As unions in the private sector have continued on what appears to the pessimist to be a slow march into obscurity and irrelevance, public employee unions and collective bargaining are thriving in a majority of states. In this article, the author first provides a brief overview of the relevant scholarly research, and then changes the focus to the future of unionization and collective bargaining in the public and nonprofit sectors. It is suggested that the deck continues to be stacked against federal unions and collective bargaining, but that there are portents for significant gains in the state and local sectors, depending on bargaining-friendly changes in state and federal law.

Keywords

public employees, unions, collective bargaining

It is a longstanding irony that despite the relative strength of unionization and collec- tive bargaining in the public sector, scholarly research has lagged significantly behind the copious quantity of published research on unions in the private sector. The fading fortunes of labor unions in private employment have been much discussed in the lit- erature (e.g., Bennett & Kaufman, 2002; Freeman & Medoff, 1984; Goldfield, 1987), as have the prospects for union revival and resurgence (e.g., Francia, 2006; Milkman & Voss, 2004; Tillman & Cummings, 1999; Turner, Katz, & Hurd, 2001). But eco- nomic, structural, and public policy conditions, magnified by fierce management opposition and punctuated by poor strategic choices by union leadership, have con- spired to prevent a significant turnaround of some 45 years of membership decline (see Kearney, 2009, pp. 13-20). Each time the sickly union patient shows signs of revival, it seems that hopes are dashed against hard realities. For the moment, the private

1North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA

Corresponding Author: Richard C. Kearney, School of Public and International Affairs, North Carolina State University, Campus Box 8102, Raleigh, NC 27695-8102, USA Email: [email protected]

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

90 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

sector unions have placed their bets on congressional legislation that would amend the National Labor Relations Act to permit employee choice of (a) to vote for or against union representation through the conventional secret ballot or (b) to substitute signed authorization cards. The assumption is that unions would win more representation elections because the “card check” would diminish opportunities for employers to harass union organizers and suppress union support.1

The cynic is led to conclude that absent approval of this proposed legislation or other actions or events that produce a significant rebound in union strength, num- bers, and political influence, private sector unions may soon be relegated to the dusty far margins of the U.S. economy and society. Labor scholars may choose to perform an autopsy or pick through the bones of the deceased to speculate on what caused the death. A more productive alternative would be for labor scholars to leave the foregoing task to the historians and devote their own time and attention to unions and collective bargaining in government and the nonprofit sector, which continue to be viable and dynamic.

In contrast to their sickly private sector counterparts, public employee unions present a picture of relative strength and good health. This picture has sharpened dramati- cally from public employee unions’ rough emergence in the nation’s shipyards in the early 19th century through the 1950s, during which time they succeeded in organizing only a small proportion of federal, state, and local workers. Suppressed by an unfavorable legal environment, the argument that negotiating with organized employees constituted a violation of state sovereignty, and other factors, unions in government struggled to organize workers, win recognition, and gain bargaining rights. Circumstances changed in 1962 with President Kennedy’s issuance of Executive Order 10988 guaranteeing union organizing, recognition, and collective bargaining rights to federal workers. This date marks the starting point for the contemporary growth and development of union- ization and collective bargaining at all levels of government.

Kennedy’s executive order did not apply directly to state and local governments but it did exert a marked stimulus effect. By signaling that the sovereignty argument was no longer germane and that unionization and collective bargaining were permitted and even encouraged for federal employees, the executive order inspired union activists and spurred a growing number of state legislatures to adopt legislation facilitating union recognition and bargaining. There were, of course, additional factors contrib- uting to the diffusion of state and local collective bargaining, including the expansion of the size of government at all levels, the social turmoil and change characterizing the 1960s, and growing awareness among public workers that unions in the private sector had registered tangible successes for their membership (Shaw & Clark, 1972, pp. 901-904). Unions such as American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) and the American Federation of Teachers saw their opportuni- ties and seized them.

Nearly half a century has passed since the initial surge in public employee union- ization and collective bargaining. Union density in government leveled off and then declined slightly during the 1980s and 1990s. A substantial body of research emerged

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 91

on public employee unions and collective bargaining. In this article, I first provide a brief overview of the scholarly research and then turn my attention to the future. Will unions in government experience a fate similar to that suffered by private sector unions? Will the status quo prevail? Or will we witness a resurgence of unions and bargaining in the future?

The Research Coincident with the rise of unions in government was an explosion of scholarly research on the structures, processes, and impacts of labor relations and collective bargaining in the federal, state, and local sectors. Some of it was normative, directly or indirectly supporting or arguing against collective bargaining. The stormy history of unionization in America’s coal mines, railroads, and factories, including the infiltration of commu- nist organizers, and numerous acts of violence by both sides prejudiced many citizens, business people, and scholars alike against unions and bargaining in government.

The contemporary literature on public employee unionism and collective bargain- ing can be traced to a three-part Brookings series titled “Studies of Unionism in Government.” The initial book, The Unions and the Cities (Wellington & Winter, 1971) sounded an alarm about the potentially pernicious effects of unions in urban governments, critically examining the applicability of collective bargaining and decry- ing the growth of “militant unionism” and the challenges it posed in “distorting” the political process in the cities. The second volume in the series by David T. Stanley (1972), Managing Local Government Under Union Pressure, took an empirical approach in systematically examining the effects of unions on local government per- sonnel processes, budgets and finance, and other outcomes. Stanley was particularly incisive in his treatment of the clash between collective bargaining and the merit system. Many of his early findings, such as union effects on hiring, promotions, griev- ances, work management, and working conditions, hold true today.

The final book, Public Employee Unionism by Jack Stieber (1973), focused on the bargaining process as well as on the unions as political and bargaining organizations. Stieber’s carefully balanced analysis of the strike issue is in sharp contrast to Welling- ton and Winter’s polemic against the work stoppage. Taken together, the Brookings series, along with Spero and Capozzola’s (1973) The Urban Community and Its Union- ized Bureaucracies, stand as foundational research on unions and collective bargaining in government.

Other book-length treatments of public employee unionism and collective bargaining include edited collections (e.g., Aaron, Grodin, & Stern, 1979; Aaron, Najita, & Stern, 1988; Freeman & Ichniowski, 1988; Lewin, Feuille, & Kochan, 1981; Najita & Stern, 2001), texts (Bent & Reeves, 1978; Coleman, 1990; Kearney, 2009), and functionally specific works (e.g., Salerno, 1981, on law enforcement officers; Jennings, Smith, & Traynham, 1988 and Oestreich & Whaley, 2008, on public transportation; and Love- less, 2000, on teachers). Norma Riccucci (1990) contributes a volume on women and

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

92 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

minorities in relation to public sector unions. Paul Johnston’s (1994) influential book on social movement unionism focuses on nurses and custodians, including those employed by public and nonprofit organizations.

Detailed analyses of various procedural aspects of public employee labor relations have been produced by independent scholars and those associated with the Industrial Relations Research Association (IRRA) and other organizations (e.g., Aaron, Grodin, & Stern, 1979). This work investigates contract administration (Feder, 1989), causes of grievances and workplace problems (Bemmels, 1994; McPherson, 1983), dispute resolution procedures and outcomes (Bohlander, 1994; Coulson, 1980; Haber & Karim, 1995; Lewin & Peterson, 1999; Mareschal, 2005), legal analyses of arbitrator decision making (Bazerman & Farber, 1985; Decker, 1994), and other representation, bargaining, and dispute resolution activities.

