U
NIONS
: A S
OCIAL
P
SYCHOLOGICAL
C
ONTRIBUTION TO
U
NDERSTANDING
U
NION
S
UPPORT
LEDABLACKWOOD,* GEORGELAFFERTY,** JULIEDUCK* ANDDEBORAHTERRY*
I
ndustrial relations research that attempts to grapple with individuals’ union-related sentiments and activities often draws on one of two traditions of psychological research— the individual-level factors tradition (for example, personality and attitude-behaviour relations) and the social context tradition (for example, frustration-aggression and relative deprivation). This paper provides an overview of research conducted from within these traditions to explain union-related phenomena and identifies some of the limitations that arise as a consequence of a shared tendency to treat people in an atomistic fashion. The paper argues for an understanding of the psychological processes that underpin group-based action. To this end, it elaborates a theoretical framework based on social identity theory and self-categorisation theory that would allow us to examine the dynamic interplay between the individual, their cognitions and their environment. The paper concludes with a brief discussion of a specific case of union mobilisation, to indicate how this theoretical framework might aid empirical analysis.INTRODUCTION
The decline in union density in Australia is, in the main, attributed to structural change in the economy and associated shifts in employment into less unionised industries, occupations, and types of employment status (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2000; Department of Workplace Relations and Small Business 1997; Griffin and Svensen 1996; Hartley 1995; Peetz 1998). A conservative Coalition government has further eroded the position of unions through industrial relations ‘reforms’, including the prohibition of compulsory unionism and preference clauses, the encouragement of individual contracts and enterprise bargaining, and reduction in the powers of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission (Davidson and Griffin 2000). In addition to contributing to real constraints on union subscription and participation, these changes have been accompanied by the rhetorical entrenchment of individualist values associated with free-market liberalism (Griffin and Svensen 1996; Hartley 1995). This is reflected in what some peak unions in Australia and overseas perceive to be a decrease in people’s ideological motives for joining unions (Peetz 1998).
While acknowledging that macro-level issues have precipitated a decline in union density, not all commentators agree with the sense of inevitability of this decline that has been expressed in some quarters. In a comprehensive review of the industrial relations landscape, (Peetz 1998) revealed that while many countries other than Australia are experiencing a decline in union density, this experience is not ubiquitous and is particularly severe in Australia. He argued that this points not only to the depth and rapidity of structural change in this country, but also to the struggle that unions have had in formulating a response to these changes. Importantly, Peetz (Peetz 1998) emphasised that while macro-level factors are the driving force behind changes in the environment within which unions operate, unions are responsible for how they choose to respond to these changes and can have an impact on the outcomes. From this perspective, an understanding of the dynamic relationship between the macro-level factors governing the industrial relations context and the micro-level factors influencing the psycho-logical processes that drive employees’ responses to that context, should be able to assist unions in thinking about and preparing their responses to the challenges that lie ahead. With this in mind, the present paper provides an overview and analysis of the main psychological contributions to understanding this problem.
The psychological research that has looked at the reasons for people subscribing to, participating in, and resigning from unions (Klandermans 1986c) has taken two main forms: (a) research that looks for enduring, individual level variables associated with collective action including support for unions (for example, personality factors, attitudes/beliefs, and individual decision-making processes), and (b) research that examines the social contexts of conflict between unions and management (for example, frustration-aggression and relative deprivation approaches). These traditional approaches are reviewed before turning to a discussion of a more dynamic theoretical framework. In recent years, a number of studies from an interactionist perspective have focused on the relationship between the individual and society (for example, social identity theory and self categorisation theory) in the area of collective action and in relation to unions specifically. This latter area of research—perhaps unfamiliar to an industrial relations audience—has the potential to sharpen our understanding of the psychological processes that influence the dynamic interplay between the industrial relations context and the actors involved.
REVIEW OF TRADITIONAL APPROACHES
Personality factors
instances of collective action (Kelly and Breinlinger 1996).1This is not surprising
when we consider that collective action, by definition, requires acting as a member of a group, not as an individual, and thus what might be of more relevance is a person’s perceptions of qualities of the group rather than of the self. It is important that attributes of the individual that can contribute to agency, continue to receive attention. However, these are attributes (e.g. perceived access to relevant power, skills and resources) that are more specific to context and to the action under consideration rather than enduring qualities of the person.
Attitudes and individual decision-making
Of greater interest than personality research, has been research that investigates people’s attitudes towards unions and the antecedents and behavioural con-sequences of these attitudes (including subscribing, participating, and resigning). Measures of attitude have largely been derived from a scale of union commitment developed by Gordon et al.(1980), in which commitment is defined as (a) the desire to maintain membership of an organisation; (b) willingness to make an effort for the organisation; and (c) a belief in the values and goals of the organis-ation (Gordon et al.1980, p. 480). Since union commitment has been concep-tualised as an attitude (Sverke and Kuruvilla 1995), much of the work focusing on the relationship between union commitment and union-related behaviours has been informed, either explicitly or implicitly, by value-expectancy theories of decision-making. The two most commonly used models are (a) one derived from the value-expectancy theories of reasoned action (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980), and its extension, the theory of planned behaviour (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980; Ajzen and Madden 1986); and (b) Klandermans’ (1986c) value-expectancy model. Klandermans’ (1986a; 1984a) model contains two elements: consensus mobilisation, which is akin to consciousness-raising as the process by which union members’ support for the union’s objectives is attained; followed by action mobilisation, where members are persuaded that the benefits of participation will outweigh the costs. It is the latter element that has received the most research attention.
