Comparative Union Responses to Mass Immigration: Evidence From an Immigrant City

• Published in: Critical sociology Vol. 26; no. 1-2; pp. 82 - 105
• Main Authors: Grenier, Guillermo, Nissen, Bruce
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London, England SAGE Publications 01.01.2000
• ISSN: 0896-9205; 1569-1632
• DOI: 10.1177/08969205000260010601

This article places union relationships with immigrant workers into a globalized and historical context, and utilizes primary data to examine the relationships of four unions in the heavily immigrant Miami, Florida area with immigrant workers in the past four decades. Two are building trades unions with a long exclusionary history and two are industrially organized unions, one in the service sector and one in manufacturing. Varying patterns of relationships with immigrants are discovered. Explanations for differing responses can be found in the union's structure, its traditional membership and employer characteristics, its leadership's vision and ideology, and its internal cultural practices. The paper ends with nine predictors of a union's likelihood of successfully integrating immigrants into its membership.