Will Unionism Prosper in Cyber-Space? The Promise of the Internet for Employee Organization

Abstract

This paper argues that the low cost of information, communication, and interaction on the Web offers trade unions opportunities to improve services and attract members and thus reinvent themselves for the 21 st Century. Analyzing current use of the Internet by unions in the United Kingdom and United States, we develop five hypothesis about the impact of the Internet on unions. 1) the Customized Services hypothesis that unions will individualize services; 2) the Cyber-organizing hypothesis that the Web will ease organization and produce virtual minority unions at many non-union firms; 3) the Cyber-democracy hypothesis that the Web will enhance democracy in unions; 4) the Cyber-dispute hypothesis that the Web will become an important space for industrial disputes; and 5) the New Internationalism hypothesis that the Web will strengthen the international labor community. If unions fail to exploit the opportunities on the Web to gain members, we expect other organizations, Internet recruitment sites, specialized advice centers, and the like, to fill the e-union niche.

What Do Unions Do for Economic Performance?

“…If 8(a) (2) were abolished, one can imagine such arrangements gradually evolving, working well in some workplaces, and then being adopted elsewhere in various forms. The Internet will likely play a major role in any such evolution (Diamond and Freeman, 2001;Freeman, 2002 was written and, even now, the empirical evidence in this area is (understandably) limited and cannot establish (or reject) causal union effects or their magnitudes nearly so conclusively as one might like.…”

“…This 38 would permit and encourage management to be involved in the development of their firm's labor relations system, but with workers now starting from an enhanced endowment or bargaining position. Although one cannot predict precisely how any given system might evolve and operate, the widespread availability of the Internet makes it likely that both management and employee groups will use electronic communications to provide and exchange information (Diamond and Freeman, 2001;Freeman, 2002).…”

Helping Workers Online and Offline: Innovations in Union and Worker Organization Using the Internet

“…Pondering the problem of U.K. unions enrolling members at organized worksites, Darlington (2001) and Diamond and Freeman (2002) argue that unions need to improve and personalize their services to members. One plausible way to improve services is to raise the knowledge and skills of union reps.…”

“…These nascent online efforts might develop into a new form for mediating between workers and employers or they may turn out to be a digital form of public relations in support of traditional collective bargainingbased unions and their political goals. Simply adopting Internet and related technologies, as many unions have done (Diamond and Freeman 2002;Freeman 2005;Newman 2005;Stevens and Greer 2005) is not sufficient. For a new union form to succeed it has to fi nd packages of services for workers outside of collective bargaining at costs that workers will pay, outperform competitor suppliers of those services, and overcome employer and antiunion consultant use of online as well as offline access to workers.…”

Information Technology, US Union Organizing and Union Effectiveness

“…IT's ability to connect geographically dispersed workers and co-ordinate their activities is credited with organizing success at the US Immigration and Naturalization Service (Lazarovici 2001) and in efforts to build solidarity and create new membership forms at Washtech (Wilson and Blain 2001: 55). Such synergies also contribute to union democracy (Diamond and Freeman 2001). Several dissident movements, such as Teamsters for a Democratic Union and the UAW's New Directions, maintain websites and chat rooms (for a list see www.uniondemocracy/Resources/AUDLinks.htm) that allow members to engage in widespread debate and co-ordination in ways not possible only a few years ago (also see Greer 2002).…”