According to both the theory of reasoned action/planned behaviour and Klandermans’ (1984b; 1986c; 1986b) model of action mobilisation, a person’s intention to support his or her union will be influenced by his or her belief that support will lead to a desired outcome, the expected reaction of significant others, and the expected costs and benefits associated with the action. In their influence on intentions, each of these beliefs and expectations is weighted by the value the person places on them. In addition, the theory of planned behaviour (Ajzen and Madden 1986) developed in response to the focus placed by the theory of reasoned action (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980) on behaviours under complete volitional control—proposes a role for individuals’ beliefs about their personal ability to perform a specific behaviour in a particular context. It is likely that perceived behavioural control (Ajzen and Fishbein 1980; Ajzen 1991) will be of particular relevance when considering the constraints placed on union-related activity in some workplaces.
campaigns over work reorganisation, staffing agreements and the shorter working week (Klandermans 1986c; Klandermans 1984b), and attendance at union meetings (Flood 1993). Other research, however, has been more equivocal. These models predict that if the costs of union activity outweigh the benefits— for instance where the individual perceives their union to be ineffectual or powerless, or where there are sanctions against being involved—then people should withdraw their support for the union. This prediction, however, has not been supported by empirical research in instances of, for instance, protracted industrial strike action where employees appear to base their decisions on beliefs about the justness of the cause (e.g. Fantasia 1988; Gouldner 1954; Turnbull et al. 1991).
There is now general support for there being two main routes to union commitment and support—the instrumental route and the ideological route (e.g. Freeman and Medoff 1984; Goldthorpe et al.1968; Newton and Shore 1992; Sverke and Sjoeberg 1995). The impact of the distinction between these two routes to union support—and the perceived tension between the two—is evident in divisions within the Australian trade union movement about strategic direction. Specifically, these divisions are about the long-term sustainability of a servicing model of unionism, where loyalty to the union depends on the delivery of services (instrumental) versus an organising model of unionism, where loyalty to the union depends on a belief in collective action. According to some commentators (e.g. Hartley 1992), the evidence points to the two sets of beliefs having quite distinct outcomes with instrumental or pragmatic beliefs being more important in the area of union subscription, but ideology being more stable in the long-term, and predictive of effortful forms of participation (Kelly and Breinlinger 1996; Veenstra and Haslam 2000).
Social influence
Contextually related changes in the valence of people’s beliefs is a reminder that collective action involves the individual thinking and acting in concert with others, and thus raises the need to consider how others influence our thoughts and behaviours (Hartley 1992). Support for social influences on union-related attitudes and behaviours—particularly joining behaviour—has been found in relation to four predictor variables (a) family background; (b) workplace social identity; (c) social networks in the workplace; and (d) extent of social approval from managers and colleagues (e.g. Bain and Price 1983; Fullagar et al.1994; Fullagar et al.1995; Kelloway and Newton 1996; Youngblood et al.1984).2
In the theories of reasoned action and planned behaviour (Ajzen and Madden 1986; Ajzen 1991; Fishbein and Ajzen 1975), social influence is operationalised as the subjective norm—the person’s assessment of the likelihood that relevant others such as co-workers expect the person to support the union. This is weighted by the person’s motivation to comply with these expectations. The social motives component of Klanderman’s (1986c) action mobilisation model maps directly on to the subjective norm. The proposed role of the subjective norm/social motive has received little support in research on union-related behaviours (e.g. Kelloway and Barling 1993; Sverke and Sjoeberg 1995). Although this lack of strong support is consistent with general findings from the theory of reasoned action and planned behaviour research (see Ajzen’s 1991 meta-analysis), it is counter-intuitive and contrary to the findings reported above from the wider social psychological research into unions.
The lack of empirical support for the role of social influence can be attributed to a number of limitations in the treatment of norms in the value-expectancy models of attitude-behaviour relations (Terry and Hogg 1996; Trafimow and Finlay 1996). Specifically, (a) the description of the ‘subjective norm’ in terms of the extent to which people perceive that others want them to perform the behaviour, rather than as the perceived attitudes and behaviours of others who are contextually relevant (see Brown 1988); and (b) the assumption that the normative and attitudinal components are based on different belief structures and, therefore, are cognitively independent of each other (Liska 1984). Contrary to this latter view, structural equation modelling has revealed ‘crossover’ relationships (Oliver and Bearden 1985) between attitudes and beliefs about relevant others’ attitudes (normative beliefs) suggesting that norms may be influential in the formation of attitudes (Terry and Hogg 1996; Vallerand et al.1992).
The social influence research leads us to the second psychological research tradition that has contributed to the study of union-related phenomena: research that looks at the social-contextual factors influencing collective action.
Frustration–aggression theory and work-related dissatisfaction
activity. A widespread public belief is that frustration, dissatisfaction, and/or alienation lead to strike activity. One psychological approach looks at internal psychological processes and identifies frustration as the cause of participation in collective action through trade unions. According to the frustration-aggression hypothesis, people strive for a state of intra-psychic equilibrium and thus, in work-related situations where they feel frustrated, dissatisfied or alienated, they are driven to restore their sense of equilibrium by participating in trade union activities. Although there is some support for a relationship between job dissatisfaction and union-related behaviours, overall, the findings have been inconclusive (DeCotiis and LeLouarn 1981; Farber and Saks 1990; Getman et al. 1976; Guest and Dewe 1988; Kochan 1980; Schriesheim 1978; Snyder et al. 1986; Youngblood et al. 1984). Participation in trade union activity is not the only course of action that a person can take to combat feelings of frustration or dissatisfaction (Bluen 1994). Thus, inconsistent findings may be the result of some employees either suppressing their discontent or expressing it in forms other than support for the union (Klandermans 1984b). Furthermore, strike decisions often arise in the context of tensions between employees and management over employment conditions that may not be related to employees’ general sense of (dis)satisfaction with their job or their workplace.
