Unions in a Globalized Environment: Changing Borders, Organizational Boundaries, and Social Roles (review)

Abstract

The past half-century has seen three dominant waves of research in American industrial relations. The first (John Dunlop, Sumner Slichter and others) joined postwar social science in celebrating American institutions, including an industrial relations system that brought gains to workers while providing stable production. The second wave (Tom Kochan, Harry Katz, and others) responded to the collapse of that system with a new "transformation" literature, highlighting employer opposition, union decline, and strategic choice.