There has also been a fair amount of research on the impacts and outcomes of unions and collective bargaining on management organization (Burton, 1972; Gely & Chandler, 1993), wages (Ashraf, 1998; Chandler, 1995; Delaney, 1988; Zax, 1988), benefits (Belman & Heywood, 1991; Belman, Heywood, & Lund, 1997), public budgets (O’Brien, 1994; Toulmin, 1988; Valletta, 1989), work practices (O’Brien, 1996), pro- ductivity (Holzer, 1988; Matzer, 1988), and privatization (Chandler & Feuille, 1991; Hoover & Peoples, 2003). Strike frequency and effects have captured the attention of some scholars (Burton, 1978; Capozzola, 1979; Hebdon & Stern, 2003; Sterret & Aboud, 1982). Union political activities and their impacts have also attracted interest (Chandler & Gely, 1995; Delaney, Fiorito, & Jarley, 1999; Gely & Chandler, 1995; Masters & Delaney, 1987).

Professional journal articles on public employee labor relations and collective bargaining such as those cited above have found homes in journals dominated by industrial relations specialists and labor economists (Industrial and Labor Relations Review, Industrial Relations, Journal of Labor Research), specialized journals (Jour- nal of Collective Negotiations, Labor Studies Journal, Labor Law Journal, Arbitration Journal), and various journals in political science, public administration, public policy, education, law enforcement, and related disciplines. Occasionally, public labor relations pieces appear in Public Administration Review.

What is striking about this broad body of research is that relatively little of it has been published by public administration and public policy scholars. Articles on public sector labor policy only occasionally appear in leading policy journals such as Review of Policy Research, Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, and Policy Studies Journal. Labor relations contributions have been infrequent in the field’s two lead- ing journals, Public Administration Review and the Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory. A somewhat greater presence is found in the two journals specializing in public human resource management: The Review of Public Personnel Administration (ROPPA) and Public Personnel Management. Probably the largest number of recent public sector labor articles has been published in the Journal of Labor Research. As noted above, most of the scholarly books and articles have been

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 93

authored by labor relations specialists and labor economists, not political scientists or public administration researchers (ROPPA is the exception2). This is not because there is a dearth of research issues and questions for political scientists and public adminis- trationists to investigate. For instance, a book-length post mortem sifting through the ashes of federal labor–management relations after the George W. Bush years is a com- pelling need and those scholars trained in political science and public administration are better positioned to write such a treatise than scholars who specialize in corporate labor relations or the labor movement more generally.

Nonetheless, despite the importance of unions and collective bargaining in all sec- tors of government, there is a relative paucity of labor relations research by public administration and policy scholars. It is difficult to say why. Perhaps public employee labor relations is not as attractive a research topic as is private sector labor relations because of the “social movement” and “class struggle” identification of labor in busi- ness, and labor’s sometimes violent struggles to gain recognition and bargaining rights from firms for the “oppressed workers.” Government labor relations is generally more tranquil and somehow less threatening, and for that reason perhaps less interesting as a subject of study. To put it another way, “justice for janitors” seems intrinsically more interesting than “justice for bureaucrats.”

Moreover, private sector labor scholarship involves a broad range of disciplines, including political science, industrial relations, economics, labor law, and sociology. Public labor research tends to be confined to the subfield of human resource manage- ment. The broader public administration scholarship tends to be captivated by “reform” topics such as new public management (NPM) initiatives. Certainly there have been labor relations reforms, such as labor–management partnerships and mutual gains bar- gaining, but these have received modest attention in the literature, usually as a component of a broader piece of reform research.3

Finally, doctoral programs in public administration rarely incorporate courses in public sector labor relations or expose students to research in the field. Thus, few stu- dents are attracted to study the topic.

There is no shortage of public sector labor relations topics ripe for research. One of the most compelling, but difficult to undertake, needs concerns unions and labor rela- tions in the nonprofit sector. The National Labor Relations Act, as amended, legally applies to the nonprofit sector. But as a practical matter, states and localities are often deeply involved in nonprofit labor relations for purposes of protecting the public health and safety, providing human services, ensuring efficiencies in government contracts with nonprofits, and other dealings. Johnston’s (1994) book on social movement union- ism, Clark and Clark’s (2006) article on unions and patient care, and Mareshal’s (2006) work on home health care workers are solid examples of published research in this understudied sector. Much more is needed, but systematic empirical analyses that go beyond case studies are very difficult in the absence of data on the extent and potential effects of union organization in the nonprofit sector.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

94 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

Public Sector Unionization: Decline, Growth, or Status Quo?

To understand where public employee unionization and collective bargaining is going, one must have a grasp of where it has been and where it is today. Figure 1 displays membership trends of unions in the public and private sectors. Private sector bargain- ing unit representation for collective bargaining has dropped from its 1954 peak when one-third of the nation’s nonagricultural workers were represented to just 8.5% in 2008; membership density (the percentage of workers who are dues-paying union members) is even lower at 7.7% of the private nonagricultural labor force. The situation is markedly different in government, where the total federal, state, and local union representation is 40.7% and membership is 36.8%. Local governments report the highest levels of union representation at 46.1% and membership at 42.2%, followed by state govern- ment with 35.1% representation and 31.6% membership (Hirsch & Macpherson, 2009). The recent figures (2006-2008) for unionization at all levels of government are slightly positive, but representation and membership rates have declined from 1994 peaks of 44.7% and 38.7%, respectively, to 40.7% and 36.8% in 2008 (Hirsch & Macpherson, 2009).

As shown in Table 1, public sector unionization and representation under bargain- ing contracts vary significantly across the states. New York has the highest rates of membership (72.9%) and representation (70.5%), followed by Massachusetts, Con- necticut, and Rhode Island. The lowest figures are for Georgia (8.7% membership, 11.5% representation) and Virginia (9.3% membership and 11.7% representation).

Figure 1. Union membership percentage 1973-2008 Source: Hirsch and Macpherson (2009).

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 95

The variance in union density strongly associated with the state legal environment for collective bargaining. Generally speaking, those states with comprehensive bar- gaining laws covering all state and local employees such as New York and Connecticut have higher rates of union density and representation than states with partial coverage (e.g., Georgia) or no legal bargaining (e.g., North Carolina, Virginia).