Notwithstanding the above limitations, there are sufficient real-world examples to suggest that dissatisfaction will, in some circumstances, underpin collective protest such as union activity (see Premack and Hunter 1988). In order to understand what these circumstances might be, we need to turn to theoreti-cal models that move beyond intra-psychic processes to look more at the nature of the social context. One of the most influential of these social context models has been relative deprivation theory.
Relative-deprivation theory
Summary
Research into union-related sentiment and activity has been reasonably fruitful and much is now known, or suspected, about the personal and environmental factors that have an impact on these attitudes and behaviours. For example, people’s instrumental and ideological attitudes, their sense of agency (both personal and collective), their perceptions that there are grounds for action and that others support such action must all be implicated. Additional factors not elaborated here include aspects of social movement organisations such as access to resources, existence of networks, relations of respect and trust between members. However useful, running through all this research is a tendency to treat people in an atomistic fashion. As a consequence, when taken alone, they contribute little to understanding changes in union support across place and time.
INTERACTIONIST PERSPECTIVES
Social identity
Collective action is contingent on seeing the self as part of a group. A recurring theme in previous research is the failure to account for the sense of group solidarity that arises in particular contexts and how this experience of solidarity implicates group-level processes of social influence. In accord with Klandermans’ (2002; 2000; 2002) more recent work, we believe that identitycan disentangle the knot of collective behaviour explanations. There is now considerable evidence for the effect of group identity on union-related outcomes. Allen and Stephenson (1983) found that increased identification with either union or management led to a more stereotypic perception of the relevant outgroup. A number of studies have found support for a relationship between union identification and preparedness to participate in union activities (Frege 1996; Kelly 1993; Veenstra and Haslam 2000). Furthermore, in comparison to other social psychological variables, such as political efficacy, collectivist orientation, perceived intergroup conflict, outgroup stereotyping, and relative deprivation, Kelly and Kelly (1994) found that union identification was the best predictor of engagement in union activity, and the only predictor of engagement in difficult forms of union activity (e.g. speaking at a meeting). The above point to a direct relationship between identity and collective behaviour. We propose that identity also has an interactive effect with the variables that have thus far been discussed in this paper.
Social identity and self-categorisation theories
relations of status and power to one another, and that because we derive our sense of certainty and self-worth from our group memberships, we are motivated to defend and enhance group status (Hogg and Abrams 1995). In the remainder of this paper we explain how an understanding of the processes of self-categorisation that underpin social identity can improve our analysis of union support. We present propositions that can act as a guide to empirical research and conclude with an illustration of theoretical application by way of a current case study.
Social influence revisited
At a fundamental level, a group processes approach puts social influence centre stage. In an extension to social identity theory, self-categorisation theory, Turner and his colleagues (Turner et al.1987) elaborated a single process model of social influence in groups, called referent informational influence (see Abrams and Hogg 1990; Turner 1991). According to this model, when a valued group membership that is attitudinally-relevant (e.g. the union or a group of fellow employees) becomes salient, the process of self-categorisation results in a person’s thoughts and behaviours being more in line with the group rather than with unique properties of the self. It is this process that is thought to underlie collective action (Kelly and Breinlinger 1996).
The referent informational influence model represents an important departure from the more traditional models of social influence. This model is distinguished by its emphasis on a single process of social influence based on self-categorisation, rather than on the specification of dual processes of normative and informational influence that traditional models suggest result, respectively, in public compliance and private acceptance (Deutsch and Gerard 1955). For instance, van der Vall’s (1970) explanation for approximately one-third of the workers in his study identifying the influence of others in the workplace as a reason for joining the union, was that these workers wished to avoid being seen as parasites—that is, that they were simply displaying public compliance. In contrast, referent informational influence specifies that ingroup normative information is a source of both normative and informational influence and, for this reason, it should produce more than simply compliance—even in the presence of coercion, there should be a change in the person’s attitudes. This explanation resonates with union movement experiences of the impact that workplace cultures appear to have on workers’ more enduring attitudes towards unions (Peetz 1998; Hartley 1995).
be less certain about their attitudes and hence particularly susceptible to the influence of their work colleagues. In relation to the third factor, research into public opinion suggests that around highly contested values such as individual versus collective action, there can be considerable variation in individual group members’ or subgroups’ subjective representations of what is the normative posi-tion of the group (e.g. Giles et al.1977; O’Gorman 1986). Thus, the employee group’s normative position may be difficult to discern—particularly in a broader political and economic environment that arguably has a very strong norm in favour of individualism, and in a context of structural change that has produced increasing fragmentation of the workplace.
Proposition one: When a relevant and valued group membership (e.g. union or employee membership) is contextually salient, people who strongly identify with the group will expect to be in agreement. Where they are not, they will be motivated to bring their attitudes and behaviours in line with the group norm (social influence will occur)—particularly where they are uncertain about their own beliefs and the norm is clear. Where people do not identify with the group or are strongly opposed to the group norm, they may choose to distance themselves from the group and behave according to individual considerations (including cost-benefit analysis and response to coercion).
