Does Strike Action Stimulate Trade Union Membership Growth?

Most of the literature on strikes has addressed one of four issues: causation, variation between sectors and countries, trends over time and the relationship between strikes and other forms of collective and individual protest. Very little research has addressed the equally important questions of strike outcomes and trade union membership despite the substantial body of research on the causes of trade union membership decline and strategies for membership growth. In this paper we reverse the usual sequence of trade union membership as a causal factor in the genesis of strikes and examine the impact of strikes on trade union membership levels. After setting out the relevant theory and hypotheses, we use a unique seven‐year dataset of trade union membership joiners and leavers from a major British trade union with a substantial record of strike activity. Controlling for other possible determinants of trade union membership, we find that months in which there is strike action, whether national or local, are associated with a significantly higher rate of membership growth, measured both by the number of joiners and by the ratio of joiners to leavers. Data from new union members suggest that perceived injustice and perceived union effectiveness both motivate the decision to join.     

Trade Unions and Political Participation in the European Union: Still Providing a Democratic Dividend?

Decline in electoral participation is a feature of many Western democracies. In this paper, we focus on the relationship between trade union membership and political participation. Workplace authority structures, trade union membership and union presence have been identified as important influences on electoral participation. Based on a survey of employees in 15 member states of the European Union, we test for a relationship between political participation, union membership and union workplace presence. The independent effect of trade union membership on political participation was found to be both significant and positive and is associated with higher levels of political activism and electoral participation. Furthermore, an institutional context that facilitates high levels of union density seems likely to have an overall positive effect on citizen participation.     

The Composition of Union Membership: The Role of Pensioners in Italy

This paper considers changes in the membership composition of the three leading Italian trade union confederations during the last fifteen years. The analysis emphasizes the remarkable growth of membership among pensioners and the drop in active workers. The key issue here is that intergenerational aspects of unions' membership components are taken into account in the bargaining process. Unions internalize unemployment externalities on pension benefits resultant on the wage outcome as they consider the welfare of all their members in the economy. A formulation of the union monopoly model with endogenous membership supports these findings, while the econometric evaluation of the membership component effects shows that unions are forced to pursue wage moderation and improvements in employment conditions.     

Raising Trade Union Membership Concentration, 1892–1987: The Relative Effects of Mergers and Membership Change

A number of recent studies measure trade union membership concentration using the Herfindahl index. This study uses the same measure to examine the relative effects of the different factors that influenced the level of British union membership concentration between 1892 and 1987. Five factors are identified as influencing this development: mergers, formations, dissolutions, breakaways, and membership change. Marked occupational differences in the relative effect of these factors are shown. In aggregate terms, mergers and membership change tend to be complementary in effect until 1946 and counteractive thereafter.     

Why Do Non–union Employees Want to Unionize? Evidence from Britain

This paper assesses the determinants of the level of support for union membership among non–union employees. Using data from a representative sample of non–union employees in Great Britain, the research confirms the importance of job dissatisfaction, left–wing views and perceived union instrumentality as predictors of willingness to join a trade union, union instrumentality being the most significant.     

Union Growth in Malaysia and Singapore

This paper examines the determinants of trade union membership growth in Malaysia and Singapore for the period 1965–1983 and finds that the standard Western-based aggregate model of trade union growth applies to these countries. However, regression results suggest that the model's key variables have differential effects in the two countries.     

Institutions and Strategies: Trends and Obstacles to Recruiting Workers into Trade Unions in Poland

In this article, we examine the role of institutional context, organizational structures and trade union strategies in tempering membership decline in the number of trade unions in Poland. Empirical data include membership statistics collected for NSZZ Solidarno?? and 54 affiliates of two other largest trade union confederations (OPZZ and FZZ) supplemented by semi‐structured interviews with union leaders. In a decentralized collective bargaining system in Poland, a centralized trade union confederation (NSZZ Solidarno??) can more easily shift resources to efficiently organize workers than decentralized confederations, OPZZ and FZZ, whose development is mostly driven by competing trade unions representing narrower occupational groups. In conclusion, this observation is put in a broader context of the debates about trade union renewal in Eastern Europe.     

