Affirmative Action from Below: Civil Rights, the Building Trades, and the Politics of Racial Equality in the Urban North, 1945–1969

Sugrue, Thomas J.

doi:10.1007/978-1-137-06580-3_10

Cited by 9 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Like any other American political and social institution, unions also had problematic histories of racial and gender bias, discrimination, and exclusion. These, too, became the source of critical attention in the public sphere, especially as the Civil Rights Movement moved from the schools and voting booths to the workplace (Hill, 1968, 1996; Mclean, 2008; Sugrue, 2004).…”

Section: Anti‐unionism and The Uses Of Racementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Workers in the building trades lived by a masculine, oft‐times racially exclusive, and militant solidarity. But civil rights activism had begun to push federal, state, and local officials to take action against employing contractors and unions who resisted opening the industry to Black workers, while feminism and anti‐war activism brought forward critiques of blue‐collar masculinity as well as ways of displaying one's manhood less tied to traditional patriotism (Freeman, 1993; Sugrue, 2004).…”

Section: Anti‐unionism and The Uses Of Racementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Nixon proved responsive. The administration's Philadelphia Plan of June 1969, which was aimed at opening the city's building trades to Black workers, masked the deeper set anti‐labor struggle of corporations with a civil rights gloss and overwrought concerns about inflation (Linder, 2000; Stein, 1998; Sugrue, 2004). Narrowly conceived, the plan did not accomplish the dual goals of increased minority access and lower labor costs (Stein, 1998, p. 151).…”

Section: Anti‐unionism and The Uses Of Racementioning

confidence: 99%

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Labor Studies and the Political Economy of Trump

Szymanski

Wells

2020

New Dir Adult Contin Educ

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Section: Anti‐unionism and The Uses Of Racementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Anti‐unionism and The Uses Of Racementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Anti‐unionism and The Uses Of Racementioning

confidence: 99%

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Labor Studies and the Political Economy of Trump

Szymanski

Wells

2020

New Dir Adult Contin Educ

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“…It is well-known that in most of the trades, at least until affirmative action policies took hold in the 1960s and 1970s, entry was restricted to the sons and nephews of predominantly white male members (Grabelsky 2007, 53;Palladino 2005, 156-66;Sugrue 2004). Since then, union memberships have become more diverse in terms of race and ethnicity, and while "legacy" apprentices do sometimes express a sense of entitlement around their status as union members by openly resisting the content and purpose of classroom study, the overall change is certainly reflected in a range of personal experience that animates our classroom discussions.…”

Section: The Contradictory Legacies Of the Craft Unionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Blue-Collar Classroom

Szymanski

Wells

2016

Labor Studies Journal

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This article examines how a labor studies program, most of whose students come from unions in the building trades, wrestles with a deeply rooted perception about the relationship between an individual's skill and her wages. Aspects of tradition and experience in the unionized building trades validate it, and public discourse today sees it as a basic economic truth. Other aspects of building trades' tradition and experience, as well as current mobilizations by low-wage service workers, show that collective power determines wages and enables a conversation about the social wage that decouples individual skill from wage levels.Over the course of a semester in our university-based labor studies program, students from various classes come together for what we call "Food for Thought" discussions of current issues relevant to the labor movement. These sessions are student driveneither directly through presentations by panels of students or through presentations by outside speakers that students feel will begin a compelling and relevant conversation. In two recent sessions, fast food workers shared their personal stories, their strike efforts, and their campaigns for $15 an hour.Fast food workers are on the front lines of union organizing in a way that our students, as relatively privileged members of the building trades, are not. In spite of a strong sense of brotherhood fostered in their own union, Local #3 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), one of our students asked the fast food workers what qualifications and training they had that would qualify them to join their yet-to-be-attained union. We sensed that underlying this question was the notion that fast food workers have to prove themselves "skilled" in some way in order to join a union, or that an apprenticeship program such as Local #3's was required to demonstrate the "right" to increasingly higher wages and other benefits. Another student asked a related question-"If you want better wages why don't you better yourself and get a better job?"-which emphasized the all-too-accepted-notion that fast food and other low-paid workers are unskilled and, therefore, paid what they are worth.The majority of the students at the Food for Thought discussion were sympathetic and supportive of the fast food workers' campaign, and those that raised questions did so respectfully. In fact, one student, a former fast food manager, stated that fast food workers have to have a range of skills-from knowing how to cook (so "they don't kill someone") to knowing how to deal with all kinds of quirky and unruly customers. But still, the discussions during these sessions, attended by more than 200 of our students, captured a central challenge to our program, The Harry Van Arsdale Jr. Center for Labor Studies, State University of New York (SUNY)/Empire State College. In the classroom, our students, like much of the general public, often engage in discussions through the lens of the prevalent and powerful belief, deeply embedded in American history, that it is self-...