Conditions for the activation of group processes
The above discussion implicates both individual-level variables and social context in the activation of psychological processes of social influence. For a particular social identity such as union member or employee to become activated a number of conditions must first be met (Turner et al.1987). To begin with, a social category must be accessible to the individual—for example, if being an employee or, indeed, a unionist is an important part of a person’s sense of self, he or she will be likely to think and act in terms of that particular social category. Contributing to this accessibility might be individual-level factors such as previous experience with unions and pre-existing attitudes and beliefs. Furthermore, there must be a match between a social category and the perceived situation (Oakes 1987; Oakes et al.1994). In a specific industrial relations con-text, this might mean that similarities within the employee group and differences between employees and management must be consistent with a person’s normative beliefs about the social meaning of the employee and management categories and their relationship (Oakes et al.1991).
criticism relates to the tendency to focus exclusively on ‘union’ identification, which has obscured what is important in terms of people’s perception of the inter-group context of union activity. Although unions are certainly organisations with which some people will strongly identify, they are at the same time a vehicle for collective action by employees. Given the importance that work-based identity has in our society, shifts in support for a union may be less a consequence of self-categorisation as a union member and more a consequence of categorising the self with other employees in an occupation or industry. Finally, the third criticism relates also to the assumption of context and the tendency for researchers to focus exclusively on the path from social ‘reality’ to social cate-gorisation (Reicher and Hopkins 2001). This ignores the active and purposeful framing of social ‘reality’ that is central to political projects. A person’s decision to pursue collective action through their union is dependent on the perception of an ‘us’ versus ‘them’ relationship.
The above discussion indicates the difficulties inherent in field research and the need for researchers to be more attuned to individuals’ perceptions of the intergroup context. For instance, when looking at the potential role of employment-related identity a consideration is the gradual shift away from occupationally homogeneous, integrated communities that traditionally have been associated with greater union support (Brett 1980). The greater tenuousness and transience of work with increasing casualisation and outsourcing across industries, has arguably contributed to many employees feeling little sense of identification with their workplace. Similarly, the creation of ‘superunions’ that cross over occupations and/or industries has the potential to leave some groups of employees feeling marginalised. The point here is that it is not simply physical distance (i.e. impediments to contact between unions and potential members) but also psychological distance (i.e. the lack of a sense of shared identity) that can be the challenge for unionists. Thus, it is important to assess whether people respond to the categories or groups presented to them, and whether they see themselves as part of the dominant group or as peripheral to this group (e.g. part of a subgroup defined by a particular occupation or employment status).
self-categorise and hence, whether their response will be directed by psychological processes operating at the group or at the individual level.
Social context and the role of perceived threat
In the current economic and political environment, many Australian workers feel personally threatened in terms of job security and general levels of change (Griffin and Svensen 1996; Peetz 1998; Peetz 1996). At the same time, the ability of workers to bargain collectively through their unions is being under-mined (Davidson and Griffin 2000; Griffin and Svensen 1996). There is con-siderable evidence that points to an increase in union support around disputes between employees and management over wages and conditions (Bluen 1994; Turnbull et al. 1991). Intuitively, this makes sense—we would expect that a ‘rational’ person would support their union if it was defending their conditions. It is less easy to account for instances where threat to employees’ rights to organise has lead to increased support for the union. One explanation, based on the ‘rational’ actor model, is that under such circumstances support for the union becomes more important as a form of collective insurance (Peetz 1998). Another explanation, which does not necessarily obviate the first, is that the increased support for unions under such conditions is, for some, an expression of solidarity in an intergroup context of threat.
Various studies have found support for the proposition that perception of group threat leads to increased self-categorisation, including studies examining threat to the identity of women (Dion 1975), Jewish males (Dion and Earn 1975), and national identity (Branscombe and Wann 1994). The implication is that perceptions of group threat should, in turn, lead individuals to exhibit greater conformity to group norms. Considered in these terms, the relationship between perceptions of threat to the union or to employment conditions and engagement in union activity needs to be understood in terms of a process whereby people self-categorise on the basis of a group membership that has a normative position supporting the union. Rather than a straightforward relationship between threat and support for the group, Spears, Doosje and Ellemers (Spears et al.1997) pro-posed that threat interacts with levels of (enduring) identification. For instance, a person who identifies highly with a group is likely to show increased solidarity when the group is threatened, whereas a person for whom group membership is less important maychoose to distance him or herself from the group and act more as an individual.
to be acquiescent (see Peetz 1996). The finding that low union-identifiers show heightened support for the union in the threat condition is also consistent with Fosh’s (1993) longitudinal research in which she found that in a workplace where there was traditionally low union support (and by implication, weak, enduring union identity), 400 to 500 out of a total 840 employees turned out for a special branch meeting when there was a crisis in employee–management relations. The question that both Fosh (1993) and Veenstra and Haslam (2000) posed is whether such increases in support—coming from a low support base—are a consequence of people pursuing individualistic strategies to protect personal interests (i.e. where ‘bailing out’ is not considered an option) or group strategies to protect collective interests (i.e. where threat heightens the salience and self-relevance of a union-based category and increased support results from social influence). What the Fosh (1993) and the Veenstra and Haslam (2000) studies demonstrate is the considerable fluidity in people’s union activity across contexts. However, it is not simply the ‘objective’ presence of intergroup threat that is important, but how people interpret that threat.
