This paper offers a critical evaluation of the notion of collective voice, advanced by Freeman and Medoff (1984) in their pioneering contribution What Do Unions Do? It takes note of theoretical and empirical work supportive of/consistent with the collective voice/institutional response model, and tracks some development of the model. Equally, although much criticism of What Do Unions Do? has been wide of the mark, there are critical areas in which the model is deficient. These lacunae include, but are not restricted to, the lingering imprecision of collective voice; the problem of bargaining power which calls into question the distinction between collective voice/institutional response and the monopoly face of unionism; the over-emphasis upon worker dissatisfaction; and, relatedly, the neglect of individual voice. The bottom line is that the notion of union voice is urgently in need of restatement if it is to continue to shape research into the economic consequences of unions.
Download Info
To download:
If you experience problems downloading a file, check if you have the
proper application to
view it first. Information about this may be contained
in the File-Format links below. In case of further problems read
the IDEAS help
page. Note that these files are not on the IDEAS
site. Please be patient as the files may be large.
Publisher Info
Paper provided by Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) in its series IZA Discussion Papers with number
862.
Cited by: (explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)