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Labour/Le Travailleur

Reviews / Comptes Rendus

Volume 26, 1990

URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/llt26rv01

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Publisher(s) Canadian Committee on Labour History

ISSN 0700-3862 (print) 1911-4842 (digital)

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Cite this article (1990). Reviews / Comptes Rendus. Labour/Le Travailleur, 26, 171–246.

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Craig Heron, The Canadian Labour Movement: A Short History by Robin Wylie /171 Judith Fingard, The Dark Side of Victorian Halifax by Greg Marquis /173 Norman R. Ball, Bâtir un pays. Histoire des travaux publics au Canada by Yves Gingras / 174 John A. Eagle, The Canadian Pacific Railway and the Development of Western Canada, 18961914 by Allen Seager / 176 Andrée Lévesque, La norme et les déviantes. Des femmes au Québec pendant l'entre- deux-guerres by André Lachance /177 Linda Kealey and Joan Sangs ter, eds.. Beyond the Vote: Canadian Women and Politics by Karen Dubinsky /178 Allen Gottheil, Les Juifs progressistes au Québec by Marie Poirier /181 Nadia Fahmy-Eid et Lucie Piché, Si le Travail m'était conté autrement ... Les Travailleuses de la CTCC-CSN: quelques fragments d'histoire by Caria Lipsig-Mummé /182 Elinor Barr, Silver Islet: Striking it Rich in Lake Superior by Peter Campbell /184 Alvin Finkel, The Social Credit Phenomenon in Alberta by J.R. Mallory /185 Wendy Mitchinson and Janice Dickin McGinnis, Essays in the History of Canadian Medicine by Jay Cassel / 188 Alain Pontaut, Santé et sécurité. Un bilan du régime québécois de santé et sécurité du travail, 1885-1985 by Bernard Brody / 189 A.B. McCullough, The Commercial Fishery of the Canadian Great Lakes by John J. Van West/193 Louis Caron, La vie d'artiste. Le cinquantenaire de l'Union des Artistes by Jacques Rouillard / 195 André Beaucage, Syndicats, salaires et conjoncture économique, L'expérience des fronts communs du secteur public québécois de 1971 et 1983 by Maurice Lemelin /196 Louis Favreau, Mouvement populaire et intervention communautaire de 1960 à nos jours. Continuités et ruptures by Gabriel Gagnon /198 Robert Boivin, Histoire de la Clinique des citoyens de Saint-Jacques (1968-1988). Des comités de citoyens au CLSC du plateau Mont-Royal by Jean-Pierre Collin / 199 Keith Dix, What's a Coal Miner to Do? The Mechanization of Coal Mining by Ian McKay/201 Builder Levy, Images of Appalachian Coalfields by Danny Samson / 203

4 Daniel Rosenberg, New Orleans Dockworkers: Race, Labor, and Unionism 1892-1923 by Bruce C. Nelson / 205 John D'Emilio and Estelle B. Freedman. Intimate Matters: A History of Sexuality in America by Geoffrey S. Smith / 206 Jessie Lloyd O'Connor, Harvey O'Connor, and Susan M. Bowler, Harvey and Jessie: A Couple of Radicals by Mark Leier / 209 Elizabeth Arme Payne, Reform, Labor and Feminism: Margaret Dreier Robins and the Women's Trade Union League by Linda Kealey / 210 Richard W. Judd, Socialist Cities: Municipal Politics and the Grass Roots of Amer icon Socialism by Kenneth McNaught / 212 Sydney Stahl Weinberg, The World of Our Mothers: The Lives of Jewish Immigrant Women by Ruth A. Frager / 213 Marc Scott Miller, The Irony of Victory: World War II and Lowell, Massachusetts by John T. Cumbler / 21S Ronald L. Filipelli, American Labor and Postwar Italy, 1943-1953: A Study in Cold War Politics by Stephen Burwood /216 Howard Jacob Karger, éd.. Social Workers and Labor Unions byJohnM. Herrick/218 Barry E. Truchil, Capital-Labour Relations in the US. Textile Industry by A.B. McCullough / 220 Peter Novick, That Noble Dream: The "Objectivity Question" and the American Historical Profession by Harold M ah / 221 David Le win and Richard B. Peterson, The Modern Grievance Procedure in the United States by Paul Craven / 224 Alexander Cockbum, Corruptions of Empire: Life Studies &. The Reagan Era by John Peter Olinger / 225 David Levine, Reproducing Families: The Political Economy of English Population History by E.P. Thompson / 227 E.A. Wrigley, Continuity, Chance, and Change: The Character of the Industrial Revolution in England by Charles E. Freedeman / 229 Christine Collette, For labour and for women: The Women's Labour League, 1906-18 by Dorma T. Andrew / 230 Mary Drake McFeely, Lady Inspectors: The Campaign for a Better Workplace, 1893-1921 by Carolyn Strange / 232 B.J. Ripley and J. McHugh, John Maclean by Stuart Macintyre / 233 Mary Lynn Stewart, Women, Work and the French State: Labour Protection and Social Patriarchy, 1879-1919 by Joan Wallach Scott / 235 Roger Bourderon and Yvan Avakoumovitch, Détruire le PCF Archives de l'Etat français et de l'occupant hitlérien 1940-1944 by Michèle Lalancette / 236 Henry Milner, Sweden: Social Democracy in Practice by Philip Resnick / 238 Greg M. Olsen, éd.. Industrial Change and Labour Adjustment in Sweden and Canada by S.F. Kaliski / 240 Donna Rae Gabaccia, Militants and Migrants: Rural Sicilians Become American Workers by E. Carlson-Cumbo / 242 Vladimir Andrle, Workers in Stalin's Russia, Industrialization and Social Change in a Planned Economy by Lewis H. Siegelbaum / 243 Bill Freund, The African Worker by Bob Shenton / 245 5 REVIEWS/COMPTES RENDUS

