Labor-Management Relations

Course Description

Prerequisite: None
This course covers the development of labor relations in the United States, from the period preceding collective bargaining through the emergence of theories of management and corresponding stages of labor relations practice in the 20th century. The latter include: the rise of contract unions; industrial relations in an era of unionization and collective bargaining; the crisis resulting from increased competition and globalization; and the subsequent transformation of American labor-management relations. Students will develop a comparative perspective by studying labor-management relations across advanced capitalist economies. Finally, the course will examine the future of labor-management relations, exploring the extent to which they will be adversarial or cooperative, and considering alternative models of worker representation.