyrs to the vigilante lynching of Frank Little, this is the story of injunction and imprisonment, of the framing up and the gunning down of dissident workers. No assessment of American radicalism, or of American democracy, is complete without the kind of information Professor Fusfeld provides." [Dave Roediger]

Class Struggle Unionism

Class Struggle Unionism PDF Author: Joe Burns
Publisher: Haymarket Books
ISBN: 1642596817
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 199

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Book Description
For those who want to build a fighting labor movement, there are many questions to answer. How to relate to the union establishment which often does not want to fight? Whether to work in the rank and file of unions or staff jobs? How much to prioritize broader class demands versus shop floor struggle? How to relate to foundation-funded worker centers and alternative union efforts? And most critically, how can we revive militancy and union power in the face of corporate power and a legal system set up against us? Class struggle unionism is the belief that our union struggle exists within a larger struggle between an exploiting billionaire class and the working class which actually produces the goods and services in society. Class struggle unionism looks at the employment transaction as inherently exploitative. While workers create all wealth in society, the outcome of the wage employment transaction is to separate workers from that wealth and create the billionaire class. From that simple proposition flows a powerful and radical form of unionism. Historically, class struggle unionists placed their workplace fights squarely within this larger fight between workers and the owning class. Viewing unionism in this way produces a particular type of unionism which both fights for broader class issues but is also rooted in workplace-based militancy. Drawing on years of labor activism and study of labor tradition Joe Burns outlines the key set of ideas common to class struggle unionism and shows how these ideas can create a more militant, democtractic and fighting labor movement.

Big Bill Haywood and the Radical Union Movement

Big Bill Haywood and the Radical Union Movement PDF Author: Joseph Robert Conlin
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Haywood, William Dudley, 1869-1928
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description


Left Wing Unionism

Left Wing Unionism PDF Author: David Joseph Saposs
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Labor unions
Languages : en
Pages : 200

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Book Description


Race and Radicalism in the Union Army

Race and Radicalism in the Union Army PDF Author: Mark A. Lause
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 0252091701
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
In this compelling portrait of interracial activism, Mark A. Lause documents the efforts of radical followers of John Brown to construct a triracial portion of the Federal Army of the Frontier. Mobilized and inspired by the idea of a Union that would benefit all, black, Indian, and white soldiers fought side by side, achieving remarkable successes in the field. Against a backdrop of idealism, racism, greed, and the agonies and deprivations of combat, Lause examines links between radicalism and reform, on the one hand, and racialized interactions among blacks, Indians, and whites, on the other. Lause examines how this multiracial vision of American society developed on the Western frontier. Focusing on the men and women who supported Brown in territorial Kansas, Lause examines the impact of abolitionist sentiment on relations with Indians and the crucial role of nonwhites in the conflict. Through this experience, Indians, blacks, and whites began to see their destinies as interdependent, and Lause discusses the radicalizing impact of this triracial Unionism upon the military course of the war in the upper Trans-Mississippi. The aftermath of the Civil War destroyed much of the memory of the war in the West, particularly in the Indian Territory (now Oklahoma). The opportunity for an interracial society was quashed by the government's willingness to redefine the lucrative field of Indian exploitation for military and civilian officials and contractors. Assessing the social interrelations, ramifications, and military impact of nonwhites in the Union forces, Race and Radicalism in the Union Army explores the extent of interracial thought and activity among Americans in this period and greatly expands the historical narrative on the Civil War in the West.