Craig Heron, The Canadian Labour industrial unionism of the Workers' Unity Movement: A Short History (Toronto: League. Heron does not explain that this Lorimer 1989). was due to Stalinist weaknesses, subordi­ nating the class struggle to an alliance THE 1980S SAW in Canadian labour history between the party and official union the appearance of two diametrically op­ structures. posed narratives of Canadian workers, World War II was the great watershed Desmond Morton's Working People and in the Canadian union movement For the Bryan Palmer's Working Class Experi­ first time, industrial unions were estab­ ence. Morton, a leading social democrat, lished on a large scale and governments focused his overview on unions. Palmer, recognised unions and collective bargain­ a Marxist, chose instead to develop an ing in law. The 'rule of law' in the work­ analysis of Canadian workers as a class, place, however, has acted as a double from the forms of capitalist accumulation edged weapon. Legal recognition in­ and class organization to broader ques­ creased union security in the workplace tions of working-class consciousness or but at the price of centralising shopfloor 'culture'. One more survey has appeared power in the hands of a paid union offi­ on the Canadian union movement to close cialdom which was often divorced from the decade. This time it is by Craig Heron, the immediate concerns of workers. a social democratic proponent of labour In the 1980s governments began to process analysis. dismantle the 1940s settlement, with Heron's survey focuses on four mo­ wage controls, rewritten labour codes, ments of struggle in the working-class and a dramatic increase in coercive back- movement: the Knights of Labor in the to-work legislation. The union movement 1880s, the mass strikes of 1919, the in response has tried to avoid direct strug­ breakthrough of the 1940s when unions gle in an effort to preserve the 1940s were recognized on a permanent basis, 'social contract' with governments and and the public sector upsurge of the 1960s employers. But when the reader gets to and 70s. this point Heron's distinction between a What he also discusses is how the political or bureaucratic response to a Canadian union movement has coped in downturn disappears in a syndicalist (or periods of downturn, of an employers' social democratic?) cloud. offensive, in the 1920s and 30s, and the Here Heron's political weaknesses 1980s. In the 1930s, Heron rightly states emerge in judging the steps unions have the critical importance of revolutionary taken, such as Canadian and 'social' politics in keeping unionism alive. The unionism, to combat the pressures of the Communist Party was essential in devel­ 1980s. What both represent, however, is oping a cadre of industrial union builders. a retreat from the US concessions struggle He also shows the triumph of the bureau­ and a move to restore the structures of cratic industrial union model of the class conciliation. United Mine Workers over the political Because Heron believes English Can­ Table of Couteau for Review! it on pp. 4 & 5. ada is oppressed by the United States, he 171 172 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL welcomes the development of national funds with workers' pension money. As unionism by the autoworkers and wood­ Louis Laberge says, "profit is not a dirty workers as evidence of class struggle word." Not to the officials. unionism. In the Woodworkers' case, the The Canadian Labour Movement majority Canadian section of the IWA has concludes with a programme for the abandoned the loggers and mill workers 1990s, Heron's personal prescription for of the Pacific northwest. The Canadian union rebuilding. In this new 'social Autoworkers, not in high regard since vision' Heron emphasizes such issues as their raid on Newfoundland fishermen or­ a fair day's work for a fair day's pay, ganized by the UFCW, have even stooped democracy, and solidarity, without ad­ to enterprise unionism in cutting a deal dressing the issue of a political vehicle of with Nissan management in Japan to rep­ change. This simply can't be done with­ resent the new Ingersoll, Ontario plant out openly debating the dominant politi­ without even consulting the workers. cal force in the workers' movement, the Heron also welcomes the turn to 'so­ New Democratic Party. cial unionism,' the