This book combines the tools of political science, sociology, and labor history to offer a wide-ranging analysis of how unions have participated in politics in Britain, Germany, and the United States. Rather than focus exclusively on national union federations, Gary Marks investigates variations among individual unions both within and across these countries. By examining the individual unions that make up union movements, he probes beyond national descriptions of British laborism, German socialism, and American business unionism while bringing the analysis closer to the actual experiences of people who joined labor organizations.

Among the topics Marks examines are state repression of unions, the Organizational Revolution, the contrasting experiences of printing and coalmining unions, and American Exceptionalism.

Originally published in 1989.

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