There has been a longstanding chicken-and-egg debate among public sector labor scholars about the direction of the relationship between collective bargaining laws and union density. A logical conclusion is that bargaining laws are both a product and precur- sor of public employee unionization—the relationship is reciprocal. Union membership growth produces political influence that can, in turn, spur the legislature into adopting a collective bargaining law. There is also evidence that collective bargaining laws stim- ulate future union membership growth (Burton, 1979; Farber, 1987; Hindman & Patton, 1994; Ichniowski, 1988; Waters, Hill, Moore, & Newman, 1994). Though interesting in

Table 1. Union Membership Density and Bargaining Unit Coverage by State, 2008

Membership Coverage Membership Coverage State (%) (%) State (%) (%)

Alabama 29.8 33.6 Missouri 23.3 28.0 Alaska 55.6 58.1 Montana 38.5 45.6 Arizona 19.2 23.5 Nebraska 27.3 36.4 Arkansas 16.0 21.6 Nevada 36.5 42.7 California 57.3 60.8 New Hampshire 47.8 54.5 Colorado 22.0 26.4 New Jersey 62.1 62.9 Connecticut 63.0 64.7 New Mexico 16.0 28.9 Delaware 38.7 43.1 New York 70.5 72.9 D.C. 21.1 24.8 North Carolina 11.0 17.2 Florida 28.0 33.9 North Dakota 16.3 22.4 Georgia 8.7 11.5 Ohio 40.6 45.5 Hawaii 54.3 57.2 Oklahoma 18.0 22.7 Idaho 16.7 19.5 Oregon 59.9 62.2 Illinois 50.3 52.8 Pennsylvania 52.9 56.6 Indiana 27.4 32.6 Rhode Island 61.9 64.6 Iowa 31.3 40.0 South Carolina 10.9 16.7 Kansas 16.6 22.9 South Dakota 16.6 23.1 Kentucky 16.3 19.8 Tennessee 16.0 20.1 Louisiana 13.3 16.6 Texas 15.0 18.4 Maine 45.2 54.2 Utah 15.5 18.9 Maryland 30.9 35.9 Vermont 40.2 48.9 Massachusetts 61.0 64.3 Virginia 9.3 11.7 Michigan 57.3 59.0 Washington 51.0 55.9 Minnesota 55.0 57.9 West Virginia 25.3 28.5 Mississippi 9.4 13.3 Wisconsin 47.7 50.1 Wyoming 13.2 16.2

Source: Hirsch and Macpherson (2009).

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

96 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

its own right, this debate is not particularly germane for the purposes of this article. It is not so much union membership that affects government, but rather the outcomes of the collective bargaining process.

Unions exercise their greatest impact through collective bargaining4 over the terms and conditions of employment, including wages, benefits, and work arrangements and procedures. What we do know is that in the absence of a facilitative legal environ- ment mandating or permitting bargaining, collective bargaining rights are difficult to win and exercise. All state and local employees have a first amendment right to orga- nize and join a union or employee association, but they do not have a commensurate right to be recognized by management for purposes of collective bargaining. Bargain- ing does occur in some scattered state agencies, local governments, and school districts without formal legal sanction (Dilts, Boyda, & Sherr, 1993; Rhodes & Brown, 1992), but the vast majority of bargaining relationships are carried out in the context of a facilitative legal environment.

Figure 2 illustrates the state public policy environment for collective bargaining adoption. The policies range from statewide statutory coverage that mandates collec- tive bargaining for all public employees, to coverage of one or more employee groups (e.g., teachers or local government workers), to authoritative prohibition of bargain- ing. Policy development for bargaining is generally traced back to Wisconsin’s 1959 law granting bargaining rights to local government workers. Since that time, and prin- cipally by the late 1970s, another 42 states have adopted bargaining coverage for at least one category of employees through legislation, gubernatorial executive order, attorney general opinion, or state supreme court ruling. Two states, North Carolina and Virginia, by statute explicitly prohibit public employee union recognition and collec- tive bargaining.

Figure 2. Collective bargaining in the states, 2009

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 97

There are clear geographical dimensions to bargaining law adoption. Most of the comprehensive bargaining states are what once was described as the urbanized, industrial- ized states of the Frostbelt that had historically high levels of private sector unionization in manufacturing. Those not explicitly permitting collective bargaining are below the Mason–Dixon Line extended westward. Southern and Southwestern states are demographically and culturally different from the union-friendly states. Their citizens and governments are generally politically and socially conservative and in most of these states there is a historical—and passionate–aversion to organized labor.

For public employee unions to move their membership and representation trajecto- ries upward again they will have to (a) argue and lobby successfully for a more facilitative legal environment for collective bargaining in the recalcitrant states and/or (b) continue pressing Congress for national legislation mandating collective bargaining for state and local employees. These are not incompatible strategies, and as I will argue below, each stands a reasonable possibility for success.

The Legal Environment in the States: Change or Status Quo? The State and Local Sectors

Nearly half of the comprehensive bargaining states adopted across-the-sectors cover- age in an incremental fashion, first authorizing negotiations for one or two occupational or jurisdictional categories, then approving extensions until full coverage was attained. Similarly, opportunities exist for legislative expansion of collective bargaining rights to new categories of state and local employees in the partial bargaining states, where bargaining rights have been won for at least one occupational group of state or local workers. For example, following more than two decades of union pressure and leg- islative inaction, Washington State finally extended collective bargaining to state employees in its Personnel Reform Act of 2002.

But the remaining partial-bargaining states have a variety of arrangements in place, and some of them are very narrow. In Georgia, for instance, only firefighters (with municipal government consent) and MARTA (rapid transit) workers enjoy formal bar- gaining rights; in Texas, only police and firefighters if approved by local referendum; and in Utah, only teachers. Unions have made only very modest gains in these three states. Alabama, Maryland, Nevada, and Oklahoma permit collective bargaining for local government employees but not state workers. Legislative expansion of bargain- ing rights in these states would seem to be a logical step and state workers have been pressing to win these rights but with little to show thus far.

AFSCME, the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Office and Profes- sional Employees International Union (OPEIU), and other unions have recently turned their attention to organizing employees in nonprofit foundations, day care centers, cul- tural entities, schools, and churches, social service organizations, as well as health care workers in hospitals, home care, and other institutions that are paid in whole or in

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

98 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

part under contracts with state or local governments (Mareschal, 2006). In several instances the unions have creatively constructed and secured new public policy favor- able for collective bargaining for these new members. In California, Oregon, and Washington, SEIU won “policy interventions that created public authorities as employ- ers of record for home care aides” that granted the aides collective bargaining rights (Mareschal, 2006, p. 27; see also Delp & Quan, 2002). In Oregon, the initiative process was used to establish a home care commission to serve as employer of record, with 63% voter approval (Mareschal, 2006, p. 33). New York Governor Eliot Spitzer signed a 2007 executive order giving federally subsidized, home-based child care providers the right to unionize and engage in collective bargaining (previously, they were consid- ered independent contractors). Shortly thereafter, the United Federation of Teachers (an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers) won representation rights for 28,000 providers (Greenhouse, 2007).

Through these strategies, the problem of identifying “management” for purposes of collective bargaining with non-traditional workers was resolved. That there are political limits to expanding bargaining rights to nonprofit employees became evident in 2008 in Washington, after an effort to extend such rights to day care center workers and adult family home workers in that state failed in the legislature (Thomas, 2008), and in Cali- fornia, where Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill that same year that would have granted collective bargaining rights to subsidized child care providers, including family members (Sanders, 2008).

