The dynamics of union responses to migrant workers in Canada

Abstract

This study examines how five unions in the Canadian province of Alberta responded to a sudden influx of temporary foreign workers (TFWs), as part of Canadian employers’ increased use of migrant workers in the mid-2000s. The authors find three types of response to the new TFW members: resistive, facilitative and active. Furthermore, these responses were dynamic and changing over time. The different responses are best explained not by the unions’ institutional context, but by internal factors shaping each union’s response. Drawing upon the concept of referential unionisms, the study explores how unions’ self-identity shapes their responses to new challenges such as the influx of migrant workers.