Social context and the role of social-structural beliefs
For industrial relations researchers the idea that socio-political context matters for union support is a truism and the description and interpretation of structural relations, when attempting to explain instances of collective action, represents the more familiar level of analysis. From a social-psychological perspective, structural factors likewise are acknowledged, but the focus of analysis moves to the level of people’s subjective representations of a contextually specific intergroup relationship. Social psychological research examining contextual factors that promote collective action as a strategy has found that a crucial factor is a shift in causal attributions for lack of success from internal attributions (e.g. insufficient ability) to external attributions (e.g. economic factors or illegitimate practices). Thus, what contributes to collective action is the belief that one’s position is a function of one’s membership of a particular group and not of something intrinsic to the self.
This shift from individual to group-based processes has found support—mainly in laboratory studies—and is consistent with the explanations offered for the mixed results from studies exploring the effects of locus of control and political efficacy, and with research into collective relative deprivation. It is also reflected in how the social movement participation model conceptualises the process by which people become part of the mobilisation potential. According to this model, people must first share a ‘collective action frame’ for the movement’s cause (Klandermans and Oegema 1987; Klandermans 1997). The three com-ponents of the collective action frame are: (a) explanations in terms of injustice; (b) identity (us versus them antagonism); and (c) agency (social change is possible). The ‘collective self’ is seen as playing a facilitating role in all three components (Smith et al.1994).
and relations between groups within it (i.e. their subjective belief structures). Two broad types of subjective belief structure are social mobility and social change. Social mobility reflects the dominant myths (e.g. belief in a ‘just world’) and leads to individual action to improve one’s personal position. Social change ideology is one that we would associate with group-based action, such as through a union. In accord with the social movement participation model, crucial factors thought to influence which strategy people adopt are: (a) their strength of identification with a behaviourally-relevant group (identification), and (b) their causal explanation for the position of employees (perceived legitimacy). Social identity theory proposes additional factors which are: (c) whether people perceive that the boundaries between employees and employers/management can be transgressed (permeability, e.g. through exerting influence in the workplace), and (d) whether they can conceive a cognitive alternative to social-structural relations between employees and employers/management (stability [Hogg and Abrams 1995; Turner 1999]).
It is assumed that people with an ideological commitment to their union have a social belief structure that supports social change through collective action—that is, they are likely to perceive that structural relations between the employee group and management are illegitimate, the intergroup boundaries are impermeable, and power differences are unstable. For this reason, these people are primed to read a context involving any level of conflict or threat in such a way as to activate their union identification. That is, the perception of conflict or threat should lead almost automatically to alignment with the union. At the other end of the spectrum, there are those who have a deeply held ideological opposition to unions and who are, therefore, unlikely to support the union, regard-less of the provocation to do so. For those employees (arguably the majority) who do not hold strong ideological positions either way, their relationship with the union might be conceived as more ambivalent. It would therefore be expected that for this group, changes in the local industrial relations context—and how this context is subjectively interpreted—might be particularly important in respect of their preparedness to support the union.
people’s beliefs about the social-structural relations between employees and management—and how this impacts on self-categorisation in an industrial relations context.
Proposition three: Support for one’s union is not the only strategy that a person who perceives employment-related vulnerability or threat can pursue. For instance, a person might pursue social mobility strategies, either moving up or out of the organisation, or they might psychologically disengage from their work-place and from their colleagues. How individuals respond will be affected by whether their social-beliefs about the context implicate group level or individual level processes. Thus, contextually specific perceptions about (a) the justice of the intergroup relationship (legitimacy); (b) the ability to transgress group boundaries (permeability); and (c) the ability to imagine an alternative scenario, namely the intergroup relationship (stability) are important factors. The degree to which a person identifies with an ingroup in this relationship is thought to moderate the influence that these beliefs have on union support. The complexity of the interrelationships between these factors and how they are mediated in the real world still requires considerable investigation.
Coming full circle—or individual-level variables matter, but they are constructed in dynamic social contexts
To illustrate the complex interrelationships between individual, group and social level factors we will describe the unfolding of a recent dispute. It concerns the termination of employment of the National Tertiary Education Industry Union (NTEU) Branch President at an Australian university. There had in recent years been several conflicts between the university management and the union. For example, in the previous round of enterprise bargaining, management had attempted to introduce a non-union agreement (which went to a ballot, but was defeated). The Branch President had also been outspoken on several controversial issues in previous months.
Yet immediately prior to the termination, performed by a middle manager, relations between the union and senior university management had appeared reasonably harmonious. Therefore, the salience of the employee and/or union group memberships—and by implication, the salience of collective goals—had been relatively low for most of the union’s constituency. As a consequence, self-categorisation on the basis of either of these group memberships was unlikely, and we would expect that individuals’ support for their union was driven by past behaviours and by individual-level calculations that included both ideological and instrumental attitudes. However, this situation was transformed quickly, once the NTEU represented to its constituency its understanding of the circumstances of the Branch President’s unexpected termination of employment. There emerged a context in which union and employee group memberships became potentially more salient. We will not discuss the merits of the respective positions here, but will concentrate on the impact upon union mobilisation.
