Documents Russell, Zachary A. 3 results

"Whether termed participation, organizational or union citizenship, extra-role behaviors, or activism, union members' voluntary efforts on behalf of the union have received renewed academic and practitioner interest in recent years. The reason for the renewed interest is the terms' close association with the organizing model of unionism, which some refer to as the “soul” of union representation–at a time when unions are doing much soul-searching. What predicts union activism? We find that the effects of a variable indicating perceived behavioral control to be as or more important in predicting activism and activism intentions than more conventional predictors. We also find evidence supporting the conclusion of some prior research that attitudes, i.e., covenantal beliefs, are relatively more important for activism—or at least for future union activism intentions—than are union instrumentality beliefs."

"The question of why workers support unions is one of the most fundamental in employment relations. Using Ajzen's Theory of Planned Behavior we conduct a selective review of literature and evidence on union voting, joining, and participation. We focus primarily on the question of motivation as stemming from self-interest or from pro-social considerations. Secondary attention is given to the influence of others' views (subjective norms) and worker perceptions that they can achieve desired behaviors (perceived control or self-efficacy). We find support for the notion that workers are concerned with neither member self-interest (“just us”) alone, nor pro-social (“justice”) alone, but rather that they are motivated to form, join, and participate by both considerations. This micro-foundation for considering unions as institutions suggests that unions are neither narrow self-interested institutions nor purely pro-social movements, but “a little bit of both.” We offer propositions and consider implications for theory, practice, and future research."

"This study examined the effects of precarious work characteristics on U.S. workers' attitudes about three union-related issues using the 2009 Young Worker Survey. Union-related criteria included distrust in employers to treat employees fairly, collective efficacy (rather than individual) in solving workplace problems, and union efficacy in terms of whether union members are better off (or worse off) than nonunion workers. The results suggest that precarious work is much more a problem for younger workers (aged 18-34 years) than for older workers (aged 35 years and above). Consistent with prior studies, we find that young workers tend to hold more positive views of unions, although they are not uniformly more “pro-union” about all three union-related criteria. Further analysis indicates that what may be seen as youth effects on union attitudes are in part precarious work effects that can be confounded due to the strong relation between youth and precarious work."