attempt by major At best, stepping beyond the NDP unions to harness social movements as a without addressing the question of way to influence public policy and deflect workers' political organization can only attacks on the union movement through a end in syndicalism, asking the unions to process of community lobbying rather act in a general political manner that is than workplace struggle. In essence, what simply not part of their nature as eco­ the new social unionism represents is a nomic organizations representing the social democratic lobby. class. At worst. Heron's programme can To grasp the conservative nature of only act as a fig leaf for a social democ­ the unions' response to the downturn of racy appearing to offer a fresh alternative the 1980s, all we have to do is scan Kumar while managing a capitalism in growing and Ryan's interviews with Canada's top crisis. This is precisely the dilemma of union leaders. Almost all union leaders Labour parties in New Zealand and Aus­ identify the state's assault on the post-war tralia. settlement in industrial relations as more Heron's labour history has the important than the early 1980s recession strength of the long term perspective in in altering the balance of power between showing how the future of unionism in employers and unions. Canada is shaped by moments of struggle. Because of this, the concern of union But an inability to learn from the lessons leaders has been not so much with the fact of the last great downturn, the 1920s and of concessions but in blocking conces­ 1930s, leads Heron to a false optimism sions that violate the principles of the about how unions can rebuild in the 1990s 1940s' industrial relations rules. For ex­ without revolutionary socialist politics. ample, Operation Solidarity was called Combining English Canadian nation­ off when the Socreds agreed to carry out alism, 'social' unionism, solidarity funds, layoffs by seniority. Thousands of union and increased bureaucratization of locals' members lost their jobs. But the union affairs, is not a vision of an anti-capitalist officialdom had preserved the principle future. In reality, this strategy is a conser­ of seniority. vative effort to re-establish the collective This thrust towards a class collabora­ bargaining regime of the 1940s. tive compromise is particularly evident To mistake the strategies of the union when it comes to creating 'Solidarity bureaucracy to preserve itself, even pop­ Funds' as a way to develop clout with ulist ones like mobilizing social move­ business and governments for recogni­ ments, for the class struggle, is to invite tion. Modelled on the Quebec Federation more sellout disasters like Operation Sol­ of Labour scheme, what unions are really idarity in British Columbia. Instead, so­ establishing are corporate investment cialists have to engage in the more diffi- REVIEWS 173

cult task of building structures of direct garet Howard, "The Wickedest Woman in struggle within die unions and a Marxist Halifax" and two families of recidivists, workers' party without. the Fords and the Kellums. Then there is Many NDP and trade union officials Isaac Sallis, a grog seller who was more a will welcome Heron's survey. Class lower-class opportunist than a working- struggle socialists do not They will con­ class hero like Joe Beef of Montreal. tinue to rely on Bryan Palmer's Working- Many of these recidivists were prostitutes Class Experience. and Fingard suggests they were victims Robin Wylie not only of class discrimination but of University of Saskatchewan male excess. There is little romantic or noble about these people. Part U discusses Judith Fingard, The Dark Side of Victor­ the institutional response to the under­ ian Halifax (Potters Lake, Nova Scotia: class: evangelical missions, refuges for Potterfield Press 1989). female offenders, poor relief (the Su Vin­ cent de Paul Society and the Association NINETEENTH-CENTURY HALIFAX is an ex­ for Improving the Condition of the Poor), cellent laboratory for social historians for and the Society for the Prevention of Cru­ two reasons. First, it was a garrison and elty. Fingard argues that reformers and naval town and commercial entrepot their target groups had radically different marked by seasonal unemployment. Its views of these institutions; die clients trade unions were among the first in Can­ looked at them as short term "drop-in" ada. Halifax also had an underclass con­ centres. Many historians have described sisting mainly of Irish Catholics and a such religiously-motivated reform efforts smaller black minority. Second, because as attempts at social control. Twenty of the activities of the Public Archives of years ago such thinking was deemed Nova Scotia, sources on the city are fairly 'revisionist'. Fingard does not let social rich. Judith