The Influence of Attitudes and Normative Pressures on Voting Decisions in a Union Certification Election

ILR Review ◽  
1989 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 262-279 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Ruth Montgomery

This paper investigates how both attitudes and normative pressures influenced the voting decisions of public university clerical workers in a December 1984 union representation election. Not surprisingly, the voters' attitudes, shaped by the results they expected to follow from union certification and their evaluation of those results as good or bad, appear to have been an important determinant of voting intentions and, in turn, actual votes. Also influential, although less so, was normative pressure, a function of how the voters thought others (family, co-workers, other clericals, supervisors, and other management staff) wished them to vote and how strongly they were inclined to satisfy those wishes.

ILR Review ◽  
1989 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas F. Reed

Although many studies have investigated the determinants of union representation election outcomes, none has examined union organizers' influence on those outcomes. Based on a literature review and interviews with the directors of organizing of eight unions, the author of this study hypothesizes that certain personal characteristics of organizers are associated with success in organizing campaigns. An analysis of survey questionnaires completed by 64 organizers supports the general hypothesis that some personal and demographic characteristics of organizers affect both the percentage of pro-union votes and election outcomes.


2021 ◽  
pp. 0143831X2199009
Author(s):  
Jack Fiorito ◽  
Irene Padavic

US unions have often been characterized as ‘exceptional’ in their weakness and conservatism compared to their Western European counterparts. American organized labor is associated with a ‘business unionism’ philosophy that assumes American workers are only pragmatic and materialistic, seeing their unions as vehicles for improving the terms and conditions of employment at their workplaces. Such an analysis omits the potential power of a belief that unions work to improve society. Applying an experimental vignette design based on a survey of over 1000 employed persons, this article examines whether ‘workplace instrumentality’ is the only motivation for workers to support unions. The authors consider the likelihood of voting yes in a union representation election to test the efficacy of two less studied predictors – perceiving unions as positively influencing society and perceiving them as facilitating workers’ voice in union policies and practices. Logistic regression shows that the most influential beliefs associated with union support were that unions improve terms and conditions of employment for represented workers (‘union instrumentality’), that unions positively influence society (‘prosocial unionism’), and that unions offer workers substantial influence on union policies and practices (‘worker say’). Researchers and union organizing campaigns should consider devoting greater attention to the social benefits of unionism and to union democracy.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cornelia Sindermann ◽  
René Mõttus ◽  
Dmitri Rozgonjuk ◽  
Christian Montag

Voting decisions of individual voters have the power to influence political developments by enabling certain parties and politicians to govern their country. Therefore, it is of tremendous importance to understand what is driving individual differences in voting intentions and decisions. This study investigated the predictability of voting intentions in a German sample by Big Five of personality domains, facets, and nuances/items; thereby overcoming several shortcomings of previous studies descriptively associating Big Five domains and voting behaviors.A dataset of N = 4,997 people (48.19% men) was investigated. Random forest models were trained and tested at different split ratios of training-to-test datasets 1,000 times. Mean classification errors and variable importance scores across runs at each split were extracted to predict i) voting versus non-voting, ii) voting for specific parties, iii) voting for left- versus right-from-the-center parties.Only voting and non-voting could be predicted with classification errors consistently below 10% by Big Five domains, facets, and items. Openness was one important domain in this prediction. Investigating facets and nuances did not enhance prediction over investigating domains.


Author(s):  
Steven Mellor ◽  
R. James Holzworth ◽  
James M. Conway

Abstract. An important part of the unionization process is predicting the individual’s vote for or against union representation. We proposed and tested a multilevel model based on the relative importance of costs and benefits of representation. Regression statistics from within-person analyses were used to show the influence of perceived costs and benefits on judgment policies about intent to vote in a representation election. Using these statistics as outcome variables, between-person analyses were used to show the influence of decision frame on cost-benefit influences, in which framing a vote as one for or against the union was conceived as a contextual variable in an election. Results were used to extend prior unionization research and to suggest how employers and unions may attend to framing effects in an election.


ILR Review ◽  
1985 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
pp. 179-194 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen M. Hills

This study finds striking differences in attitudes toward union representation between union and nonunion workers in the U.S. labor force. Data from the National Longitudinal Survey of 1980 show that if a certification election were held at the workplace of the men aged 28 to 38 who were sampled, 87 percent of those already covered by a union contract said they would vote for union representation, whereas only 27 percent of the nonunion workers said they would do so. Among the nonunion workers, however, attitudes differed sharply by race and industry, as pro-union attitudes were more widespread among blacks than whites and among workers in government and construction than those in other industries. The author tested the effect of several possible determinants of attitudes, such as degree of job satisfaction, occupation, pay rate, and region of residence. Many of these factors were significantly related to union attitudes, but including them in a multivariate analysis did little to change the differences in attitude across industries.


2007 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 81-90
Author(s):  
Russell K. Baker

On November 19, 1993 the following notice was sent to the office of the general manager of GTE Supply Company in Tampa, Florida:Gentlemen:A petition for certification as collective bargaining representative of certain of your employees has been filed with this office, pursuant to the Labor Management Relations Act, as amended. A copy of the petition is enclosed. Should you desire further information before a Board Agent communicates with you, telephone or write the office to which the case is being assigned, referring to the above case name and number" (United States of America, 1993).This letter was the beginning of the final phase of long-term labor unrest at GTE Supply. The labor conflict began over five years earlier, and culminated in a third union representation election in January 1994.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
José Joaquín Pérez ◽  
Matias Corbeaux ◽  
Cristian Doña-Reveco

The objective of our research is to analyze the causes and/or factors that influence the voting intentions of immigrants in the municipality of Santiago, Chile. To achieve this, we interviewed twenty immigrants who had the right to vote in two different periods. Before and after the October 2016 municipal elections. By doing this we were able to compare their answers having the elections as a pivotal point. We followed a content analysis of their answers to evaluate their discourses with regards to voting intentions. We conclude that the factors that influence immigrants’ voting decisions are multiple. We center our conclusions in the lack of information migrants have on their electoral rights, the lack of interest of candidates on migrants as a voting force, and the lack of recognition from the State of migrants as legal subjects. These reasons produce high political indifference on immigrants.


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