Kate Bronfenbrenner - Research Focus

Research Focus

Bronfenbrenner is a highly regarded expert on labor union organizing and collective bargaining strategies. She introduced rigorous statistical methodology and survey techniques to a field which had been dominated by case studies. Her most notable contribution in this regard were two papers. The first was the 1994 paper 'The Promise of Union Organizing in the Public and Private Sectors,' co-authored with Tom Juravich. In 1995, Bronfenbrenner and Juravich co-wrote a second work, 'Union Tactics Matter: The Impact of Union Tactics on Certification Elections, First Contracts, and Membership Rates.' Based on Bronfenbrenner's doctoral dissertation, the two papers were widely distributed throughout the labor movement and had a significant impact in promoting union organizing as a key issue in the 1995 AFL-CIO presidential race. Both papers have been combined, updated and published, in various journals and books, a number of times since then.

Bronfenbrenner is also well known for her studies of anti-union tactics utilized by employers in NLRB-sponsored union organizing elections. In 1995, Bronfenbrenner and Juravich co-wrote 'The Impact of Employer Opposition on Union Certification Win Rates: A Private/Public Sector Comparison.' Previously, individual labor unions—and, to a lesser extent, the AFL-CIO—had collected anecdotal evidence on employer anti-union tactics and strategies. Much of this work was kept secret, for fear that anti-union employers would realize that unions were learning how to respond and modify and improve their anti-union tactics accordingly. This 1995 paper, however, brought this research agenda into the open and made it a topic for academic discussion. The paper grouped and categorized anti-union tactics and strategies, and used surveys and statistical analysis to judge their effectiveness. This paper also had a galvanizing effect on the American labor movement, creating a behind-the-scenes cottage industry in analyzing anti-union consultants and anti-union organizing campaign tactics. The work of the AFL-CIO-affiliated organization, American Rights at Work, and its opposite number, the employer-financed Center for Union Facts, both stem from the emphasis on opposition research engendered by Bronfenbrenner's paper. Data cited in the paper was heavily relied on by proponents of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA). EFCA opponents dispute much of her statistical assertions, claiming that they are derived from uncorroborated reports of biased union organizers.

To a lesser extent, Bronfenbrenner conducted research and written on the impact of outsourcing and offshoring, and the effect they have on workers, wages, employment and unions in the United States and around the world. In 2006, Bronfenbrenner brought more than 550 trade unionists and scholars from 53 countries to discuss union initiatives in strategic corporate research, global organizing and global collective bargaining campaigns; exchange research on the changing nature of multinational corporate ownership and governance structures, human resources practices, and business strategies; and to discuss ways in which labor unions and academics could work together to enhance their understanding of multinational corporations.

Bronfenbrenner's best-known work, however, is mostly likely Ravenswood: The Steelworkers' Victory and the Revival of American Labor, co-authored with Tom Juravich.

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