Fingard, who has written on reformers off the hook but suggests some 19th-century topics such as poverty and new revisionism that students of institu­ sailors, has combined these two strengths tional reform should ponder. to produce a unique volume. Her com­ Without discounting the class basis of mand of primary sources is impressive the legal system, Fingard asserts that class (some of the material has appeared else­ instrumentality was not the only force be­ where in article form) and she makes lib­ hind Victorian institutional reform. This eral use of international secondary echoes the work of a few other historians. literature. Part I examines the disreput­ Petty crime and misbehaviour was not so able, 92 "jailbirds" whose lives were much class rebellion but a strategy for marked by poverty, violence, alcohol survival and the institutions dismissed by abuse and incarceration. These were revisionist historians as mechanisms of highly visible petty offenders who fre­ social control were used as a form of quented the police station, the personal or family welfare. In this light, magistrate's court, the poorhouse and the police court, jail, prison, poorhouse Rockhead Prison. The research, most of it and middle-class rescue efforts were both culled from police and court reports in the intrusive and useful. They became more press, is meticulous. This is 'bum and intrusive over time. The Society for the strumpet' history. The jailbirds were "res­ Prevention of Cruelty, for example, was idents of specific, rough and disreputable marked by "a mixture of social amer- streets of the city, limited in their lifetime iolaration, social control and lower-class opportunities because of racial prejudice, opportunism." This theoretical recasting gender inequalities, educational depriva­ of institutional reform owes a lot to tion, chronic poverty, pathological disor­ women's history, which suggests that ders, or, by association with those so state coercion is sometimes a good thing. limited." (10) We are introduced to Mar­ Another theme is that members of the 174 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL underclass abused each other and them­ Norman R. Ball, dir.. Bâtir un pays. selves. Lower-class women who were Histoire des travaux publics au Canada victims of violence tended to be victim­ (Montréal: Boréal 1988). ized by lower-class men. Isaac Sallis was not averse to making money from the COMME LE NOTE Norman Bail dans son misery of others. introduction de Bâtir un Pays, les travaux The sources present difficulties (the publics n'ont pas été le point de mire des jailbirds were illiterate) but the study historiens et ce bien que ces travaux could benefit from a broader view of class d'ingénieurs aient été "au coeur de relations in the commercial city. Al­ l'histoire du Canada." (19) Englobant, though Fingard notes that the lower ranks selon la définition de William Hurst, "la of evangelical reform were largely work­ conception, la construction et l'entretien ing class, she mostly ignores the largest de tous les équipements nécessaires aux segment of the population. Details on the divers paliers administratifs pour assurer lives of a few misfits make for lurid read­ les services qu'exige le fonctionnement ing, but it would have been useful to have d'une société organisée" (9), les travaux at least some speculation as to the work­ publics fournissent en effet les bases ing-class response to the jailbirds. Were matérielles d'existence des sociétés mod­ they a despised lumenproletariat? Objects ernes. Bâtir un Pays nous offre donc une of pity? Are the experiences of marginal première synthèse collective en treize prostitutes and alcoholics useful for un­ chapitres consacrés aux différents aspects derstanding the plight of working-class de l'histoire des travaux publics au Can­ women in late 19th-century Halifax? ada: les ponts, les routes, les voies d'eau, What was the nature of temperance sup­ les chemins de fer, le transport en com­ port among the working class? The issues mun, la gestion de l'eau (approvisionne­ of alcohol, family violence, and public ment, égouts, irrigation, inondations), la order were of interest to more than the production d'électricité, le traitement des middle-class reformers and the dregs of déchets solides, la construction des the city. Related to this, 'respectable' ar­ édifices publics et des aéroports. Seul le tisans, tradesmen, servants and labourers dernier chapitre, de Alan F.J. Artibise, might be shocked by Fingard's assump­ consacré à la construction des villes, per­ tions about their sexual morality. To por­ met de faire le lien entre ces multiples tray life in Victorian Halifax as some­ activités que les différents chapitres thing out of Hogarth or Dickens is to présentent souvent de façon trop isolées