This study examined women’s committees in two public sector unions in British
Columbia with predominantly female memberships over a twenty year period. The question
addressed was how and under what circumstances the committees could secure gains for
women, given a context where women remain at a power disadvantage relative to men.
Gains sought were of three types: 1) improvements in contract clauses particularly
beneficial to women; 2) increased female participation in union governance; and 3)
structural changes conducive to future increases in female participation in union governance.
Structures as defmed included both formal structures and other regularized procedures,
including processes of communication, decision making and resource distribution.
Based on literatures from several disciplines, a power model was developed that
guided data collection. Data were collected via archival research and semi-structured
interviews, and analyzed qualitatively.
The study found that the structures governing how the committees operated were
significant factors in committee effectiveness and that the active cooperation of the
leadership and/or the membership ensured that structures conducive to committee
effectiveness existed. The committees’ major challenge was to align their goals with those
of the leadership or the membership in order to generate the level of support that would
permit them to achieve their goals. The degree of alignment between committee and
membership goals affected to what extent the committee could secure goals not supported
by the leadership and was the major variable affecting committee power. However,
committee power was not necessarily associated with the level of gains achieved for women because both leadership and membership actions and existing union structures could induce
outcomes for women not orchestrated by the committees.
As a result of this research, the initial power model was refined and the restrictions
on the committees’ and leaderships’ use of power were clarified. The utility of crossing the
disciplinary boundaries between organizational theory, industrial relations, and political
science to explore how power is exercised in unions was demonstrated. Support for the
political model of organizations was generated, suggesting that insights gained from the
study of unions might advance organizational theorizing.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:BVAU.2429/8765 |
| Date | 05 1900 |
| Creators | Foley, Janice R. |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Relation | UBC Retrospective Theses Digitization Project [http://www.library.ubc.ca/archives/retro_theses/] |
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