Union Organizing: New Challenges and Prospects

Abstract

Among unorganized workers there exists widespread prounion sentiment and interest in workers' rights. Serious obstacles, particularly in the private sector, frequently prevent translation of those sentiments into collective bargaining. Intensified, often illegal, employer resistance, and the inadequacy of the collective bargaining legal apparatus combine to deny workers their right to determine freely whether they want union representation. Many employers seek delays to defuse organizing efforts; others violate employee organizing and collective bargaining rights through illegal discharges or refusal to bargain. Illegal antiunion consultant activity subverts congressionally established national labor policy to encourage the practice of collective bargaining. New organizing approaches are developing in response to such obstacles and to the changing composition and aspirations of the work force while traditional methodology is being strengthened. The primary challenges to organizing in this decade will be the adversity of employer opposition and the changing character of work in America.