Category Archives: Ellem, Bradon

2001 ASSLH conference – The life and times of the Barrier Industrial Council: A study in local peak union origins, purpose, power and decline

Bradon Ellem & John Shields
Work & Organisational Studies, School of Business, University of Sydney

Abstract

The Barrier Industrial Council (BIC) is one of the best known examples of a powerful union peak body in Australia. Upon its establishment in the early 1920s, it oversaw a particular form of working class mobilisation and, for many years, exercised something like a hegemony both for and over its affiliates. Continue reading →

2001 ASSLH conference – Theorising peak union formation, purpose and power: A discussion paper

Bradon Ellem & John Shields
Work & Organisational Studies, School of Business, University of Sydney

Abstract

Peak unions occupy a constantly moving point of intersection between two competing sets of forces: those of organisational unity and class solidarity and the forces of fragmentation and sectionalism. We suggest that for any group of unions to form a peak body a state of internal equilibrium of power balance must exist between the unions concerned. Continue reading →