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“…As codified in its best‐known variant, the neo‐Alinskyite model, these endeavors require professional community organizers who understand how to build democratic action organizations, train indigenous leaders, define and analyze political issues, mount organizing campaigns, mobilize participants, and expand the terrain of conflict (Alinsky, 1971; Delgado, 1986; Heathcott, 2005). Historic successes within this broader tradition might be said to include major civil‐rights legislation and labor law, antidisplacement actions against urban renewal, and the community reinvestment mandates (Gotham, 1999; Morris, 1984; Sugrue, 2004; Squires, 1992).…”

Section: History and Strategy: Reassessing “Community Organization”mentioning

confidence: 99%

Reframing Community Practice for the 21^StCentury: Multiple Traditions, Multiple Challenges

Sites

Chaskin

Parks

2007

Journal of Urban Affairs

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Community" in the twenty-first century seems to be everywhere and nowhere. On the one hand, the rhetoric of community is omnipresent, as nonprofit organizations, civic associations, government agencies, and even multinational corporate entities routinely describe their activities to be community-oriented. On the other hand, community in the broader sense of shared interests or solidarities appears to be under unrelenting attack, challenged by sociopolitical forces and intellectual currents that point toward more fragmented social orders. Locating community as a particular field of practice poses similar dilemmas. This article summarizes the broad outlines of the history of "community organization" in the United States, emphasizing both its multiple traditions and the enduring nature of its practical and strategic dilemmas. It provides an analysis of the key intellectual and social challenges facing the field and the different kinds of pressures they may be exerting on the different traditions of community action. Finally, it suggests four "boundarycrossing" areas of activity that cut across the inherited traditions and may represent emerging sources of innovation for community-based action."Community" in the twenty-first century seems to be everywhere and nowhere. Although this state of affairs is hardly unprecedented-community has been lost, found, and rediscovered over the years with disturbing regularity (e.g., Stein, 1960;Sampson, 1999)-the problem is especially pressing today. On the one hand, the rhetoric of community is omnipresent, as nonprofit organizations, civic associations, government agencies, and even multinational corporate entities routinely describe their activities to be community-oriented. Long-neglected inner-city community areas have been rediscovered; new conceptions of communal ties (e.g., social capital) have emerged; new kinds of planned communities are being constructed. On the other hand, community in the broader sense of shared interests or solidarities appears to be under unrelenting

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Affirmative Action from Below: Civil Rights, the Building Trades, and the Politics of Racial Equality in the Urban North, 1945–1969

Cited by 9 publications

References 2 publications

Labor Studies and the Political Economy of Trump

Labor Studies and the Political Economy of Trump

Blue-Collar Classroom

Reframing Community Practice for the 21^StCentury: Multiple Traditions, Multiple Challenges

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Affirmative Action from Below: Civil Rights, the Building Trades, and the Politics of Racial Equality in the Urban North, 1945–1969

Cited by 9 publications

References 2 publications

Labor Studies and the Political Economy of Trump

Labor Studies and the Political Economy of Trump

Blue-Collar Classroom

Reframing Community Practice for the 21StCentury: Multiple Traditions, Multiple Challenges

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About

Reframing Community Practice for the 21^StCentury: Multiple Traditions, Multiple Challenges