perpetuate many of the stereotypes found les unes des autres. in Thomas Raddall's Warden of the North Les chapitres sur les ponts et les voies (1948). One final criticism: although the d'eau relèvent davantage de l'histoire des author makes extensive use of police re­ techniques et de l'archéologie industrielle cords, there is little material on the police que de l'histoire sociale. Ils nous force itself, the principal institution with renseignent sur les grandes dates de con­ which the jailbirds came into contact. It struction et les différents types de ponts also was the principal bureaucracy for et de canaux. Du premier pont de bois dealing with the social problems that con­ d'importance sur la rivière Outaouais cerned the reformers. All in all, however, entre Ottawa et Hull en 1828, on passe this study is a welcome addition to social, aux ponts de fer à partir de 18S0 et aux women's, and urban historiography. The ponts d'acier a la toute fin du siècle. Le 'debate' on Victorian social reform in vingtième siècle verra le développement Canada has become quite staid and des ponts de béton, utilisés surtout pour Fingard*s volume should help change le réseau routier. Au milieu du dix- this. neuvième siècle, les ponts de fer les plus Greg Marquis importants sont liés au développement du Mount Allison University chemin de fer; pensons au pont Victoria REVIEWS 175

construit entre 1854 et 1859. Avant le développement de l'hygiène publique; développement des chemins de fer, le une épidémie de typhoïde étant plus transport se faisait par les voies d'eau et efficace que des manifestations pour con­ la croissance des activités commerciales vaincre les autorités locales de recueillir du pays a entraîné la construction de can­ les eaux usées. aux permettant d'étendre les distances Dans l'ensemble, le volume nous naviguables. Construit entre 1824 et présente l'évolution des techniques 1833, le Canal Welland permettait ainsi utilisées et des structures institutionnelles de contourner les chutes Niagara. La créées par les différents paliers de création du Canada et le peuplement des gouvernements pour gérer les travaux Prairies n'entraîna pas seulement le publics. On aurait préféré que tous les développement du chemin de fer au cours chapitres adoptent une perspective du dernier quart du dix-neuvième siècle sociale. Ainsi dans son chapitre sur les mais également celui des canaux à l'est du aéroports, Julie Harris parle de la con­ Lac Supérieur de façon à diminuer les struction de Mirabel sans jamais mention­ coûts de transport du blé et autres ner l'existence de fortes oppositions à ce marchandises. projet. Elle note seulement que "les Alors que le transport par bateau était autorités exproprièrent 88 000 acres de le seul compétiteur du transport par train, terrains répartis dans quatore petites la diffusion rapide de l'utilisation de municipalités et déplacèrent près de 10 l'automobile entre les deux guerres 000 personnes." (332) Une fois ce viendra modifier cette relation. Un réseau "détail*' mentionné, l'auteure décrit les routier se mettra lentement en place pour aérogares, les pistes, etc. Les lecteurs de se développer rapidement à la suite de la LabouriLe Travail seront probablement Seconde Guerre mondiale et donner lieu déçus de constater que les artisans de à la création des autoroutes. toutes ces constructions sont plutôt ab­ Bien que la plupart des chapitres aient sents de cette histoire des travaux publics, tendance à se limiter à décrire les Bâtir un pays étant une histoire des pro­ différents travaux entrepris depuis la duits et non des producteurs, bien que les découverte de la Nouvelle-France, cer­ noms de quelques grands ingénieurs tains auteurs abordent aussi la question de comme Thomas Coltrin Keefer soient l'impact social des changements tech­ mentionnés. niques. Dans son chapitre sur le transport La fragmentation des chapitres ne en commun, Paul-André Linteau montre permet pas au lecteur d'avoir une vision bien comment la mise en place de tram­ de l'ensemble du développement. En fait, ways électriques a favorisé à la fois le la diversité des pratiques et des intérêts développement des banlieues, la concen­ d'une province à l'autre suggère que les tration des activités économiques dans les ingénieurs, politiciens et travailleurs centre-villes et l'apparition de secteurs impliqués dans la construction de ces d'habitation réserves aux démunis. Dans grands travaux ont contribué davantage à son étude sur l'irrigation et la lutte contre la croissance de leurs provinces respec­ les inondations, A A. den Otter établit le tives qu'à celle du Canada, entendu lien entre la colonisation des Prairies, le comme "pays." Cherchant une unité développement des techniques de derrière les différents styles d'édifices contrôle des eaux et les compagnies