Is U.S. Labor Changing as Fast as the Workplace

AT FIRST GLANCE the coupling of these two anthologies in one review might seem a matter of apples and oranges. A Labor Mo ventent for the Century, edited by Gregory Mantsios, focuses on the possibilities for US unions offered by the new leaders of the AFL-CIO; while Unions and Workplace Reorganization, edited by Bruce Nissen, looks at the profound changes in work organization associated with lean production. Both anthologies present valuable discussion and debate about their main topics, but brush only lightly and infrequently on the subject matter of the other. Yet, from different angles they both address the future of organized labour in the United States. Indeed, the points of departure of these two collections say much about the changes and continuities taking place in America's House of Labour since the election of the New Voice team of John Sweeney, Rich Trumka, and Linda Chavez-Thompson to the top three positions of the AFL-CIO in October 1995. For Mantsios this 1995 leadership change is the take-off point for the debate and speculation in the book's 21 contributions. That election saw Lane Kirkland, federation chief since 1979, resign under protest, and former second-in-command Thomas Donahue go down to defeat in the AFL-CIO ' s first contested election in its forty year history. As might be expected from such an anthology, its basic view is that the arrival of the New Voice means more than a mere personnel change in the Washington, DC headquarters. In the Introduction Mantsios describes the outlook of New Voice supporters as follows

Business · Demographic economics · Economics · Labour economics · Labor Movements and Unions

• Labor History Bibliography, 1999

  Peter Meyer Filardo•Labor History•2000

  Add to list