Intolerable vices: An inductive-deductive empirical analysis of union intolerance in relation to willingness to join a union

Abstract

Provided are empirical answers to questions about what conscious emotions underlie union intolerance and what elements of these emotions relate to willingness to join a union. We draw from the racial intolerance literature, with attention to emotions listed by religious institutions as intolerable vices. We also draw from personal websites and blogs authored by employees who espouse union hatred to identify vices seen as encouraged by unions. With this source material in hand, union intolerance is defined as sustained hatred evoked when unions are perceived by nonunion employees to encourage intolerable vices, with union members envisioned as first-line recipients of such encouragement. Turning to the natural sciences, we evoked inductive processes to identify representative vices and to construct a union intolerance scale. With samples of nonunion employees (Ns = 262, 267), a scalable dimension is revealed. Our deductive work draws from: (a) a heuristic framework, in which conscious feelings are thought to evoke an emotional readiness to act; and (b) psychodynamics, in which unacceptable emotions are thought to be projected onto targeted others. With these conceptualizations, a prediction model is advanced, with willingness to join positioned as an outcome of readiness to act stemming from intolerance. Using the sample data, a hypothesized negative relationship is shown, in which diminished willingness to join is associated with more intolerance. Contextualized in reference to the union history of sampled employees, the negative relationship is also shown as intensified in relation to claims of union discrimination. Directions for future research and implications for union recruitment are discussed.