de publics au Canada, Mark Fram et Jean chemin de fer qui avaient intérêt au Simonton notent que "le sentiment pro­ peuplement de l'Ouest pour assurer la fond que chaque région avait de son rentabilité du réseau ferroviaire. Enfin, identité spécifique a fait obstacle a l'analyse du développement des réseaux l'émergence d'une vision centralisée." d'égouts présentée par Douglas Baldwin (285) Les auteurs concluent qu'il est "im­ est sensible aux liens unissant la construc­ possible de relever des caractéristiques tion de réseaux d'égouts et le communes en nombre suffisant pour 176 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL définir un style ou une technique propre­ John A. Eagle, The Canadian Pacific ment canadiens que ce soit dans le passé Railway and the Development of Western ou à l'heure actuelle." (306) De même, Canada, 1896-1914 (Montreal: McGill- dès l'ouverture de son chapitre sur Queen's University Press 1989). l'électricité, Arnold Roos se demande "comment parler d'une histoire de Tms TEXT COMMANDS only a brief review l'énergie électrique au Canada, chaque in this journal. It contributes little or noth­ province et chaque territoire a la sienne, ing to the study of railway labour or rail­ mélange de politique, d'économie, de way culture. However, it is the book that géographie et de technologie," et admet Harold Innis ought to have published in candidement que "le seul point commun, 1930: a straightforward, well-written, and s'il existe, c'est que chaque province s'est usefully organized account of the Cana­ engagée dans sa propre voie." (183) Cette dian Pacific up to World War I, set against diversité est telle qu'en pratique, étudier the backdrop of agricultural expansion le Canada est à peu près équivalent à faire and resource exploitation in 'the West' It une étude comparative entre plusieurs is certainly recommended to anyone pays. Cette absence "d'unité nationale," studying Canadian political economy si l'on peut dire, est profonde et se reflète who could not name more than two mem­ jusque dans l'origine même de Bâtir un bers of Wilfrid Launer's Ministry of the Pays. En effet, comme le note William Talents, or explain the industrial conse­ Hurst dans son avant-propos, c'est le quences of the Crow's Nest Pass railway. directeur de l'American Public Works Eagle's periodization suggests an im­ Association (APWA) qui a incité les plicit argument that traditional emphasis membres des sections canadiennes de son on the 1880s as the pivotal decade for the Association à suivre l'exemple des CPR is misplaced. In fact his introductory américains qui venaient de publier His­ chapter includes an excellent summary of tory of Public Works in the United States the corporation's first fifteen years (1881- (1776-1976). L'APWA a même appuyé le 1896). A predominantly United States op­ projet sous l'angle financier, administra­ erating management created, in these tif et rédactionnel. Des mauvaises langues years, one of the largest and most sophis­ pourraient voir là une preuve ticated corporate structures on the conti­ supplémentaire du fait que les nent, "patterned after the system pion­ nationalistes "canadiens" n'arrivent eered by the Pennsylvania Railroad." (We jamais à se définir que par rapport aux still need to know more about the dy­ américains.... Quoiqu'il en soit. Bâtir un namic between such immense managerial pays demeurera un ouvrage de référence apparatuses and the fact that most of the parce qu'il fixe les grandes étapes du railway was in fact self-managed, by développement des structures matérielles skilled workers, on a day-to-day basis.) qui rendent possible la vie relativement Despite its vast concessions and proper­ confortable des villes modernes. En ter­ ties, though, Canadian Pacific was still minant, il est malheureux de devoir con­ financially vulnerable, as shown by its stater que la lecture des épreuves n'a pas crisis in the depression of 1893. As a été très attentive. J'ai relevé plusieurs co­ strictly transportation enterprise, Cana­ quilles et, chose plus grave, neuf endroits dian Pacific was more-or-less uneconom­ où des mots ou des membres de phrases ical The idea that Canadian Pacific could étaient absents, rendant la phrase souvent operate on a 'mercantilist' basis, as an incompréhensible. all-red trade route through the capitalist desert of the western interior, is a fallacy. Yves Gingras As an engine of capital accumulation, Ca­ Université du Québec à Montréal nadian Pacific had to turn to an activist policy of promoting the west's resources. From timber on Vancouver Island (vast REVIEWS 177

