TY - BOOK AU - Ed Blissett PY - 2013 CY - Oxford, United Kingdom PB - Peter Lang Verlag SN - 1662-7784 SN - 9783035305364 TI - Inside the Unions T2 - A Comparative Analysis of Policy-Making in Australian and British Printing and Telecommunication Trade Unions DO - 10.3726/978-3-0353-0536-4 UR - https://www.peterlang.com/document/1053306 N2 - This book consists of a comparative analysis of policy-making in Australian and British telecommunications and printing trade unions. It tests the validity of different theoretical models of union policy-making and behaviour, whilst also assessing the strength of the book’s hypothesis, that informal micro-political influences inside unions – such as personal friendships, enmities and loyalties – affect union policy-making to a greater extent than has been previously acknowledged in the literature. Two central questions lie at the heart of this book: How, and why, do unions adopt specific policies? What factors explain the different behaviour of similar unions, when faced with comparable policy choices? As a former senior union officer the author realised that trade unions are often wary of publically disclosing those factors which informed their policy choices. For this reason an interview-rich methodology was adopted, which involved a seventeen-year longitudinal study, in which over 220 officers and staff of all the relevant unions, were interviewed in depth. The result is a book which throws new light on the rich and complex process of union policy-making. KW - behaviour, friendships, loyalties LA - English ER -