published_or_final_version / Political Science / Master / Master of Philosophy

The relationship between government and business during the New Deal can best be understood as one based on mutual dependence rather than endemic hostility. This is demonstrated with reference to the Northwest lumber industry and its response to New Deal labor standards and labor union legislation. The Northwest lumber industry during the 1920s and 1930s was beset by the problems of overproduction and cut throat competition which plagued much of American industry during the Great Depression. Industry leaders strove for ways in which to regulate a fiercely competitive marketplace. Attempts to foist higher production standards on marginal competitors through the promotion of voluntary trade associations failed because of the absence of enforcement mechanisms within the associational structure. The National Recovery Administration (NRA) similarly failed to provide a disciplined framework for competition in the region because the federal government failed to fulfill its role as an enforcement agent, although the experience of the NRA did suggest to the industry the potential benefits of stabilizing the marketplace through the regulation of labor costs, which were such a significant and vulnerable item in the business calculations of lumber operations. The problem of enforcement, however, remained. Labor unions had a record under the NRA and in the coal and clothing industries as an effective regulator of labor standards, but the memory of radical unionism in the early lumber industry combined with a concern for managerial prerogatives to forestall any voluntary support on the part of Northwest lumber leaders for unionisation in the region. The elevation of unions under the National Labor Relations Act, however, prompted versatile lumber executives to use the empowered unions for their own regulatory purposes. Never entirely comfortable with the potential costs of strong unions, the Northwest lumber industry turned to the federal regulation offered under the Fair Labor Standards Act as an additional, effective and less risky method of securing much needed stability in the industry.

In Latin America, women's ability to participate in the paid workforce on equal terms as men is constrained by many cultural and political obstacles, and this reinforces women's unequal citizenship status. Even though unions have rarely supported women's rights historically, and are currently losing political power in the neoliberal economic context, I argue that union women have a crucial role to play in the social struggle to expand women's labor rights. Building on theories about the social construction of citizenship, I develop an original theoretical framework suggesting that civil society acts on three levels to expand citizenship rights: the individual level (working with individuals to make them more rights-conscious), within social institutions (working to ensure that policies within social institutions actually reflect the rights of individuals), and at the level of the state, where civil society contributes to the construction of new citizenship discourses. / The framework is then applied to the Mexican case. Examining the rise of working class feminism in the context of the debt crisis and transition to economic liberalism in the 1980s, and the subsequent democratic transition in 2000, I show how these contexts led union women to participate in civil associations active at each of these three levels of citizenship construction. More specifically, this participation has been important in raising awareness of women's labor rights among women workers, challenging patriarchal union structures, and bringing the issue of women's labor rights into the debate over reform of Mexico's Federal Labor Law. I ultimately conclude that in the absence of support from a broad women's labor movement, the chances that women's labor rights will be supported by the Mexican government and Mexican unions will be low.

This thesis is a study on Fabian attitudes towards the struggle for independent labour representation during the last two decades of the nineteenth century. The Fabian Society has often claimed it greatly influenced the struggle to establish a working-class political party prior to the inauguration of the Labour Representation Committee (LRC) in 1900. Yet, many of the Fabians' contemporaries disagreed. This thesis challenges any assertion that the Fabian Society greatly influenced the LRC. Through a study of the Fabian Society's early history, beliefs and attitudes it is clear that the Fabians were more likely to be very negative towards any rank and file movements. The Fabians had little faith in the "average sensual man". Even their Manifesto "To Your Tents Oh Israel" cannot, in the final analysis, be viewed as concrete proof that the Fabian Society placed great hope in the working man and in his struggle for labour representation.

No description available.

No description available.

Dissertation--Stockholms universitet, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 367-384) and index.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Melbourne, Dept. of Political Science, 2000. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references (leaves 448-476).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Michigan State University. Dept. of History, 2008. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Mar. 30, 2009). Includes bibliographical references (p. 283-294). Also issued in print.

"Thesis submitted to the Council of Europe, Strasbourg." / Includes bibliographical references.