acreages of which were acquired for a la première moitié du vingtième siècle: song, freehold tenure, by 1905) through The New Day Recalled. Lives of Girls and the fruitlands of the Okanagan, to the coal Women in English Canada, 1919-1939 de lands of the Rockies and on to partly irri­ Veronica Strong-Boag et Les femmes au gated agricultural lands on the Prairies, tournant du siècle 1880-1940. Ages de la this corporate activity did much, ironi­ vie. Maternité et vie quotidienne de De­ cally, to develop water transport. nise Lemieux Lucie Mercier. Ces deux While the connection between the volumes ont pour sujets principaux les CPR and the wheat economy was cer­ iges de la vie et le quotidien des femmes, tainly significant. Eagle argues, the claim la professeur Strong-Boag se limitant aux that Canadian Pacific rose on the back of Canadiennes anglaises, mesdames the Prairie farmer "needs to be modified." Lemieux et Mercier, aux québécoises. The most important of the CPR's natural Tous les deux nous renseignent sur resource ventures" was in fact the devel­ l'expérience de la majorité des femmes opment of an integrated metalliferous c'est-à-dire celles qui se conforment aux mining and smelting complex at Trail, BC prescriptions émanant du pouvoir (la between 1898 and 1906, when the CP normalité). Andrée Lévesque a voulu, elle subsidiary. Consolidated Mining and aussi, étudier la vie des femmes mais à Smelting, emerged full-blown. One can­ partir d'une problématique différente: la not disagree with this conclusion, al­ déviance. Ainsi son étude vient compléter though Eagle does tend to gloss over les ouvrages de mesdames Strong-Boag et some of the difficulties and contradic­ Lemieux Mercier en présentant le vécu de tions of the underground economy in the celles qui ont défié "le discours et les far west, partly caused by disabilities on prescriptions énoncées par les agents freight rates and coal prices imposed upon normatifs." (8) Toutefois l'ampleur du the fuel-producing component by the sujet l'a amené à limiter sa recherche à Crow's Nest Pass Agreement and its cor­ deux aspects privilégiés de la mission des ollaries. femmes à l'époque: la maternité et la Canadian Pacific was the main instru­ sexualité. Pour mener à bien son étude, ment of what Ross McCormack calls the elle part de l'hypothèse que des femmes rapid transformation to industrial capital­ se sont écartées du modèle de vie ism in the Canadian West between 1896 "jeunesse chaste, fréquentations pures, and 1914. Its consequences for class for­ mariage béni de nombreux enfants tous mation and class relations were enor­ accueillis en remerciant le Seigneur" mous. John Eagle's excellent, but neces­ (11), proposé par les élites religieuses et sarily limited, text will form an important laïques de l'époque. building block for any new synthesis of Comment ces femmes qui ont dévié regional labour history. de la norme ont-elles vécu leur marginalité? Quelle a été l'attitude de la Allen Seager société québécoise envers elles? Telles Simon Fraser University sont quelques-unes des questions qui préoccupent l'auteure et auxquelles elle Andrée Lévesque, La norme et les répond dans la deuxième partie de son déviantes. Des femmes au Québec pen­ volume. Malgré la difficulté d'évaluer dant l'entre-deux-guerres (Montréal: Les l'importance d'actes comme la contracep­ Editions du remue-ménage 1989). tion, l'avortement, l'abandon d'enfants et l'infanticide, à cause du caractère caché L'OUVRAGE d'Andrée Lévesque se situe ou tout au moins camouflé de ces gestes dans un courant historiographique récent intimes et souvent sans témoins, la pro- au Canada qui, en un an environ, a vu la fesseure Lévesque réussit à lever le voile publication de deux autres études sur ces actions grâce à une analyse d'importance sur la vie des femmes dans minutieuse et critique des statistiques 178 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

démographiques, archives judiciaires, critique, Mme Lévesque ne s'est pas registres hospitaliers et journaux. laissé dominer par ses sources qui L'expérience quotidienne des mères émanaient du pouvoir pour la plupart et célibataires et l'attitude de leur famille, elle a su percevoir entre les lignes le vis­ des autorités religieuses et de la société en age et l'attitude des déviantes dont elle général envers elles sont cernées grâce présente un portrait et une analyse aux registres et dossiers médicaux des réalistes et nuancés. Bref une excellente patientes de l'Hôpital de la Miséricorde à étude, rédigée dans un style clair et précis, Montréal. Ensuite puisant ses informa­ que tous ceux et celles qui s'intéressent à tions dans les registres des cours de jus­ l'histoire des femmes et à l'histoire des tice municipale et provinciale, les procès- mentalités se doivent de lire. verbaux et le rapport de l'enquête Coderre sur la police de Montréal, Andrée André Lachance Lévesque étudie le vécu des femmes qui Université de Sherbrooke pratiquaient la prostitution et en vivaient de même que la