Women Challenging Unions

Women Challenging Unions PDF

Author: Linda Briskin

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Published: 1993-12-15

Total Pages: 519

ISBN-13: 148759643X

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Women Challenging Unions is a collection of original papers that presents a vision of an invigorated and vibrant labour movement, one that would actively seek the full participation of women and other traditionally excluded groups, and that would willingly incorporate a feminist agenda. This vision challenges union complicity in the gendered segmentation of the labour market; union support for traditionalist ideologies about women's work, breadwinners, and male-headed families; union resistance to broader-based bargaining; and the marginalization of women inside unions. All of the authors share a commitment to workplace militancy and a more democratic union movement, to women's resistance to the devaluation of their work, to their agency in the change-making process. The interconnected web of militancy, democracy, and feminism provides the grounds on which unions can address the challenges of equity and economic restructuring, and on which the re-visioning of the labour movement can take place. The first of the four sections includes case studies of union militancy that highlight the experiences of individual women in three areas of female-dominated work: nursing, banking, and retailing. The second and third sections focus on the two key arenas of struggle where unions and feminism meet: inside unions, where women activists and staff confront the sexism of unions, and in the labour market, where women challenge their employers and their own unions. The fourth section deconstructs the conceptual tools of the discipline of industrial relations and examines its contribution to the continued invisibility of gender.

The Most Difficult Revolution

The Most Difficult Revolution PDF

Author: Alice Hanson Cook

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2019-06-07

Total Pages: 324

ISBN-13: 1501735748

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Over half the women in the United States are now employed outside the home, and the proportions are comparable in many European countries. Yet nowhere has this revolution in the composition of the labor force been followed by the triumph of a more difficult revolution—the struggle for full equality in the rights and roles of women. Building upon research begun by the late Val R. Lorwin and Alice H. Cook, Cook and Arlene Kaplan Daniels survey recent efforts of trade unions in Germany, Austria, Sweden, and Great Britain to ensure equal opportunity in the workplace. In identifying the successes and setbacks of the European experience, the authors consider the implications for change in the agendas of American unions. Cook and Daniels show how unions in the countries studied have promoted women's equality through the channels of internal policy, collective bargaining, and political influence. They provide rich cross-cultural comparisons of patterns of government involvement, the extent of women's participation in the unions, education of women for union leadership, access to vocational training, pay equity, the conditions of part-time work, and workplace health and safety concerns. The Most Difficult Revolution will be a vital resource for comparatists in the fields of women's studies, labor studies, political science, anthropology, sociology, and economics.

Union Women

Union Women PDF

Author: Mary Margaret Fonow

Publisher: U of Minnesota Press

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 268

ISBN-13: 9780816638826

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For more than a quarter century, steel mills in the United States and Canada have produced more than metal: they have produced a new kind of worker and union activist -- "Women of Steel." In an era labeled postfeminist and postindustrial, women have created spaces in this quintessentially male-dominated workforce from which to mobilize for their rights as women and workers. In Union Women, Mary Margaret Fonow captures the stories of the women of the United Steelworkers. She focuses on a tenacious group who used their developing power in the union to challenge sex discrimination and to advocate for women's rights, and applied their transnational resources to construct a feminist response to globalization and economic restructuring. In the process, they have transformed the organizations, resources, and networks of both the labor and women's movements, and have in turn transformed themselves into feminists. In Union Women Fonow uses statistical, archival, and ethnographic research methods to provide a broad historical account of women in the steel industry. Fonow's sweeping approach allows her to examine several key issues in social movement, feminist, and political theory, and to show that insights from these fields shape each other. She explores how social movements are gendered, how working-class women develop a feminist consciousness, and how this process is informed by intersecting demands of race, class, and gender. As a comparative, cross-national study, Union Women also demonstrates how different political and social cultures affect women's organizing and strategic decisions. Finally, Fonow emphasizes that economic restructuring and globalization pose immediate challenges forwomen as laborers and activists, and that, in order to survive, all unions must develop organizing and mobilization strategies informed by feminism and other social movements.

Gender and Leadership in Unions

Gender and Leadership in Unions PDF

Author: Gill Kirton

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2013-01-25

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 1136154574

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Reflecting the increased attention to gender and women in the field of employment relations, there is now a growing international literature on women and trade unions. The interest in women as trade unionists arises partly from the fact that women comprise 40 percent of trade union membership in the USA and over 50 percent in the UK. Further, despite considerable overall union membership decline in both the UK and USA, more women than men are joining unions in both countries. Recognition of the importance of women to the survival and revival of trade union movements has in many cases produced an unprecedented commitment to equality and inclusion at the highest level. Yet the challenge is to ensure that this commitment is translated to action and improves the experience of women in their union and in their workplace. Gender and Leadership in Trade Unions explores and evaluates the similarities and differences in equality strategies pursued by unions in the US and the UK. It assesses the conditions experienced by women union members and how these impact on their leadership, both potential and actual. Women have made gains in both countries within union leadership and decision-making structures, however, climbing the ladder to leadership positions remains far from a smooth process. In the trade union context, women face multiple barriers that resonate with the barriers facing aspiring women leaders in other organizational contexts, including the gendered division of domestic work; the organization and nature of women’s work; the organization and nature of trade union work and the masculine culture of trade unions. The discussion of women trade union leaders is situated more broadly within debates on governance, leadership and democracy within social justice activism.

Making Globalization Work for Women

Making Globalization Work for Women PDF

Author: Valentine M. Moghadam

Publisher: State University of New York Press

Published: 2011-11-28

Total Pages: 355

ISBN-13: 1438439628

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Making Globalization Work for Women explores the potential for trade unions to defend the socioeconomic rights of women in a global context. Looking at labor policies and interviews with people in unions and nongovernmental organizations, the essays diagnose the problems faced by women workers across the world and assess the progress that unions in various countries have made in responding to those problems. Some concerns addressed include the masculine culture of many unions and the challenges of female leadership within them, laissez-faire governance, and the limited success of organizations working on these issues globally. Making Globalization Work for Women brings together in a synthetic and fruitful conversation the work and ideas of feminists, unions, NGOs, and other human rights workers.

Feminizing the Unions

Feminizing the Unions PDF

Author: Sheila Cunnison

Publisher: Ashgate Publishing

Published: 1993

Total Pages: 312

ISBN-13:

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Analyses the position of women in the trade union movement. Examines ways in which masculine culture pervades the union movement and supports structures of male power and dominance, suppressing women's voices and subordinating their concerns. Draws attention to the challenges women make to the culture of masculinity and their attempts to operate through their own culture of femininity.

The Trade Union Woman

The Trade Union Woman PDF

Author: Alice Henry

Publisher:

Published: 1915

Total Pages: 358

ISBN-13:

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The book examines the history of women's labor organization and the relationship of working-class women to the campaign for woman suffrage.

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