The Cowboy Mentality

Organizers and Occupational Commitment in the New Labor Movement

Datos Bibliográficos

ID11229657
AutoresDaisy Rooks (autor de correspondencia)
Año2003
Volumen28
Número3
Páginas33-62
Fecha de publicación2003-09-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaLabor Studies Journal (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0160-449X • E-ISSN: 1538-9758
EditorialSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0160449x0302800302
OpenAlexW2115138064
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas9
Referencias citadas31

This paper details the experiences of union organizers in Sweeney's "new labor movement." It examines the occupational demands that organizers must contend with, such as extensive travel, long hours and emotionally demanding work. The author then describes the occupational culture of organizing, otherwise known as "the cow boy mentality." Far from a centrally coordinated retention strat egy, the cowboy mentality is a set of assumptions about organizing being more than a job, being superior to other forms of work in the labor movement, and being best experienced with an intensity resembling a military boot camp. The author then demonstrates how the cowboy mentality paradoxically strengthens the occupa tional commitment of some organizers, while alienating and ex cluding others. Interviews with organizers reveal that women and people of color are most likely to be alienated by the cowboy men tality, thus undermining new labor's efforts to diversify the move ment

Aesthetics · Art · Movement (music · Political science · Public relations · Set (abstract data type · Sociology · Work (physics · Anarchism and Radical Politics · Labor Movements and Unions · Psychology · Race, History, and American Society · Social Psychology