Organized Labor in Contemporary American Politics

Session Submission Type: Virtual Roundtable

Session Description

Organized labor has been an enduring and important influence in American politics including mobilizing voters, serving as a counterweight to business interests, combatting rising economic inequality, and acting as a crucial element of the Democratic Party coalition. Over the last decade, there has been a resurgence in research on organized labor. This roundtable will bring together several of the scholars helping lead this research revival to discuss the place of labor in contemporary American politics. In doing so, this session will create connections across new scholarship, highlight a budding research area within the American political economy field, and think critically about the place of this important player in contemporary American politics.

Some of the central questions this roundtable will consider are:
1) Given declining union density, does labor still matter in American politics? If so, does it still matter in the same way/s as before?
2) What does a Biden presidency mean for organized labor?
3) How has the pandemic and state government austerity affected labor and state politics?
4) What is the legacy of the 2018 strike wave?
5) What should be next for the study of labor in American politics?

Chair: Jacob Hacker—Yale University
Research focus: public policy, the American political economy, and economic inequality.

Participants:
Laura Bucci—Saint Joseph University
Research focus: the consequences of declining unionization for political inequality in the American states.
Selected publications:
“The State of Labor in the Democratic Party Coalition,” Party Politics (2020)
“Who Passes Restrictive Labour Policy? A View from the States,” Journal of Public Policy (2020)
“Organized Labor’s Check on Rising Economic Inequality in the U.S. States,” State Politics and Policy Quarterly (2018)

Daniel J. Galvin – Northwestern University
Research focus: labor policy and politics, alt-labor, labor standards enforcement
Selected publications:
“Labor’s Legacy: The Construction of Subnational Work Regulation,” Industrial and Labor Relations Review (2020).
“From Labor Law to Employment Law: The Changing Politics of Workers’ Rights,” Studies in American Political Development 33, 1 (2019): 50-86.
“Deterring Wage Theft: Alt-Labor, State Politics, and the Policy Determinants of Minimum Wage Compliance,” Perspectives on Politics 14, 2 (2016): 324-350.

Jake Grumbach—University of Washington
Research focus: the political economy of the United States including business and labor, and political and economic inequality.
Selected publications:
“Labor Unions and White Racial Politics,” American Journal of Political Science (2020)
“Interest Group Activists, Party Insiders, and the Polarization of State Legislatures” Legislative Studies Quarterly (2020)
“The NBA Strike is a Big Moment for Athlete Activism—and the Labor Movement in American” Vox (2020)

Melissa Arnold Lyon—Annenberg Institute at Brown University
Research focus: Research focus: political economy of education, inequality, federalism, teacher politics and policy
Selected publications:
"Bounded Unions How Restrictive Labor Policies Affect Teachers, Students, and Progressive Politics," Dissertation (2020)
"Adaptation could bring new strength," Education Next (2019)
"Blurring lines? How locally based collaborations handle the redistribution/development tradeoff," Urban Affairs Review (2018)

Alexis N. Walker (Organizer)—Saint Martin’s University
Research focus: American Political Development, public policy, federalism, and organized labor.
Selected publications:
Divided Unions: the Wagner Act, Federalism and Organized Labor (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2020)
“The Historical Presidency: ‘The Fibre of which Presidents Ought to be Made’: Union Busting from Rutherford Hayes to Scott Walker,” Presidential Studies Quarterly (2016)
"Labor's Enduring Divide: The Distinct Path of Public Sector Unions in the United States," Studies in American Political Development (2014)

Sub Unit

• Related Groups / Labor Politics

Cosponsor

• Division 55: Class and Inequality

Chair

• Jacob S. Hacker Yale University

Presenters

• Laura C. Bucci Saint Joseph's University

• Daniel Galvin Northwestern University

• Jake M Grumbach Princeton University

• Melissa Lyon Brown University

• Alexis Walker Saint Martin's University