Trade unions across the world have been considered to be vestiges and their relevance to the modern day economy has been questioned (Bryson, Ebbinghaus, & Visser, 2011). Recent efforts of union revitalization have not only given much needed hope for the labour movement around the world, but also facilitated research in the area of union revitalization studies (Heery, 2003; Sullivan, 2010). Strategies adopted by the trade unions for union revitalization have attracted attention from multiple scholars (Boxall & Haynes, 1997; Freje & Kelly, 2005). However, India despite of its increasing economic and geopolitical importance lacks adequate research on studies related to adoption of strategies for union revitalization in comparison to to other developing economies (Konings, 2006; Phelan, 2006). India was chosen for research because of its unique historical association with trade unions. This research work is positioned among strategic choice rhetoric under union revitalization research and enquires into the various factors that affect these different strategies. We argue for a broader conceptualization of the union revitalization to bring in the struggles of the marginalized workers (Cobble, 2007; Webster & Lipsig-Mumme, 2002). We aim to extend the research on union revitalization by inquiring into the differences and similarities in the strategies and the factors affecting the same. Case study based approach has been chosen for the research work and two case studies where chosen from different industrial sectors. We have made an attempt to understand the different internal and external factors that affect the choice of particular strategies of two revitalized trade unions belonging to two vastly different sectors – one belonging to the while collared service sector while the other belonging to the relatively unorganized blue collared workers. The two case studies gave us ample scope to understand the differences and similarities of strategies and factors which affected them..
Based on the views of the experts of the field about the unionization in India some prospective case studies were short listed at the initial stage. We finally chose two cases from two different sectors one belonging to the Information Technology – referred to as Alpha; which has primarily driven the growth of India and the other trade union belonging to the ship breaking industry – referred to as Beta. Data comprised of field notes, daily journal, audio recorded interviews (with verbal consent) from relevant stakeholders. In addition we also relied on secondary sources like union campaign materials, documents and prior research. Online resources and the user generated web content supplemented the primary and secondary sources and ensured the robustness of our findings Eisenhardt (1989); (Yin, 1984). Standard interview protocols (Cresswell, 1998; Yin, 2003) were followed and all interviews were transcribed. MaxQda was used for data analysis.
The data analysis was carried out as per the guidelines given by Cresswell (1998); Eisenhardt (1989); Miles and Huberman (1994) and ; Yin (2003). Evidence was found for both unions adopting a mix of strategies. Both the unions resorted to union organizing as one of the strategies for revival, albeit with some differences which makes a case for converging divergence. While the union Alpha relied on the virtual media, social networking sites in particular to revive their fortunes, the union Beta relied more on the traditional word of mouth approach. We could attribute this difference primarily to the union identity. In addition, union Alpha resorted to social movement unionism and union restructuring while union Beta adopted international unionism. A number of factors – classified as the internal and external factors, affected the choice of strategies for revitalization. We found union identity, union structure and union resources as the main internal factors while employer strategies, government’s partisanship and the role of employers’ associations emerged as important external factors which affected the union revitalization strategies for both Alpha and Beta. Amidst the growing rhetoric of the irrelevance of the collective, we have found evidence of the collective being conceivably alive and adapting itself suitably to the changed environment. Apart from gaining insights into the chronicles of union revitalization amidst the changing economic scenario, the study extends the frontiers of union revitalization research by bringing the Indian perspective (see Agarwala, 2006; Agarwala, 2008 for other notable studies). Contrary to earlier studies we have found evidence for a mix of strategies being adopted by the trade unions. Our findings reinforce the important conjecture from strategy literature about the idiosyncrasy of strategies and that a one size fit all approach cannot be adopted (Child, 1972; Mintzberg, Ahlstrand, & Lampel, 1998).
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