Trade Union Concentration and the Determination of Wages: The Case of Teachers in England and Wales

Multi-unionism is a common feature of the industrial relations scene, yet to date there has been relatively little economic analysis of its effects, in particular on the outcome of wage negotiations. In this paper, we examine the impact of multi-unionism—specifically, the degree of union membership concentration—on the determination of the relative pay of a particular occupational group, namely that of schoolteachers in England and Wales. We measure teacher trade union concentration using the Herfindahl index of concentration, and find that, after controlling for other possible influences, changes in the value of this index have a positive impact on schoolteachers' relative pay. In addition, we find union membership concentration to be a better indicator of 'union pushfulness' effects in wage determination than the traditional measure, union density. These findings are potentially of wider significance for the analysis of wage determination in multi-union environments.     

Female Part-time Workers' Attitudes to Trade Unions in Britain

This paper discusses the reasons that can be offered for the lower trade union membership rates of female part-time workers in the UK and focuses in particular on female part-timers' attitudes to trade unions. The findings are based on original research: 50 qualitative interviews with female part-time workers in the retail industry. The paper argues that female part-timers are supportive of the aims of the trade union movement and concludes that an integrated approach is necessary in order to understand part-timers' unionization rates. This includes structural factors, the approach that trade unions have taken towards part-time workers and attitudes towards trade unions.     

Academic Workers and Union Membership: An Inevitable Dilution of Solidarity?

The growth of service employment and new forms of work has supposedly fostered the diffusion of individual orientations at the expense of traditional forms of union solidarity. These developments suggest that academics are likely to manifest an individualist orientation and a weak attachment to trade union membership. Based on a survey of unionized employees in a university setting, we examine whether there are differences in union attachment and solidarity between professionals and other occupational groups.     

The Viability of Trade Union Organization: A Bargaining Unit Analysis

The paper develops a model of trade union behaviour based on the concept of the viable bargaining unit. Viability rests on five conditions: membership level, service level, membership participation, employer recognition, and facilities. Unions are seen as portfolios of viable and inviable bargaining units. Six propositions are derived, concerning union scale, growth, the impact of statutory recognition provisions, the emergence of conglomerate unions, governance structures, and relations with employers. Employer dependence is central, and a simple game‐theoretic approach is used to discuss employer co‐operation. Viability at the union level is achieved by portfolio diversification and employer co‐operation.     

Peering into the Black Hole: The Downside of the New Employment Relations in the UK

Using a national sample of 1,000 employees, this paper examines the proposition that those working in so-called 'black hole' organizations (i.e. where there is neither a set of progressive HRM practices nor a recognized trade union) will report more negative attitudes and work experiences than those in settings where there is either HRM, a trade union presence or both. The results lend some support to this hypothesis with respect to job satisfaction and organizational commitment and in judgements about experiences of fairness of treatment and trust in management. However, the most negative views about employment relations are reported by those who belong to a union in workplaces with little HRM. The findings indicate that it is HRM practices rather than trade union membership that have the major impact on attitudes and experiences. Even in black hole organizations some employees report satisfaction. This can be largely explained by a positive psychological contract between individual and organization. The implications for the role of trade unions in the promotion of fairness at work are discussed.     

Executive Compensation in American Unions

We explore compensation of labor union leaders using U.S. panel data on more than 75,000 organization‐years from 2000 to 2007. We find that membership, estimated average wages, and dues are strongly related to the compensation of the leaders of American labor unions, even after controlling for organization size and organization fixed effects. That is, within the same union over time, higher levels of these measures are associated with higher levels of pay for union leaders.     