But there are roads to recognition and collective bargaining other than statute. Col- orado state employees were effectively granted bargaining rights by means of an executive order issued by Governor Bill Ritter. The 2007 executive order permits “partnership agreements” by giving classified state workers the right to be represented by a union to negotiate on “issues of mutual concern” including wages, staffing, health care, training, efficiency, and workplace safety. This waddles and quacks enough like a duck to be labeled collective bargaining. Within 7 months some 22,500 state employees, represented by AFSCME, SEIU, and AFT, were covered by union contracts (Fender, 2008). In the most recent examples of unilateral executive action, Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano issued an executive order in December 2008 granting state employ- ees meet and confer rights.5

Not surprisingly, unions had donated a significant sum of money to Ritter’s guber- natorial campaign in 2006 (Brown, 2007). It is usually easier, and certainly cheaper, to influence a governor than it is to win the support of the majority of both houses of the legislature. This lesson had been learned and applied in 2001 in Missouri and Ken- tucky, where unions convinced Democratic governors to permit bargaining by executive order. The disadvantage of bargaining under executive order, of course, is that any future governor can revoke it with the stroke of a pen, as occurred in 2002 in Kentucky, when new Republican Governor Ernie Fletcher annulled former Governor Paul Patton’s executive order. Another Kentucky turnabout came in 2008 when Fletch- er’s successor, Democrat Steve Beshear, restored state employee bargaining rights. Indiana unions experienced a policy reversal after passage of a much longer period of

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 99

time: Former Governor Evan Bayh issued an executive order granting state employees bargaining rights, only to have Governor Mitch Daniels rescind it 16 years later.

Attorneys general have also bestowed collective bargaining and meet and confer rights though issuing opinions to that effect in Arkansas (where the effects have been modest), in West Virginia (where such opinions provided for exclusive recognition of a union, meet and confer, and impasse procedures for wages, hours, and conditions of work), and in Arizona (in which meet and confer is the norm in Phoenix, Tucson, and most urban school districts).

Another, more authoritative path to winning bargaining rights is through the state supreme court. This first occurred in the unlikely case of Florida in 1968, when the court held in Dade County Classroom Teachers Association v. Ryan (1968) that the state constitution did not distinguish between public and private sector employees in affording collective bargaining rights. The court ordered the state legislature to enact a law to set regulations and standards to implement public employee bargaining. The recalcitrant legislature, under court duress, delayed until 1974, when it finally passed the Public Employee Relations Act (see Kearney, 2009). Much more recently, Missouri state employees, along with teachers and local government workers, were awarded a constitutional right to engage in collective bargaining when the state supreme court overturned a 1947 decision that construed such rights to accrue only to private sector workers (also abrogating a 2005 executive order by Republican Gover- nor Matt Blunt that prohibited state employee bargaining). As in Florida, the Missouri court applied constitutional language providing for the right to organize and bargain collectively to all state workers (Lieb, 2007; Sherry, 2007). Information on the role unions played in pressing for a favorable supreme court opinion is not available to the author, but a friendly wager would bet that at the least, friend-of-the-court briefs were submitted by one or more groups of organized employees.

Thus, there are four state roads to securing collective bargaining rights and employ- ees and their unions wishing to secure those rights would be well served by pursuing one or more of the most promising. The unions have a reputation for being generous in their campaign assistance to friendly candidates for executive and legislative posts and persistent in calling in the implicit markers that are issued by successful candi- dates. And unlike many of their private sector counterparts, public employee unions have learned to be flexible and adaptable to their political, economic, and cultural environment, which has aided them in gaining and maintaining political relevance (Kearney, 2003b).

There is cause for union hope even in some of the nonbargaining states. Alabama grants collective bargaining rights to local government workers, Tennessee to teachers, and as noted above, Georgia to firefighters and MARTA workers, but other states in the South (Mississippi, Louisiana, South Carolina, Arkansas) remain unfriendly environ- ments for unions and collective bargaining. However, there is evidence that in Louisiana, South Carolina, and North Carolina, some teacher organizations bargain or meet and confer with school administrators or school boards, and that in other non-bargaining states some extra-legal negotiations occur between unions and management (Kearney,

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

100 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

2009). Perhaps the most interesting southern states are the two that expressly prohibit state agencies and local governments from recognizing unions for the purpose of col- lective bargaining, Virginia and North Carolina. The 2008 national election results showed these traditionally conservative “red” states becoming “blue.” Could they be expected to revoke their prohibitions against union recognition and bargaining?

There are two authoritative policies prohibiting collective bargaining in Virginia: a statute and a state supreme court ruling. The statute (Virginia Code 40.1-57.2) reads as follows:

No state, county, municipal, or like governmental officer, agent or governing body is vested with or possesses any authority to recognize any labor union or other employee association as a bargaining agent of any public officers or employees, or to collectively bargain or enter into any collective bargaining con- tract with any such union or association or its agents with respect to any matter relating to them or their employment or service.

In Commonwealth of Virginia v. The County Board of Arlington et al. 217 Va. 558 (1977), Virginia’s supreme court declared invalid any policy sanctioning collective bargaining between public employers and employee unions (effectively annul- ling informal negotiating arrangements that had developed between teachers and their employers in several urban districts; Carlton & Johnson, 1980). Virginia’s public employee unions clearly have substantial legal obstacles blocking their way collective bargaining rights, and the state’s very low union density (3.7% overall and 8.5% in public employment) offers scant encouragement. But, as noted above, Virginia deliv- ered its electoral votes to Barack Obama in 2008, demonstrating that the state’s political and social demographics are in transition; and the metamorphosis is in a direction favoring liberalization of public sector collective bargaining. Bills to revoke the prohibition against union recognition and bargaining were introduced in the legis- lature during recent sessions and it would be surprising if new efforts were not made in the next legislative session. There is evidence that informal bargaining, or meet and confer, does presently take place between teachers and administrators in some public school districts.

North Carolina joins Virginia as the only other state to legally disallow public employee collective bargaining. Following an organizing campaign by Charlotte police officers in the late 1950s that disturbed the antiunion corporate sector, North Carolina Statute 95-98 was enacted and signed into law in 1959. The stern language, captured in a single run-on sentence replete with redundancy, stands as the authorita- tive anticollective bargaining statement:

Any agreement, or contract, between the governing authority of any city, town, county, or other municipality, or between any agency, unit, or instrumentality thereof, or between any agency, instrumentality, or institution of the State of North Carolina, and any labor union, trade union, or labor organization, as bargaining

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 101

agent for any public employees of such city, town, county, or other municipality, or agency or instrumentality of government, is hereby declared to be against the public policy of the State, illegal, unlawful, void and of no effect.

Forbidding language notwithstanding, a number of meet and confer relationships function in mid-to-large size North Carolina municipalities in which union represen- tatives meet with city managers and/or council members to discuss concerns with pay, benefits, and working conditions. Fire fighter, police, and sanitation unions are the most actively engaged in meet and confer and other organized activities (Honeycutt, 2007). In 2006, for example, Raleigh sanitation workers staged a 2-day walkout over charges that supervisors were not paying for overtime work and other issues. Union and civil rights supporters marched in Raleigh demanding bargaining rights. Negotia- tions between union representatives and city officials produced a temporary settlement of the grievances.

In the first year of the 2007-2008 North Carolina biennial legislative session, HB 1583 was introduced to overturn the collective bargaining ban. The bill passed the House judiciary committee but died at the end of the session. Meanwhile, the State Employees Association of North Carolina (SEANC) formally affiliated with the Ser- vice Employees International Union in May 2008, becoming a SEIU local and vowing to assist in the struggle to revoke Statute 95-98. SEIU, SEANC, and other unions were some of the largest contributors in the 2006 and 2008 legislative elections. It is no coincidence that North Carolina’s public sector union membership rate jumped from 8.2% in 2007 to 11.0% in 2008 (Hirsch & Macpherson, 2009).

