Political partisanship, race, and union strength from 1970 to 2000: A pooled time-series analysis

This paper reports findings that assess the relationship between the resurgence in conservative political strength and union density in the United States. The conservative Republican return to political power after 1968 is likely to have produced added declines in union membership. Yet despite close political regulation of labor–management disputes, sociologists have paid little attention to the influential political determinants of success in these contests. Using fixed-effects estimation, this analysis assesses the relationship between the political strength of the political party most hostile to labor and union density. With multiple factors held constant, the results suggest that increased Republican presence in the state legislatures along with Republican control of the presidency and the governor’s office after 1989 helped to reduce union memberships. The results also indicate that increases in the percentage of African Americans produces greater union strength but not in the ex-Confederate states. Added findings suggest two policies controlled by the states have influential effects on this outcome.