TCM writes:
I think that a large component of this problem (the poor public image of unions) is due to the fact that just about the only unions left (ironic pun intended on that last word) are the amazingly successful ones (or at least the huge and durable ones).
To be sure, there's strength in scale and the amalgamation of individuals and small groups -- but just as the same dynamic plays out in corpoorations, you end up having to root for the Goliaths of the world.
It's not so much that US unions are victims of their own success in this regard, but that the scale required for them to negotiate against similarly scaled corporations has led the mega-unions to focus ever more narrowly on maintaining the status quo.
All of which is *not* to say that the solution to the PR problem is "smaller unions." Honestly, I don't know what the solution is.
I think that's true to some extent. On the other hand, there really are roughly two types of unions at this point: Status quo unions trying to retain the gains they've made, and expansionary unions trying force their way into new sectors. The latter are, to be sure, somewhat more sympathetic. But just as the rich get richer in business, the dense get denser in organizing. The ability to call sympathetic strikes, to create strike funds, to run massive political campaigns, to have a well-funded organizing operation -- these all require a large union movement, and mean that preexisting unions make future organizing campaigns more likely. Density builds on itself.
