> william bridges was big on this about 1993ish in his _Jobshift_. not the
> worst book in the world, drew on a fairly standard labor history account of
> changes in work over the centuries. actually dealt with the problems
> associated with the "breakdown of the social contract": inequality, loss
> of free time, family and community disruptions, etc
>
> dorothy sue cobble, still at rutgers i think, was actually promoting
> something similar. she's looked at unions in the service sector,
> waitresses, showing how they differed significantly from the the craft
> union model that influenced labor organizing in the 20th c. she suggests
> that some of the problems that we see with unions might be better addressed
> had we looked at the history of waitress unions (at one point 25% of all
> waitresses were unionized)
>
And, of course, the literature that the IWW puts online in some ways is close to this 'service unionism'. Of course, in some ways they are the opposite of what Cobble describes - the Wobs are openly anti-capitalist, and refuse to enforce agreements between workers and management - but in other ways, the resurgence of the Wobs seems to be clearly linked to their model of providing a service and a community (as opposed to 'locking in' a factory). How well it works, I don't honestly know...
Certainly, however, South Africa's unions have traditionally not serviced the temp/part-time/flexible workforce well. A friend of mine is in the ridiculous situation of having been turned away by a number of unions because his job doesn't fit into their established catagories.
Here is a description of IWW organising at Kinko's, a retail store:
http://fletcher.iww.org/tsunami/s3.html
"These concepts worked well as we continued to develop them. We held weekly ``cafes'' in the homes of fellow workers where we answered questions, exchanged literature, played Bridge, Scrabble, and sang many a raucous union song. Hosting these gatherings for fellow workers in their homes, delegates became known as reliable sources of information and responsible representatives of the union. These dedicated Kinkoids served as Co-workers' advocates on the job site and were able to make both effective changes in Co-worker culture as well as in immediate working conditions.
...
We have addressed many issues of concern for Kinko's Co-workers, such as: Health and Safety codes, timeliness of reviews and raises, unannounced schedule changes, the dress code, and generally bad managerial attitudes. There seem to be as many direct action tactics as there are Co-workers; Kinkoids are nothing if not creative. As a delegate, my favorite tactic is to schedule myself to give an immediately useful presentation at our mandatory monthly store meetings. So far I've instituted an emergency plan for the building (there wasn't even a First-Aid Kit when I was hired), given a talk about copyright law, and presented a workshop on how to fill out order forms and translate Kinko's arcane, in-store symbols. All delegates in our store seem to make it their business to be the life of the party at monthly meetings. We bravely ask pertinent questions like ``Won't Workers Compensation stop covering us if we don't have a safety training program?'' or ``What is `practically non-toxic in rats' supposed to mean, anyway?'' (from the Material Data Safety Handbook). The Co-workers quickly picked up on this idea and started asking anything and everything they wanted to. The managers in turn were properly dismayed and finally asked us if we wouldn't like to go bowling instead. We politely declined."
Peter -- Peter van Heusden <pvh at egenetics.com> NOTE: I do not speak for my employer, Electric Genetics "Criticism has torn up the imaginary flowers from the chain not so that man shall wear the unadorned, bleak chain but so that he will shake off the chain and pluck the living flower." - Karl Marx, 1844