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The Closed Shop: Debate, Policy and the Purpose of this Book

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Abstract

We wrote this book because the one comprehensive study of the closed shop in Britain is now twenty years old. The study is McCarthy’s.1 It has endured well into an era in which, according to piecemeal evidence, the pattern and nature of the practice has changed significantly. A replacement seems long overdue. In attempting to provide it we were inclined to adopt an approach broadly similar to McCarthy’s. Like him, we were primarily interested in the perennial industrial-relations themes of job control and job regulation. Consequently our main focus is on the purpose and influence of the closed shop in the relationship between trade unions and management.

Keywords

  • Trade Union
  • Collective Bargaining
  • Industrial Relation
  • Union Membership
  • Weak Union

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Notes and References

  1. W. E. J. McCarthy, The Closed Shop in Britain, Blackwell, Oxford, 1964.

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  2. C. Hanson, S. Jackson and D. Miller, The Closed Shop, Gower Press, Aldershot, 1982, p. 15.

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  3. J. Burton, ‘Are Trade Unions a Public Good/“Bad” ? The Economics of the Closed Shop’, in Trade Unions: Public Goods or Public ‘Bads’?, Institute of Economic Affairs Readings no. 17, 1978; see also J. Burton, The Trojan Horse: Union Power in British Politics, Adam Smith Institute, London, 1979

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  4. L. J. McFarlane, The Right to Strike, Pelican, 1981, p. 49, quoting from R. and E. Frow and M. Katanka, Strikes: A Documentary History, Charles Knight, Croydon, 1971, p. 55.

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© 1984 Stephen Dunn and John Gennard

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Dunn, S., Gennard, J. (1984). The Closed Shop: Debate, Policy and the Purpose of this Book. In: The Closed Shop in British Industry. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-17532-1_1

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