The situation developed into a clear-cut union versus management dispute, as senior management supported a decision originally made by a middle manager. The union developed a campaign oriented around core values, in particular free speech and freedom of association, coupled with a rejection of unrestrained managerial prerogative and the potential threat to the job security of all employees. The appeal to core values proved particularly successful and became the main theme of the campaign, which was centred on a series of three meetings/rallies, each of which attracted over three hundred people (approxi-mately ten times the usual attendance at union general meetings). Therefore, there was a rapid increase in union mobilisation within a highly volatile industrial setting.
Responses among staff varied considerably, though. For those academic and general staff members with high levels of union commitment, the termination of the NTEU Branch President’s employment was immediately perceived as an illegitimate use of managerial power and a clear threat to free speech, the union and its right to organise. Here, increased support for the union followed as a direct consequence of being ‘primed’ to self-categorise with the union and to read the context according to a familiar representation of the employee-management relationship.
threat to the core values of free speech and the freedom of association. Here, the perceived threat to the academic group made salient a valued group norm and positioned the union as defender of the academic group’s core values. Others, including a considerable number of general staff, tentatively engaged in their first acts of union support. For some this may have been an act of solidarity with a colleague, but for others it was expressed as a consequence of a perceived threat to personal employment status. Thus, instrumental considerations may have been foremost, at least in the initial engagement with the union’s actions. What followed, however, was an experience of solidarity that for some may have transformed how they perceived the context.
Not all academic and general staff were swayed by the union’s representation of the context, though. As would be expected, there were those who were ideo-logically opposed to the union and who rejected the union’s representation of an employees versus management divide. Some staff members adopted a position of neutrality that may have been driven by instrumental concerns about costs (for example, to their own career advancement or job security). This position was frequently expressed in a rejection of the portrayal of management as a separate, impermeable group that did not share the values of academic freedom and freedom of association: they did not see the termination as an illegitimate use of power.
The above illustrates not only that people came to support (or not support) the union via very different psychological routes, but that within the individual, there is a dynamic relationship with the context. It also illustrates the futility of much of the debate about the respective merits of a servicing versus organising model of union mobilisation. People are not simply rational actors, clinically weighing up the merits or otherwise of supporting their union. They are also emotionally and socially engaged. Hence, people’s relationship with their union is influenced by instrumental, ideological and identity factors that interact and change in complex ways across time and place.
CONCLUSION
Most industrial relations research is grounded in sociology, political science and political economy, and there has been a dearth of research drawing on psycho-logical concepts and models. Where psychopsycho-logical concepts and models have been used they have tended to draw upon a dominant individualist tradition within the discipline. This paper argues for a more genuinely ‘social’ psychological approach with several implications for how we investigate people’s relationships with their union.
attitudes. Support for a union often involves thinking or acting as a member of a group. This entails processes very different from the individual decision-making processes that have generally been examined. In other words, there is often an affective experience of the group—where the person feels attachment to and solidarity with group members—and this has implications for social influence, resulting in a dynamic relationship between individuals and the union. Furthermore, at a macro-level, the broader intergroup context that is shaped by economic and political forces influences the activation of different psychological processes via individual readings of this context. Here, in a sense, we come full circle because how a person interprets a given industrial relations context is influenced by personal experience, beliefs about the social structural relations between relevant groups, and beliefs about how they are placed in relation to these groups.
Much of the work testing the micro-level psychological processes suggested in this paper will need to take place within the domain of psychological research. It is hoped, however, that the paper will help industrial relations researchers by highlighting some of the recent debates that have a bearing on the use of psychological concepts within their field.
ENDNOTES
1. Kelly and Breinlinger (1996) provide an excellent review and critique of the personality-based approaches to collective action.
2. Hartley (1992, pp. 213–215), provides a brief summary of the research
REFERENCES
Abeles R D (1976) Relative deprivation, rising expectations, and black militancy. Journal of Social Issues32, 119–37.
Abrams D, Hogg MA (1990) Social identity theory : Constructive and critical advances.New York: Harvester-Wheatsheaf.
Ajzen I (1991) The theory of planned behavior. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes
50 (2), 179–211.
Ajzen I, Fishbein M (1980) Understanding attitudes and predicting social behaviourEnglewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Ajzen I, Madden TJ (1986) Prediction of goal-directed behavior: Attitudes, intentions, and perceived behavioral control. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology22 (5), 453–474.
Allen PT, Stephenson GM (1983) Inter-group understanding and size of organization. British Journal of Industrial Relations21, 312–329.
Australian Bureau of Statistics (2000), Employee earnings, benefits and trade union membership, Australia
(No. Cat. no. 6310.0). Aug. 2000. Canberra: ABS.
Bain GS, Price R (1983) Union growth: Dimensions, determinants and destiny. In: Bain GS, ed,
Industrial Relations in Britain.Oxford: Blackwell.
Bluen SD (1994) The psychology of strikes. International Review of Industrial and Organizational Psychology9, 113–145.
Branscombe NR, Wann DL (1994) Collective self-esteem consequences of outgroup derogation when a valued social identity is on trial. European Journal of Social Psychology24, 641–658. Breinlinger S, Kelly C (1994)Women’s responses to status inequality: A test of social identity
theory. Psychology of Women Quarterly18, 1–16.
Brett JB (1980) In: Staw BM, Cummings LL, eds, Research in Organizational Behavior, Vol. 2, pp. 177–213. Greenwich, Conn: JAI Press.
Brown R (1988) Group processes: dynamics within and between groups.Oxford, UK: Basil Blackwell. Brown R, Condor S, Matthews A, Wade G et al. (1986) Explaining intergroup differentiation in
an industrial organization. Journal of Occupational Psychology,59 (4), 273–286. Campbell A, Gurin G, Miller W (1954) The voter decides. Evanston, IL: Row Peterson. Cox S (1998) Social identity and its management : Homophobia and responses to it by gay men.Unpublished
PhD, University of Queensland, Brisbane.