An Industrial Relations Approach to the Free Rider Problem: Young People and Trade Union Membership in the UK

This is an investigation into the reasons for young people's union membership decisions in the UK. It is carried out by an examination of a survey of London sixteen-year-old school-leavers (1979–80). The data are used in two ways. First, there is a comparative examination of a similar study based on the Bain-Elsheikh propensity-opportunity model. Second, the data are re-examined to identify different and distinct strands of motivation or action, intrinsically and externally determined. These are related to formal theories from different disciplines which are linked together by the establishment of a definition of a trade union as a group, institution and social movement. The theory is extended to develop hypotheses about membership behaviour in general.     

A Switch or a Process? Disentangling the Effects of Union Membership on Political Attitudes in Switzerland and the UK

The paper examines the effects of union membership on individual political attitudes using panel data for Swiss and British workers. Considering union membership as an on/off switch (member vs. non-member), as it is often done, it is only possible to distinguish between a selection effect (unions attract like-minded individuals) and a molding effect (the experience of membership has a transformational impact on the individual). Exploiting the longitudinal structure of the data reveals that union membership is best characterized not as a switch, but as a dynamic process involving anticipation effects (which start well before becoming affiliated) and maturation effects (which become noticeable only after a certain duration of membership and may not dissipate after leaving the union). Empirically, the selection effect appears the most important in the two countries we focus on, while the molding effect is less pronounced. Anticipation and maturation effects are also non-negligible and hitherto unexplored.     

Measuring Trade Union Democracy: The Case of the UK Civil and Public Services Association

The Civil and Public Services Association (CPSA) has experienced a substantial number of organizational changes over the last 25 years, both as a voluntary response to membership concerns and to comply with legislative demands. Have these changes made the CPSA more or less ‘democratic’? An answer to this question must acknowledge that individuals interpret ‘trade union democracy’ in different ways. This paper evaluates the changes in the CPSA’s organizational structure and internal decision‐making procedures according to the emphasis of four models of trade union democracy: liberal pluralism, grass‐roots activism, individual accountability and consumer trade unionism.     

Inequality and Union Membership: The Influence of Relative Earnings and Inequality Attitudes

Using surveys from the International Social Survey Programme covering the period 1985–2002 for seven European countries (West and East Germany, Sweden, Norway, Italy, the Netherlands and Great Britain), we examine the effect of relative earnings on union membership and show that union density is higher among workers in the intermediate earnings group than among low or high earners. Next, we examine the association of inequality attitudes with union membership and demonstrate that union membership is not only motivated by instrumental considerations related to relative earnings, but also by normative concerns about inequality. We interpret our findings suggesting that rising earnings inequality is in itself a source of union decline.     

The Influence of Leadership and Member Attitudes in Understanding the Nature of Union Participation

There has been a growth of interest among industrial relations scholars in the functions of union leadership at both national and local levels. This paper presents a survey-based analysis of the impact of union leaders on member participation in Cypriot public-sector trade unions. It indicates that active leaders promote participation both directly and indirectly, through their influence on members' attitudes towards the union. The study emphasizes the importance of leadership in facilitating further understanding of member participation in trade unions.     

The Duration of Union Membership in Italy: A Research Note

Thanks to direct access to union databases, this note can answer two new questions in industrial relations: how long union membership lasts and what are the determinants of its duration within an open‐shop context. This also allows for conceptualizing union membership as a much more dynamic phenomenon than in previous studies, where it was considered a static condition whose causes or effects were to be investigated. Regression analysis applied to a sample of 29,035 Italian workers highlights that union membership duration is a positive but declining function of age. Furthermore, women, flexible workers, foreign ones, and those working in cities tend to show less attachment to union membership than the other workers.     

The Collapse of Compulsory Unionism? Collective Organization in Highly Unionized British Companies, 1979–1991

This paper examines compulsory union membership in 50 highly unionized companies between 1979 and 1991. One hundred per cent membership has collapsed among non-manuals. Post-entry 100% membership remains in the majority of manual units, as does the pre-entry closed shop among craft workers. Fewer written union membership agreements, and more unwritten verbal agreements and unofficial understandings, were evident. This pattern is accounted for by the interplay of four factors: product market competition, managerial indulgency, workplace collective organization and labour turnover.