|
|
|
Review
| Unions, Radicals, and Democratic Presidents: Seeking Social Change in the Twentieth Century, by Martin Halpern. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger Publishers, 2003. 304 pages. $79.95, cloth.
|
| In this study Martin Halpern, author of UAW Politics in the Cold War Era, effectively combines careful historical analysis with deep-felt commitment to social change. Concentrating on the period from the New Deal through the presidential election of 2000, he contributes to the social-political history of social change and the labor movement's role in it by illuminating both the factors essential to successful social-justice movements and the relationship between organized labor and liberal Democratic presidents. He begins by announcing that his scholarship is informed by his "left-wing values" (ix) and activism in social movements in the 1960s and 1970s, and that his scholarship has "re-enforced conclusions" reached in his personal political activity (x). His conclusion: substantial progress toward social justice has necessitated the simultaneous presence of "[l]iberal Democratic presidents, an activist labor movement, left-wingers, and left-center collations" (xv). These "four elements" share a "focus on gaining power to do something new or progressive" (xv), which is why each has been repeatedly contested. By "progressive" he means changes that advance social justice generally and the welfare of "working people and the oppressed" (xvi) specifically. These ideas provide the conceptual backdrop for the book's nine chapters, five of which have appeared previously elsewhere. |
1
|
|
Halpern uses the first two chapters to lay down some general points about the labor movement and social change and the cross-generational transmission of left values. For him, the labor movement, contrary to what its critics maintain, is not an "interest group" but rather "a fundamental force for social change" (7). To illustrate, he highlights the important leadership role it played in the women's suffrage and civil rights movements. More provocatively, he argues that by virtue of its organized mass base at the workplace, the labor movement provides "the only significant institutional setting" (10) for sustained opposition to the ideology and power of private business. From there, Halpern turns his attention to the persistence of the left as a radical subculture, thanks to the ability of left-wing parents to instill in their children a left version of "caring values," with its distinctive emphasis on activism on working people's behalf (16). That ability, even in periods of political repression like the 1950s, he notes, sheds light on "subcultural survival mechanisms," mechanisms important to social change since oppositional subcultures can generate "grassroots activist movements" (16). |
2
|
|
The remaining chapters are essentially densely-detailed case studies apparently intended to lend historical concreteness to what has preceded them. Perhaps inevitably, some are more compelling than others. Halpern's examination of a 1938 White-House meeting between the conservative Henry Ford and the liberal Franklin Roosevelt that changed neither man's position with respect to business and organized labor yields no surprises. More interesting and important is the author's analysis of both how Detroit's African-American left managed to survive McCarthyism thanks to its substantial base in the city's black community, especially among activist trade unionists, and how President John F. Kennedy's 1962 Executive Order 10988, allowing most civilian federal workers to bargain collectively, was an outgrowth of precisely the four elements Halpern stresses in his Introduction. |
3
|
|
The book has a patched-together feel, and the relationship between the details of specific chapters and Halpern's larger themes is not always clear. Moreover, even some social-justice activists may find Halpern's faith in the labor movement's potential misplaced. Still, in light of the history he tells, his claim that there may be "no more important social-change effort than ensuring the survival of the labor movement" (12) certainly merits serious consideration by historians and activists alike. Halpern's focus on the relationship between that movement and presidential politics is a major strength, especially timely in the lead-up to an extremely close presidential contest between an incumbent conservative Republican and a liberal Democratic challenger. |
4
|
|
Too specialized for most undergraduates, this study is best suited to reading lists for graduate courses in twentieth-century U.S. labor and radical history. Instructors in relevant courses at both levels will be able to mine the book for useful lecture material beyond the familiar, such as the context and causes of Kennedy's executive order, as well as for what the book itself reveals about left-wing values (including the author's) and historical scholarship in the service of activist progressive ends. Some who teach specifically about the history and the dynamics of social movements might organize all or part of a course around Halpern's conceptualization of the necessary conditions for substantial social change and assign students to test it for themselves. |
5
|
| | |
| Gustavus Adolphus College |
Gregory L. Kaster |
|
Content in the History Cooperative database is intended for personal, noncommercial use only. You may not reproduce, publish, distribute, transmit, participate in the transfer or sale of, modify, create derivative works from, display, or in any way exploit the History Cooperative database in whole or in part without the written permission of the copyright holder.
|