Davidson P, Griffin RW (2000) Management: Australia in a global context.Milton, Queensland: John Wiley & Sons Australia.
DeCotiis TA, LeLouarn J (1981) A predictive study of voting behavior in a representation election using union instrumentality and work perceptions. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance27, 103–118.
Department of Workplace Relations and Small Business (1997) Changes at Work: The 1995 Australian Workplace Industrial Relations Survey.South Melbourne: Addison Wesley Longman Australia. Deutsch M, Gerard HB (1955) A study of normative and informational influences upon individual
judgement. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology51, 629–636.
Dion KL (1975) Women’s reactions to discrimination from members of the same or opposite sex.
Journal of Research in Personality9, 294-306.
Dion KL, Earn BM (1975) The phenomenology of being a target of prejudice.Journal of Personality and Social Psychology32, 944–950.
Doosje B, Ellemers N, Spears R. (1995) Perceived intragroup variability as a function of group status and identification. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology 31 (5), 410–436.
Fantasia R (1988) Cultures of solidarity: Consciousness, action and contemporary American workers.
Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Farber HS, Saks DH (1990) Why workers want unions: the role of relative wages and job characteristics. Journal of Political Economy88, 349-369.
Fishbein M, Ajzen I (1975) Belief, attitude, intention and behavior: An introduction to theory and research.
Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
Flood P (1993) An expectancy value analysis of the willingness to attend union meetings. Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology66, 213–23.
Fosh P (1993) Membership participation in workplace unionism: The possibility of union renewal.
British Journal of Industrial Relations31 (4), 577–592.
Freeman RB, Medoff JL (1984) What do unions do?New York: Basic Books.
Frege CM (1996) Union membership in post-socialist East Germany: Who participates in collective action? British Journal of Industrial Relations,34 (3), 387–413.
Fullagar C, Clark P, Gallagher D, Gordon ME (1994) Journal of Organizational Behavior15, 517–533. Fullagar CJ A, Gallagher DG, Gordon ME, Clark PF (1995) A model of the antecedents of early union commitment: The role of socialization experiences and steward characteristics. Journal of Applied Psychology80 (1), 147–157.
Getman JG, Goldberg SB, Herman JB (1976) Union representation elections: Law and reality. New York: Russell Sage.
Giles H, Bourhis RY, Taylor DM (1977) In: Giles H, ed., Language, ethnicity and inter-group relations. London: Academic Press.
Goldthorpe JH, Lockwood D, Bechofer F, Platt J (1968) The affluent worker: Industrial attitudes and behavior.Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press.
Gordon ME, Philpot JW, Burt RE, Thompson CA, Spiller WE (1980) Commitment to the union: Development of a measure and an examination of its correlates. Journal of Applied Psychology
65 (4), 479–499.
Gouldner A (1954) Wildcat strike.New York: Antioch Press.
Griffin G, Svensen S (1996) The decline of Australian union density: a survey of the literature.
Journal of Industrial Relations38 (4), 505–547.
Guest DE, Dewe P (1988) Why do workers belong to a trade union?: A social psychological study in the UK electronics industry. British Journal of Industrial Relations26, 178–194.
Hartley J (1992) The psychology of industrial relations. International Review of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 7, 201-243.
Hogg MA, Abrams D (1995) Social identifications: A social psychology of intergroup relations and group processes. London: Routledge.
Karasawa M (1991) Toward an assessment of social identity: The structure of group identification and its effects on in-group evaluations. British Journal of Social Psychology30 (4), 293–307. Kelloway EK, Barling J (1993) Members’ participation in local union activities: Measurement,
prediction, and replication. Journal of Applied Psychology78, 262–279.
Kelloway EK, Newton T (1996) Preemployment predictors of union attitudes: The effects of parental union and work experiences. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science 28 (2), 113–120.
Kelly C (1989) Political identity and perceived intragroup homogeneity. British Journal of Social Psychology28, 239–50.
Kelly C (1993) Group identification, intergroup perceptions and collective action. European Review of Social Psychology, 4, 59–83.
Kelly C, Breinlinger S (1996) The social psychology of collective action: identity, injustice and gender.
London: Taylor & Francis.
Kelly C, Kelly J (1994) Who gets involved in collective action? Social psychological determinants of individual participation in trade unions. Human Relations47 (1), 63–88.
Klandermans B (1984a) Mobilization and participation: Social-psychological expansions of resource mobilization theory. American Sociological Review,49 (5), 583–600.
Klandermans B (1986a) Perceived costs and benefits of participation in union action. Personnel Psychology, 39 (2), 379–397.
Klandermans B (1997) The Social Psychology of Protest.Oxford: Basil Blackwell.
Klandermans B (2000) identity and protest: How group identification helps to overcome collective action dilemmas. In: van Vugt M, Snyder M, Tyler T, Biehl A, eds, Collective helping in modern society(pp. 162-183). London: Routledge.
Klandermans B (2002) How group identification helps to overcome the dilemma of collective action.
American Behavioral Scientist45 (5), 887–900.
Klandermans B, Oegema D (1987) Potentials, networks, motivations, and barriers: Steps towards participation in social movements. American Sociological Review52 (2), 519–531.
