Labor's War at Home: The CIO in World War II: With a New Introduction by the Author (Labor in Crisis)

"Labor's War at Home" examines a critical period in American politics and labor history, beginning with the outbreak of war in Europe in 1939 through the wave of major industrial strikes that followed the war and accompanied the reconversion to a peacetime economy. Nelson Lichtenstein is concerned both with the internal organizations and social dynamics of the labor movement especially the Congress of Industrial Organizations and with the relationship between the CIO, as well as other bodies of organized labor, and the Roosevelt administration.He argues that tensions within the labor movement and within the ranks of American business profoundly affected government policy during the war and the nature of organized labor's political relations with Roosevelt and the Democratic Party. Moreover, the political arrangements worked out during the war established the foundations of social stability and labor politics that came to characterize the postwar world. Nelson Lichtenstein is Professor of History at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He is the author of numerous books, including "Walter Reuther: The Most Dangerous Man in Detroit" and, most recently, "State of the Union: A Century of American Labor". Labor's War at Home examines a critical period in American politics and labor history, beginning with the outbreak of war in Europe in 1939 through the wave of major industrial strikes that followed the war and accompanied the reconversion to a peacetime economy. Nelson Lichtenstein is concerned both with the internal organizations and social dynamics of the labor movement—especially the Congress of Industrial Organizations—and with the relationship between the CIO, as well as other bodies of organized labor, and the Roosevelt administration. He argues that tensions within the labor movement and within the ranks of American business profoundly affected government policy during the war and the nature of organized labor's political relations with Roosevelt and the Democratic Party. Moreover, the political arrangements worked out during the war established the foundations of social stability and labor politics that came to characterize the postwar world. Contents ......Page 6 List of Abbreviations ......Page 7 Introduction to the new edition ......Page 8 Preface ......Page 30 1. Introduction ......Page 34 2. The Unfinished Struggle ......Page 41 3. CIO politics on the eve of war ......Page 59 4. "Responsible unionism" ......Page 77 5. Union security and the Little Steel formula ......Page 100 6. "Equality of sacrifice" ......Page 115 7. The social ecology of shop-floor conflict ......Page 143 8. Incentive pay politics ......Page 169 9. Holding the line ......Page 190 10. The bureaucratic imperative ......Page 211 11. Reconversion politics ......Page 236 12. Epilogue: Labor in postwar America ......Page 266 Notes ......Page 279 Bibliographical essay ......Page 334 Index ......Page 342 An examination of a critical period in American politics and labour history, beginning with the outbreak of war in Europe in 1939 through the wave of major industrial strikes that followed the war and accompanied the reconversion to a peacetime economy Focusing on the internal dynamics of the labor movement (especially the C.I.O.) and its relationship to the Roosevelt administration, this book gives the history of labor and business politics from 1939 to 1946. Nelson Lichtenstein. Originally Published: Cambridge [cambridgeshire] ; New York : Cambridge University Press, 1982. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 301-307) And Index. Annotation A new edition of a classic book on how World War II changed the face of labor in the US