Union support of EPI, one logical place for such research, to me always seemed minimal. The big international unions gave on the order of $100K a year. For them that is not very much money. EPI has about 50 people. It ought to have several hundred, or there should be two or three EPIs. (On the latter, that is regarded among unions as a no-no, "duplicating effort.") Nor was there ever much effort to put EPI people in front of union members. Methinks there is a concern about message control and face time.
EPI was never funded to provide a home for big fish like Nelson L. They are not competitive with elite universities as far as pay goes. They can't afford to be. You want people of that caliber, you either have to be lucky enough to find one willing to sacrifice financially or you have to fork over.
EPI was never encouraged to delve into research on union organizing itself. Union bigs are not crazy about objective, albeit sympathetic scrutiny from the outside. Part of this comes from the membership, who are often not comfortable with criticism of whatever they have been laboriously mobilized to do. Nor are members always supportive of research (especially of any abstract or big-think variety). Staff tend to value research as ammunition for their trench warfare. Lord knows they need ammunition, and I was happy to provide it, but they need more too.
I hasten to note that the movement is full of brilliant and dedicated people, as well as a variety of reptiles. The worst in memory was a lady at the AFL -- the name escapes me -- who ended up working for HIAA.
mbs
What I really wish would exist, is a structure in the labor movement for intellectuals who are specifically studying industrial relations.
What I mean is, why don't we have a think-tank where nelson lichtenstein, jane slaughter and some other smartypants to work at, that has a formal role in the union federation, that is responsible for churning out studies and can be sic'd on thorny questions. I can't tell you how much light it would shed on all our debates if there was a department of the afl that produced a thorough qualitative
and quantitative study on union shops organized through organizing rights agreements vs those not; or that could do a nationwide racial demographic analysis of union and non-union construction and building
trades; or that come up with some metrics on member participation in different locals and unions. Like a research department, but big- picture research. I like an academic figure like Lichtenstein could do immeasurable good for the labor movement if his freelance role of support was formalized and integrated into the movement in some way.
Even Comrade Henwood might work as a fellow at such a place, although
he would have to play nice and not forget why we support organizing rights :) ___________________________________ http://mailman.lbo-talk.org/mailman/listinfo/lbo-talk