Potential for Preemptive Federal Action Recent political events and congressional actions have given hope to state and local unions and associations that public safety workers, including police, fire fighters, and corrections employees, will gain national union recognition and bargaining rights. Since the 1970s, numerous bills have been introduced in Congress to federally mandate and regulate state and local government labor relations. Several approaches have been dis- cussed, including amending the National Labor Relations Act to cover state and local employees, creating a new federal labor authority such as the current National Labor Relations Authority (NLRA) to cover the state and local sectors, and a federal–state partnership approach in which the national government would set minimum standards for labor relations and collective bargaining in state and local governments. The first two approaches would effectively amount to a complete preemption of state and local law, whereas the partnership route would be construed as partial preemption.

A bill titled H. R. 980: Public Safety Employer–Employee Cooperation Act of 2007 was introduced in the House of Representatives in 2007, passing the House by a large majority (314 to 97). The chances for H.R. 980’s passage in the Senate were looking reasonably good when the bill’s champion, Senator Edward Kennedy, was hospitalized and diagnosed with a brain tumor in late 2008. The bill languished in the Senate as

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

102 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

Congress fixated on the national financial crisis then adjourned for the New Year to await installation of the Barack Obama administration. H.R. 980 died with adjournment of the 2007-2008 Congress.

H.R. 980 would provide collective bargaining rights for state and local “public safety officers,” defined as law enforcement officers, fire fighters, and emergency med- ical personnel. The scope of bargaining would include “hours, wages, and working conditions.” Strikes and lockouts would be prohibited. The Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), a three-member bipartisan organization that has responsibility and final authority for federal labor relations administrative functions, would be charged with issuing regulations for union recognition and collective bargaining in those states that do not currently provide such. The FLRA would also conduct and supervise elections of bargaining representatives, ensure bargaining in good faith, and hear allegations of unfair labor practices, among other responsibilities. Existing collective bargaining agreements and processes would not be preempted, and jurisdictions with a population of 5,000 or less or with fewer than 25 full-time employees could be excluded by state action (GovTrack.us, 2008).

Would H.R. 980 withstand a court challenge? It would offer a test similar to that decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority (1985) on the applicability of the Fair Labor Standards Act to state and local governments. The Supreme Court’s view on congressional authority has vacillated dur- ing the two decades since Garcia, so it remains possible that congressional preemption of state labor relations policy for public safety employees could be declared unconsti- tutional on 11th or 14th amendment grounds (Clark & Powers, 2003).

Reintroduced in 2009 as H.R. 413 and S. 1611, the bill's chances were difficult to gage. Both versions were in committee as of November 1, 2009. Passage is certainly plausible in the context of strong Democratic majorities in both houses and a prolabor Democrat in the White House. If this transpires and public safety officers in nonbar- gaining states and localities are granted recognition and collective bargaining rights, will the states, counties, and municipalities be ready to respond and manage the pro- cess? Labor relations and collective bargaining concepts and processes are alien to most elected and appointed officials in nonbargaining jurisdictions. A chaotic reckon- ing could well ensue. Certainly there will be plenty of opportunities for labor lawyers and consultants to vend their wares and practice their trade.

Some 50 years have passed since Wisconsin enacted the first state law protecting the right of public employees to form and join unions and engage in collective bar- gaining. All but seven states now provide for recognition and bargaining in one or more employee categories. But a majority of state and local workers in the United States still do not enjoy such legal rights. This could change in a positive direction for the unions should bargaining states add new categories of workers to those now permit- ted to negotiate, as comprehensive bargaining states New York and Oregon recently did with home day care workers, and as partial-bargaining states Washington, Delaware, Arizona, and Colorado did for their state employees. Several states, including Oregon, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Vermont, have recently passed bills

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 103

permitting public employees to cast their lot for collective bargaining and a union representative through a signed authorization card (“card check”) rather than secret ballot election. This change can be expected to yield higher membership and bargain- ing coverage numbers in these states.

As the foregoing discussions of Virginia and North Carolina indicate, there is move- ment in the direction of collective bargaining even in the most antiunion states, aided by increased union organizing efforts and favorable political winds. But just as the legislature, governor, attorney general or courts give, they can take away. Bargaining has been revoked by legislation in New Mexico and Florida6 and by executive order in Indiana. Courts in several states have overturned aspects of labor relations deemed ille- gal or unconstitutional. Overall, however, it appears that the near- to intermediate-term future for public employee unionism and collective bargaining is at least moderately promising.

The Federal Sector The history of federal employee unionization and collective bargaining has been writ- ten on extensively, from the early days in the shipyards and post offices through a series of 1960s and 1970s presidential executive orders and passage of the Civil Ser- vice Reform Act (CSRA) of 1978 (see Kearney, 2009; Nesbitt, 1976; Spero, 1970). Federal employee labor relations have important distinctions from state and local labor relations. Most federal collective bargaining is governed by Title VII of the CSRA, which contains a very restrictive scope of bargaining that, for example, pre- cludes negotiations over wages and benefits, union security arrangements, and position classification. Union security arrangements such as the fair share7 are forbidden, thereby creating incentives for members of the bargaining unit to act as free riders, and resulting in what Masters (2004, p. 6) calls the “nation’s largest open-shop employer.” Some federal agencies bargain under separate legal arrangements. The Postal Reorga- nization Act of 1970 offers an expansive scope of bargaining for employees of the U.S. Postal Service to include negotiations over pay. And the Federal Aviation Admin- istration has a special personnel system that incorporates collective bargaining over pay and working conditions with its employees.

Legislation creating the behemoth Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in 2002 had special provisions for union representation and collective bargaining even more restrictive than those set out in Title VII, some of which effectively “exempted” or disenfranchised some 175,000 federal workers from collective bargaining rights (see Ferris & Hyde, 2004).The disenfranchised included some 56,000 baggage screen- ers employed by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). The establishing statute even gave DHS management the right to declare any part of an existing collec- tive bargaining agreement “null and void”.8 A bill to extend bargaining rights to baggage screeners passed the House in 2007 and was sent to the Senate for adoption. Later, however, the bargaining rights language was stripped out of the bill during con- ference committee proceedings (Ballenstedt, 2007).

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

104 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

In separate legislation in 2003 The Department of Defense (DOD) was given broad authority to eliminate civil service protections for more than 700,000 civilian employ- ees, and granted the right to create its own pay, classification, performance evaluation, labor relations, and employee appeals system in a new National Security Personnel System (NSPS). Some of the most restrictive provisions and rules were struck down by federal courts,9 as noted above, and in early 2008 DOD and DHS retreated from other personnel “reforms” in the face of strong union and Democratic opposition in Congress (Riccucci & Thompson, 2008, p. 883). The final NSPS regulations issued in September 2008 restored labor–management relations in DOD to the standard proce- dures and regulations for the civil service (Ballenstedt, 2008).

