Public Sector Unions in the Age of Austerity ed. by Stephanie Ross, Larry Savage (review)

Unions generally and public sector labour relations in particular are largely understudied. This collection brings together well-established and emerging labour experts exploring public sector unions in their diverse forms. The first article by Bryan Evans discusses the dual role of the state as an employer and sovereign legislator. Situating his article in historical perspective, Evans discusses what differentiates public sector unions from their private sector counterparts, traces the historical origins of public sector associations-cum-unions and pulls together key legislative developments across the provinces and federally. Next Leo Panitch and Donald Swartz update their well-known thesis of “permanent exceptionalism” – the idea that the “temporary” removal of labour rights in the 1970s has ever since been a permanent ideological and legislative fact. Despite the “Labour Trilogy” rulings and recent Supreme Court challenges, Panitch and Swartz show how the Charter continues to grant federal and provincial governments, via the courts, free reign over the usage of injunctions and back-to-work legislation with greater laxity and less parliamentary debate. While the courts have protected the “consultative” process, this does not extend to dispute resolution mechanisms, collective agreements, or to the right to strike. As they show, the Supreme Court has effectively consolidated the assault against trade unions’ rights and freedoms into the new millennium.

Larry Savage and Charles Smith follow this up with a valuable overview of the relationship between public sector unions and electoral politics. While diverse in form and function across the provinces and federally, they show how electoral coalitions have shifted over time and place and explore the challenges this poses in a renewed era of state and capitalist militancy. The following articles by Stephanie Ross and David Camfield explore distinct understandings of “social unionism.” Both authors provide compelling theoretical and empirical data to support their arguments for union renewal, with Camfield also raising the idea of going beyond social unionism. While both Ross’ and Camfield’s visions of social unionism offer important suggestions for rebuilding trade union strength, such as the need for alliance-building and proactive framing, some of the limitations of this mode of union praxis are not fully explored.

To what extent has social unionism, even in the most militant and committed of unions, been able to stop, let alone reverse, decades of concerted attacks and defeats? Does militancy in the form of work-to-rule campaigns, sit-ins, and strikes, for example, apply equally to private and public sector forms of social unionism considering their different locations in the broader economy and society? What is the relationship between social unionism and social democracy or explicitly anti-capitalist frameworks? Also, in regards to Camfield’s article, particularly his emphasis on “reform from below” or bottom-up politics, absent a broad program of trade union political education might such an emphasis also potentially reproduce the worst excesses of right-wing populism or business unionism? While top-down versus bottom-up conceptualizations may be useful analytical tools to identify the anti-democratic or non-participator y characteristics of trade union practices, there are no special virtues in the expressions themselves. The example of the Chicago Teachers’ Union Caucus of Rank and File Educators used in Camfield’s text, while inspiring, might also reveal some important strategic and tactical considerations in light of the significant concessions and outright elimination of schools and unionized workers in the aftermath of the 2012 strike. While both authors’ introductions to social unionism are perhaps not the place to address these concerns, such questions might provide some useful food for thought in subsequent writings.

In what follows, Donna Baines provides a useful portrait of the nonprofit social services sector, with an emphasis on its predominantly female and racialized workforce, showing how an ethos of care shapes the identity of workers, and the kinds of resistance mobilized in this sector. Similarly, Linda Briskin provides an important empirical examination of nursing work and healthcare restructuring. Both authors show how women...