Klandermans B, Sabucedo JM, Rodriguez M, Weerd MD. (2002) Identity processes in collective action participation: Farmers’ identity and farmers’ protest in the Netherlands and Spain.Political Psychology23 (2), 235–251.
Klandermans PG (1984b) Mobilization and participation in trade union action: An expectancy-value approach. Journal of Occupational Psychology57 (2), 107–120.
Klandermans PG (1986b) Perceived costs and benefits of participation in union action. Personnel Psychology39, 379–97.
Klandermans PG (1986c) Psychology and trade union participation: Joining, acting, quitting.
Journal of Occupational Psychology59, 189–204.
Kochan TA (1980) Collective bargaining and industrial relations. Homewood, Ill: Irwin.
Liska A (1984) ). A critical examination of the causal structure of the Fishbein and Ajzen attitude-behavior model. Social Psychology Quarterly47, 61–74.
Newton LA, Shore LM (1992) A model of union membership: Instrumentality, commitment, and opposition. Academy of Management Review17 (2), 275–298.
Oakes PJ (1987) The salience of social categories. In: Turner JC, Hogg MA, Oakes PJ, Reicher SD, Wetherell MS, eds, Rediscovering the Social group: A Self-categorization Theory. Oxford: Blackwell.
Oakes PJ, Haslam, SA, Turner JC (1994) Stereotyping and social reality. Oxford: Blackwell. Oakes PJ, Turner JC, Haslam SA (1991) Perceiving people as group members: The role of fit in
the salience of social categorizations. British Journal of Social Psychology30 (2), 125–144. O’Gorman HJ (1986) Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences22, 333–347.
Oliver RL, Bearden WO (1985) Crossover effects in the theory of reasoned action: A moderating influence attempt. Journal of Consumer Research12, 324–340.
Peetz D (1996) Why join? Why stay? Unions, employees and aspects of union membership in Australia. Paper presented at the Tenth Conference of the Association of Industrial Relations Academics of Australia and New Zealand Perth.
Peetz D (1998) Unions in a contrary world : the future of the Australian trade union movement.
Premack S, Hunter J (1988) Individual unionization decisions. Psychological Bulletin,103, 223–234. Reicher S, Hopkins N (2001) Psychology and the end of history: A critique and a proposal for the
psychology of social categorization. Political Psychology22 (2), 383–407.
Rotter JB (1966) Generalized expectancies for internal versus external control of reinforcement.
Psychological Monographs80 (1), 1–28.
Runciman WG (1966) Relative deprivation and social justice. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Schriesheim CA (1978) Job satisfaction, attitudes towards unions, and voting in a union
repre-sentation election. Journal of Applied Psychology,63, 548–552.
Smith H, Spears R, Oyen M (1994) “People like us”: the influence of personal deprivation and group membership salience on justice evaluations. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology,30, 277–299.
Smith PB, Bond MH (1993) Social psychology across cultures: analysis and perspectives. London: Harvester Wheatsheaf.
Snyder RA, Verderber KS, Morris JH (1986) Voluntary union membership of women and men: Differences in personal characteristics, perceptions and attitudes. Journal of Occupational Psychology59, 205–216.
Spears R, Doosje B, Ellemers N (1997) Self-stereotyping in the face of threats to group status and distinctiveness: The role of group identification. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin23 (5), 538–553.
Sverke M, Kuruvilla S (1995) A new conceptualization of union commitment: Development and test of an integrated theory. Journal of Organizational Behavior16 (Special Issue), 505–532. Sverke M, Sjoeberg A (1995) Union membership behavior: The influence of instrumental and
value-based commitment. In: Tetrick LE et al., eds, Changing employment relations: Behavioral and social perspectives, pp. 229–254. Washington, DC: American Psychological Association. Terry DJ, Hogg MA (1996) Group norms and the attitude-behavior relationship: A role for group
identification. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin22, 776–793.
Trafimow D, Finlay KA (1996) The importance of subjective norms for a minority of people: Between subjects and within subjects analyses. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin22, 820–28. Tripathi RC, Srivastava R (1981) Relative deprivation and intergroup attitudes. European Journal
of Social Psychology11, 313–18.
Turnbull P, Woolfson C, Kelly J (1991) Dock strike: Conflict and restructuring in Britain’s ports.
Aldershot: Avebury.
Turner JC (1991) Social influence.Milton Keynes, UK: Open University Press.
Turner JC (1999) Some current issues in research on social identity and self-categorization theories. In: Ellemers N, Spears R, Doosje B, eds,Social identity,pp. 6–34. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Inc.
Turner JC, Hogg MA, Oakes PJ, Reicher SD, Wetherell MS (1987) Rediscovering the social group: A self-categorization theory.New York: Basil Blackwell.
Vallerand RJ, Deshaies P, Cuerrier JP, Pelletier LG (1992) Ajzen and Fishbein’s theory of reasoned action as applied to moral behavior: A confirmatory analysis. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology62 (1), 98–109.
van der Vall M (1970) Labor organizations.New York: Cambridge Univerisity Press.
Vanneman RD, Pettigrew TF (1972) Race and relative deprivation in the urban United States.
Race13, 461–86.
Veenstra K, Haslam A (2000) Willingness to participate in industrial protest: Exploring social identification in context. British Journal of Social Psychology39 (2), 153–172.
Walker I, Pettigrew TF (1984) Relative deprivation theory: An overview and conceptual critique.
British Journal of Social Psychology23, 301–310.