The George W. Bush administration will probably go down in history as many things, including as one of the most antilabor of all. One of President Bush’s first official actions on taking office was to revoke President Clinton’s Executive Order 12933, which mandated Labor–Management Partnerships in all federal agencies. The President’s Office of Personnel Management and Office of Management and Budget pursued Bush’s “freedom to manage” doctrine in attacking union rights, mem- bership, and resources along a variety of fronts (Masters, 2004; Thompson, 2007), including an effort to hand off some 425,000 federal civil service positions to firms (Tobias, 2004). As Bush and his cronies exited in January 2009, they left behind them for the next administration a depleted, beaten down federal civil service that was less unionized than eight years before. In the words of public administration scholar Paul Light (2008),

President Obama “is about to inherit a deeply dysfunctional government: the appointment process is nasty, brutish and not at all short; departments are clogged with red tape and reporting chains to nowhere; the civil service system fails at nearly every task it undertakes; and contractors roam freely under the loosest oversight.”

What of the federal unions in these unfortunate circumstances? They continued to exercise some power and influence through collective bargaining, their other representational functions, and the courts to restrain the Bush administration’s union- bashing activities (see Riccucci & Thompson, 2008). But they have also been shedding membership since 1998 (from 447,500 to 417,700). The percentage of federal nonpostal workers belonging to unions declined from 19% in 1998 to 16% in 2008; the figure for employees covered by collective bargaining agreements has been on a persistent downward slope since 1998, dropping from 25.1% to 22.3% (Hirsch & Macpherson, 2009). Reductions in membership and coverage have also been registered in the Postal Service. In 1998, 72.3% of postal workers belonged to unions and 77.7% were covered under contracts; those figures had been reduced to 61.9% and 67.6%, respectively, by 2008 (Hirsch & Macpherson, 2009). Federal union strength indicators were in decline before President Bush took office, but the Bush years undoubtedly took a further, substantial toll.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 105

Calls for federal civil service reform have been growing louder and more persistent as the CSRA is getting long of tooth (Naff & Newman, 2004; National Commission on the Public Service, 2003; Walker, 2000), but most reformers are not conceptualiz- ing reform in the same terms as the Bush administration’s privatization and “freedom to manage” efforts did (Riccucci & Thompson, 2008). It would seem that outsourcing and de-privileging of the civil service can only go so far, and both may have reached their acceptable limits already (e.g., Rainey, 2006).

Conclusion Serious hurdles must be cleared if public employee unions and collective bargaining are to progress and prosper. Federal unions must demonstrate their relevance to pres- ent and prospective dues-paying members. State and local organizations will need to press the fight for new enabling legislation for uncovered categories of workers. Priva- tization and outsourcing of traditional public service functions must be resisted. Unions everywhere need to contend with the changing demographics and technologies of the workplace. Positive public opinion must be nurtured.

Unions operate today in a supremely challenging environment. The secular decline of private sector unions hangs like a black cloud over the heads of unions in govern- ment. The enormous debt compiled by the federal government and the devastating Great Recession of 2008-2009 portend reductions-in-force at all levels of government and very little money for wage increases in the next few years. The level and scope of benefits, particularly health insurance, are at risk of substantial reductions through increased premiums, deductibles, and copayments. Mandatory defined contribution retirement plans for new state employees will likely be widespread throughout the states. Continuing calls for privatizing services and greater management authority and flexibility seem inconsistent with unionization and collective bargaining (Masters, 2004). These ingredients, mixed together, do not make a recipe for harmonious labor– management relationships in the years ahead.

The election of Democratic majorities in the U.S. House and Senate in 2008, along with a prolabor Democratic president, could help turn around union fortunes in all sectors of employment. The best-case scenario for private sector unions is that they would finally get the Employee Free Choice Act passed and a friendlier National Labor Relations Board appointed. For the federal sector, President Obama would res- urrect the partnerships approach for labor and management and Congress would revisit the restrictive labor relations provisions of Bush-era legislation and executive orders, including the Homeland Security Act. Very optimistically, perhaps the federal scope of bargaining would be expanded to wages and benefits and union security. For the state and local sector, the more dramatic (and probably somewhat more likely) scenario would be congressional enactment and presidential signature on legislation to mandate collective bargaining rights for state and local public safety employees. If some or all of these events come to pass, public sector labor relations will look dra- matically different in the next decade.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

106 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no conflicts of interest with respect to the authorship and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author received no financial support for the research and/or authorship of this article.

Notes

1. The Employee Free Choice Act would also guarantee workers a contract when they join a union and strengthen penalties against employers that violate the law or engage in unfair labor practices during organizing campaigns and contract negotiations, and provide for mediation and arbitration to settle negotiations disputes on the initial con- tract (see www.aflcio.org/joinaunion/voiceatwork/efca/whatis.cfm). The bill (H.R. 800, S. 1041) passed the House of Representatives in March 2007 and was sent to the Senate, where action was not taken. The law, if enacted, would not apply to state and local labor relations.

2. A review of ROPPA issues from journal inception through 2008 finds 26 articles on labor relations and collective bargaining. Sixteen of them are situated in two symposia, one edited by James L. Perry in 1985 (volume 5) and the other edited by Kearney in 1993 (volume 13). Subject matter of the 26 articles covers the field fairly thoroughly. The majority of these articles are written by political scientists and public administration scholars.

3. It would be interesting and instructive to systematically examine the quantitative public administration and policy research that employs “union” as a variable in multiple regression or logit models (typically operationalized as union density or presence/absence of collective bargaining). Quite often, the union variable is statistically significant in such models. Exam- ples include models for compensation, policy adoption and reform, and human resource management impacts and outcomes (see Belman & Heywood, 1995; Goode & Baldwin, 2005; Kearney, 2003a; Mladenka, 1991; O’Brien, 1994). More incisive analysis of why unions and collective bargaining are important determinants of policy adoption and out- comes is needed.

4. Several states permit meet and confer rather than collective bargaining. The formal distinction between the two terms is that collective bargaining establishes the two parties at the negotiat- ing table as equals; both must sign an agreement for it to take effect. Meet and confer does not grant equal decision-making responsibility to the union. Rather, the employer retains final authority and is under no legal obligation to negotiate or sign an agreement In practice, the distinction between collective bargaining and meet and confer is unimportant in most jurisdic- tions, as meet and confer has morphed into a de facto collective bargaining relationship.

5. Napolitano’s order may be reversed by the Republican who replaced her in the governor’s office.

6. A 2001 Florida law reorganized higher education and dissolved union contracts with faculty and other employees. The law was overturned by a state appellate court in 2005 (see Bradley, 2005). The New Mexico revocation of collective bargaining was later reversed.

7. The fair share arrangement permits unions to collect the costs of the union’s representational activities from members of the bargaining unit, whether or not they choose to join the union.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 107

8. This provision was overruled by a federal judge in 2005 in NTEU v. Chertoff (385 F. Supp. 2d. 1) and upheld on appeal.

9. For example, in 2005 a federal court struck down DHS personnel rules that violated rights for federal employees under the CSRA.

References

Aaron, B., Grodin, J. R., & Stern, J. L. (Eds.). (1979). Public-sector bargaining. Madison, WI: Industrial Relations Research Association.

Aaron, B., Najita, J. M., & Stern, J. L. (1988). Public-sector bargaining (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: Bureau of National Affairs.

Ashraf, J. (1998). Collective bargaining and compensation at public junior colleges. Journal of Collective Negotiations, 27, 393-399.

Ballenstedt, B. R. (2007, July 17). House members weigh alternate paths to TSA bargaining rights. Government Executive.

