The Rise and Demise of Patco

Abstract

This paper examines the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATCO) strike of 1981 and assesses its impact on labor relations in the federal sector. The author finds the root causes of the stoppage in the history of PATCO's relations with the Federal Aviation Administration, the equivocal manner in which the federal government had dealt with previous PATCO strikes, and the ineptness of PATCO's leaders. He argues that PATCO's basic goal was to gain the right to bargain under private sector rules, and that the union would have made considerable progress toward that goal if it had accepted the government's last offer in 1981. The author also describes the international aspects of the strike, including the strong steps taken by the Reagan administration to maintain transoceanic service.

Behavioural Determinants of Public Sector Illegal Strikes

“…Northrup (1984) argued that the basic union objective was legislative in nature --to achieve "wage determination on a private sector model." Hurd and Kriesky (1986), on the other hand, asserted that the union's primary goals were to address such work-related problems as reducing the workweek, improving retirement conditions, and dealing with autocratic management (see also Northrup 1986).…”

“…Thus, this conflict without a clear purpose is difficult if not impossible to regulate. The picture created by Northrup (1984), of PATCO carrying out a top-down, carefully crafted strike plan to achieve private-sector labour relations is difficult to reconcile with the rank-and-file nature of all previous job actions as well as the 1981 strike. The PATCO fiasco, therefore, must be seen not only as the failure of a union to interpret political and economic events, but, more importantly perhaps, the devastating collapse of a flawed collective bargaining system.…”

“…It is as if each strike was an independent event, unrelated in any way to similar events in the past. While it is certainly true that each case has unique features, certain behavioural patterns can be observed.Examples of this strike literature include the U.S. air traffic controllers in 1981 (Northrup 1984(Northrup , 1986Hurd and Kriesky 1986;Meltzer and Sunstein 1983; Kearney 1992: 306), numerous North American illegal postal strikes (Kearney 1992: 274; Goldenberg 1983: 91;Cooke 1983;Sombretto 1983;Shannon 1978), transit strikes in New York city (Donovan 1990), and jail guard walkouts in New York state in 1979 (Zimmer and Jacobs 1981;Peterson 1981) and Ontario in 1979and 1989(Hebdon 1992; and an Ontario hospital strike in 1981 (White 1990). 5 Banning the right to strike eliminates the positive role it plays in the regulation of conflict.…”

The Effects Of The Use Of Striker Replacement Workers In Canada: An Analysis Of Four Cases1

“…A related argument is that employers purposely prolong strikes through the use of replacements, with the intent of decertifying the union (AFL-CIO 1991;Gramm 1991;Hargrove 1995). The PATCO strike in the U.S. is often used to illustrate this phenomenon (Northrup 1984). Employers and &dquo;free market&dquo; advocates, on the other hand, contend that limiting or prohibiting the use of replacement workers leads to increased bargaining power for unions and increased strike activity (for a detailed review of the debate and research, see Singh and Jain 2001; Budd 1996). Business organizations argue that any restriction on the use of replacement workers would give unions an unfair bargaining advantage, shift the balance of power, and lead to increased strike activity, including longer strikes (Reynolds 1991).…”

“The Rise and Demise of PATCO” Reconstructed

“…IN his article "The Rise and Demise of PATCO" (Northrup 1984), Herbert Northrup presents a narrow and misleading explanation of the ill-fated air traffic controllers' strike of 1981. Northrup's thesis is that the goal of the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (PATvco) strike was to establish the right to bargain over wages within a private sector framework.…”