Ballenstedt, B. R. (2008, September 30). Pentagon drops plans to convert union employees NSPS. Government Executive.

Bazerman, M. H., & Farber, H. (1985). Arbitrator decision making: When are final offers important? Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 39, 76-89.

Belman, D., & Heywood, J. S. (1991). Direct and indirect effects of unionization and government employment on fringe benefit provisions. Journal of Labor Research, 12, 111-122.

Belman, D., & Heywood, J. S. (1995). State and local government wage differentials: An intrastate analysis. Journal of Labor Research, 16, 187-201.

Belman, D., Heywood, J. S., & Lund, J. (1997). Public sector earnings and the extent of union- ization. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 50, 610-628.

Bemmels, B. (1994). The determinants of grievance initiation. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 47, 285-301.

Bent, A. E., & Reeves, T. Z. (1978). Collective bargaining in the public sector. Menlo Park, CA: Benjamin/Cummings.

Bennett, J. T., & Kaufman, B. E. (2002). Introduction. In J. T. Bennett & B. E. Kaufman (Eds.), The future of private sector unionism in the United States (pp. 1-8). Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe.

Bohlander, G. W. (1994). Why arbitrators overturn managers in employee suspension and dis- charge cases. Journal of Collective Negotiations, 23, 73-89.

Bradley, G. (2005). Collective bargaining rights affirmed in Florida. Academe, May/June, 1. Brown, J. (2007, November 4). Ritter’s big gamble. Denverpost.com. Burton, J. F., Jr. (1972). Local government bargaining and management structure. Industrial

Relations, 11, 123-140. Burton, J. F., Jr. (1978). Public sector strikes: Legal, ethical, and practical considerations

(Reprint Series No. 448). New York: Cornell University, New York State School of Industrial and Labor Relations.

Burton, J. F., Jr. (1979). The extent of collective bargaining in the public sector. In B. Aaron, J. R. Grodin, & J. L. Stern (Eds.), Public-sector bargaining (pp. 1-43). Madison, WI: Indus- trial Relations Research Association.

Capozzola, J. M. (1979). Public employee strikes: Myths and realities. National Civic Review, 68(April), 178-188.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

108 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

Carlton, P. W., & Johnson, R. T. (1980). Collective bargaining and Virginia school board mem- bers: Perceptions and prognoses. Peabody Journal of Education, 57, 110-118.

Chandler, T. D. (1995). Sanitation privatization and sanitation employees’ wages. Journal of Labor Research, 15, 137-153.

Chandler, T. D., & Feuille, P. (1991). Municipal unions and privatization. Public Administration Review, 51, 15-22.

Chandler. T. D., & Gely, R. (1995). Protective service unions, political activities and bargaining outcomes. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 5, 295-318.

Clark, P. F., & Clark, D. A. (2006). Union strategies for improving patient care: The key to nurse unionism. Labor Studies Journal, 31, 51-70.

Clark, T., Jr. & Powers, J. J. (2003). Constitutional and practical pitfalls of a federally- mandated public sector collective bargaining system. Journal of Labor Research, 24, 621-641.

Coleman, C. J. (1990). Managing labor relations in the public sector. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Coulson, R. (1980). New views of arbitration: Satisfying the demands of the employee. Labor Law Journal, 31, 495-497.

Dade County Classroom Teachers Association v. Ryan. (1968). 225 So. 2d 903. Decker, K. H. (1994). Public sector grievance arbitration procedures. In J. Rabin et al. (Eds.),

Handbook of public sector labor relations (pp. 135-182). New York: Marcel Dekker. Delaney J. T. (1988). Teachers’ collective bargaining outcomes and tradeoffs. Journal of Labor

Research, 9, 363-377. Delaney, J. T., Fiorito, J., & Jarley, P. (1999). Evolutionary politics? Union differences and

political activities in the 1990s. Journal of Labor Research, 20, 277-295. Delp, L., & Quan, K. (2002). Homecare worker organizing in California: An analysis of a suc-

cessful strategy. Labor Studies Journal, 27, 1-23. Dilts, D. A., Boyda, S. W., & Sherr, M. A. (1993). Collective bargaining in the absence of pro-

tective legislation: The case of Louisiana. Journal of Collective Negotiations, 22, 259-265. Farber, H. S. (1987). The recent decline of unionization in the United States. Science, 238,

915-920. Feder D. L. (1989). Pick a forum –any forum: A proposal for a federal dispute resolution board.

Labor Law Forum, 40 (May), 268-280. Fender, J. (2008). Vote unionizes state labor. Retrieved June 12, 2008, from http://denverpost

.com Ferris, F., & Hyde, A. C. (2004). Federal labor-management relations for the next century—or

the last? The case of the Department of Homeland Security. Review of Public Personnel Administration, 24, 216-233.

Francia, P. F. (2006). The future of organized labor in American politics. New York: Columbia University Press.

Freeman, R. B., & Ichniowski, C. (Eds.). (1988). When public sector workers unionize. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Freeman, R. B., & Medoff, J. L. (1984). What do unions do? New York: Basic Books. Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority (1985). 105 S. Ct. 1005. Gely, R., & Chandler, T. D. (1993). Determinants of management’s organizational structure in

the public sector. Journal of Labor Research, 14, 381-397.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 109

Gely, R., & Chandler, T. D. (1995). Protective service unions’ political activities and departmen- tal expenditures. Journal of Labor Research, 14, 171-186.

Goldfield, M. (1987). The decline of organized labor in the United States. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Goode, S. J., & Baldwin, N. J. (2005). Predictions of African American representation in municipal government. Review of Public Personnel Administration, 25, 29-55.

Greenhouse, S. (2007, October 24). Child care workers in New York City vote to unionize. The New York Times.

GovTrack.us. (2008). H.R. 980: Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act of 2007. Retrieved October 5, 2009, from http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-980&tab

Haber, L. J. & Karim, A. R. (1995). Arbitral standards in public sector and private sector sub- stance abuse discharge cases: A comparison. Journal of Collective Negotiations, 24, 55-61.

Hebdon, R. P., & Stern, R. N. (2003). Do public-sector strike bans really prevent conflict? Industrial Relations, 42, 493-512.

Hindman, H. D., & Patton, D. B. (1994). Unionism in state and local governments: Ohio and Illinois, 1982-87. Industrial Relations, 33, 106-120.

Hirsch, B. T., & Macpherson, D. A. (2009). Union membership and coverage database. Retrieved Februay 27, 2009, from http://unionstats.gsu.edu/

Holzer, M. (1988). Productivity in, garbage out: Sanitation gains in New York. Public Produc- tivity Review, 11(3), 37-50.

Honeycutt, J. (2007). The influence of organized employees in North Carolina’s twenty-five largest cities. Popular Government, Fall, 26-29.

Hoover, G. A., & Peoples, J. (2003). Privatization of refuse removal and labor costs. Journal of Labor Research, 24, 293-305.

Ichniowski, C. (1988). Public sector union growth and bargaining laws: A proportional hazards approach with time-varying treatments. In R. B. Freeman & C. Ichniowski (Eds.), When public sector workers unionize (pp. 19-40). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Jennings, K. M., Jr., Smith, J. A., Jr., & Traynham, E. C., Jr. (1988). Labor relations in a public service industry. New York: Praeger.

Johnston, P. (1994). Success while others fail: Social movement unionism and the public workplace. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Kearney, R. C. (2003a). The determinants of state employee compensation. Review of Public Personnel Administration, 23, 305-322.

Kearney, R. C. (2003b). Patterns of union decline and growth: An organizational ecology perspective. Journal of Labor Research, 24, 561-578.

Kearney, R. C. (2009). Labor relations in the public sector (4th ed.). New York: CRC Press. Lewin, D., Feuille, P., & Kochan, T. (1981). Public sector labor relations: Analysis and readings.

Sun Lakes, CA: Horton. Lewin, D. & Peterson, R. (1999). Behavioral outcomes of grievance activity. Journal of Indus-

trial Relations, 38, 554-575. Lieb, D. A. (2007, May 30). MO: Bargain rights for public employees. Forbes, pp. 1-4. Light, P. C. (2008, November 12). Fast track to efficiency. The New York Times, op-ed. Loveless, T. (Ed.). (2000). Conflicting missions: Teacher unions and educational reform. Wash-

ington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

110 Review of Public Personnel Administration 30(1)

Mareschal, P. M. (2005). What makes mediation work? Mediators’ perspectives on resolving disputes. Industrial Relations, 44, 509-517.

Mareschal, P. M. (2006). Innovation and adaptation: Contrasting efforts to organize home care workers in four states. Labor Studies Journal, 31, 25-49.

Masters, M. F. (2004). Federal-sector unions: Current status and future directions. Journal of Labor Research, 25, 1-24.

Masters, M. F., & Delaney, J. T. (1987). Union political activities: A review of the empirical literature. Industrial and Labor Relations Review, 40, 336-353.

Matzer, J., Jr. (1988). A practical approach to productivity bargaining. In J. Matzer, Jr. (Ed.). Pay and benefits: New ideas for local government. Washington, DC: International City Management Association.

McPherson, D. S. (1983). Resolving Grievances: A Practical Approach. Reston, VA: Reston Publishing.

Milkman, R. & Voss, K. (Eds.). (2004). Rebuilding labor: Organizing and organizers in the new union movement. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Mladenka, K. R. (1991). Public employee unions, reformism, and black employment in 1200 American cities. Urban Affairs Quarterly, 26, 532-548.

Naff, K. C., & Newman, M. A. (2004). Symposium: Federal civil service reform: Another legacy of 9/11? Review of Public Personnel Administration, 24, 191-201.

Najita, J. M., & Stern, J. L. (Eds.). (2001). Collective bargaining in the public sector: The experience of eight states. Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe.

National Commission on the Public Service. (2003). Urgent business for America: Revitalizing the federal government for the 21st century. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.

Nesbitt, M. B. (1976). Labor relations in the federal government service. Washington, DC: Bureau of National Affairs.

O’Brien, K. M. (1994). The impact of union political activities on public-sector pay, employ- ment and budget. Industrial Relations, 33, 265-278.

O’Brien, K. M. (1996). The effect of political activity by police unions on nonwage bargaining outcomes. Journal of Collective Negotiations, 25, 99-116.

Oestreich, H. H., & Whaley, G. L. (2008). Transit labor relations guide (2nd ed.). San Jose, CA: Mineta Transportation Institute.

Rainey, H. G. (2006). Reform trends at the federal level with implications for the states: The pursuit of flexibility and the human capital movement. In J. E. Kellough & L. G. Nigro (Eds.), Civil service reform in the states (pp. 33-58). Albany: State University of New York Press.

Rhodes, T. L., & Brown, R. G. (1992). Divided we fall: Employee perceptions of a legal prohi- bition on collective bargaining: A closer look. Journal of Collective Negotiations, 21, 1-14.

Riccucci, N. M. (1990). Women, minorities, and unions in the public sector. New York: Greenwood. Riccucci, N. M., & Thompson, F. J. (2008). The new public management, homeland security,

and the politics of civil service reform. Public Administration Review, 68, 877-890. Salerno, C. A. (1981). Police at the bargaining table. Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas. Sanders, J. (2008, March 21). Governor vetoes collective bargaining for child-care workers.

Sacramento Bee. Shaw, L. R., & Clark, R. T., Jr. (1972). The practical differences between public and private

sector bargaining. UCLA Law Review, 19, 867-886.

at WALDEN UNIVERSITY on October 27, 2014rop.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://rop.sagepub.com/

Kearney 111

Sherry, M. (2007, May 29). Ruling strengthens public employee bargaining rights. Kansas City Star.

Spero, S. D. (1970). Government as employer. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois Press. Spero, S. D., & Capozzola, J. M. (1973). The urban community and its unionized bureaucracies.

New York: Dunellen. Stanley, D. T. (1972). Managing local government under union pressure. Washington, DC:

Brookings Institution Press. Sterret, G., & Aboud, A. (1982). The right to strike in public employment. Ithaca, NY: ILR

Press. Stieber, J. (1973). Public employee unionism: Structure, growth, policy. Washinton, DC: Brookings

Institution Press. Thomas, R. (2008, March 10). Unions’ streak in legislature is broken. The Seattle Times. Thompson, J. R. (2007). Federal labor-management relations reforms under Bush: Enlightened

management or quest for control? Review of Public Personnel Administration, 27, 105-124. Tillman, R. M. & Cummings, M. S. (1999). The transformation of U.S. unions: Voices, visions

and strategies from the grassroots. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner. Tobias, R. M. (2004). The future of federal government labor relations and the mutual interests

of Congress, the administration, and unions. Journal of Labor Research, 25, 19-41. Toulmin, L. M. (1988). The treasure hunt: Budget search behavior by public employee unions.

Public Administration Review, 48, 620-680. Turner, L., Katz, H. C., & Hurd, R. W. (Eds.). (2001). Rekindling the movement: Labor’s quest

for relevance in the 21st century. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. (2008). Major work stoppages in 2007. Retrieved October 5,

2009, from http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/wkstp_02132008.pdf Valletta, R. G. (1989). The impact of unionism on municipal expenditures and revenues. Indus-

trial and Labor Relations Review, 42, 430-442. Walker, D. M. (2000). Human capital: Managing human capital in the 21st century. Testimony

before the Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, Restructuring, and the District of Columbia. Committee on Governmental Affairs, U.S. Senate (GAO/T-GGD-00-77). Retrieved October 5, 2009, from http://www.gao.gov/archive/2000/gg00077t.pdf

Waters, M. S., Hill, R. C., Moore, W. J., & Newman, R. J. (1994). A simultaneous-equations relationship between public sector bargaining legislation and unionization. Journal of Labor Research, 15, 355-372.

Wellington, H. H., & Winter, R. K., Jr. (1971). The unions and the cities. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.

Zax, J. S. (1988). Wages, nonwage compensation, and municipal unions. Industrial Relations, 27, 301-317.

Bio

Richard C. Kearney, one of the founders of Review of Public Personnel Administration, is a professor and director of the School of Public and International Affairs at North Carolina State University. His recent research includes the fourth edition of Labor Relations in the Public Sector, the fifth edition of Human Resource Management: Problems and Prospects (with Steven Hays and Jerrell Coggburn), and articles in Publius, Administration & Society, and Public Administration Review.