perception que l'on en Linda Kealey and Joan Sangster, eds., avait à l'époque. Beyond the Vote: Canadian Women and Toutefois, pour bien analyser cette Politics (Toronto: University of Toronto déviance, il est important auparavant de Press 1989). connaître ce que le société québécoise de l'entre-deux-guerres défini comme la THE 1989 NDP LEADERSHIP convention was normalité puisque les comportements a telling moment in recent political his­ sont jugés déviants ou non par rapport à tory. As the media commentators (partic­ un ensemble de prescriptions qui constit­ ularly the always-pedantic Stephen uent la norme. C'est ainsi que dans la Lewis) found Audrey McLaughlin's sub­ première partie de son ouvrage, à l'aide dued speech-making style lacking in com­ de sources comme les mandements des parison to the bombastic hucksterism of évêques, les prédications du carême, les Dave Banett, as delegates expressed their conférences prononcées par des religieux, reservations about whether McLaughlin les publications des Semaines sociales du was 'tough enough to stand up to' the Canada, Mme Lévesque réussit à établir other party leaders (hearing later about le discours et les pratiques normatives de the homophobic whisper campaign un­ l'Égl ise, l'État et la société en général sur leashed against the McLaughlin camp), it la maternité et la sexualité. La consulta­ was all a lesson in how much overt sexism tion des pages féminines des journaux, is still permissible in public political dis­ des revues féminines et d'un journal ouvr­ course. It is a sad comment on the social ier, Le Monde ouvrier, lui permet de democratic left that it took a Tory woman vérifier comment ces prescriptions — PC strategist and CBC commentator étaient reçus auprès des québécoises dans Nancy Jamieson — to call these com­ leur ensemble. ments for what they were. Cette étude appartient à l'histoire des Few of the women in Linda Kealey and mentalités, un secteur encore peu Joan Sangster's collection made it any­ développé au Québec. Il faut rendre where near the heights of a leadership con­ hommage au professeure Lévesque d'en vention, but all would have recognized the avoir écrit une belle page. Pourtant pressures and not-so-subtle obstacles facing l'entreprise n'était pas facile pour qui women who enter political life — of both veut aller plus loin qu'une simple descrip­ the large and small "p" varieties. The thir­ tion du vécu des femmes et expliquer le teen essays in this book (a few previously pourquoi des attitudes et comportements published but most new) explore the history de la société québécoise et, en particulier, of Canadian women's post-suffrage politi­ des femmes face à la maternité et à la cal involvements in electoral, social move­ sexualité. Faisant preuve d'un bon esprit ment, labour and ethnic politics. REVIEWS 179

The range of d» book fe ambitious, but on die political spectrum requires more unfortunately the depth and quality of die dian a simple 'status of women* survey of papers are quite uneven. It could also have the progress women made in different used either an extended introduction or a parties or movements. Knitting socks is more hUtoricaDy-infbrmed theoretical/con­ knitting socks, after all, whedier it's for ceptual overview. Similarly, a few of die the Mackenzie Papineau battalion in historical pieces in die book would have Spain or for Canadian troops in World benefitted from a stronger theoretical War I. What is more important man a grounding: too often one gets lost in de­ chronicle of die activities of women is an scriptive detail and generalities. Central understanding of how gender is con­ questions or debates are too often over­ structed widiin parties and movements, as looked. Still, tins is a good collection — a well as die vision of social change and nice mix of generations of historians, region sexual politics which such parties or (except what happened to die Atlantic?), movements promote. Nicely captured by and especially ethnicity. Though I hesitate Joan Songster's phrase "militant mother­ to contradict that journal of objective and ing," several essays explore how disinterested reporting, Saturday Night women's traditional and maternal quali­ magazine, which saw in the book a left wing ties served as a source of political moti­ "bias," there is also in fact a blend of polit­ vation. In dus sense, diis book is an ex­ ical approaches in die collection. ploration of some of the problems and The wide range of die book is its contradictions of "maternal feminism" greatest strength. In an edited collection which Linda Kealey's earlier collection, it is often die case mat there are as many Not an Unreasonable Claim probed for a themes as there are authors. Despite the previous generation of female reformers. uneven level of sophistication, on the Many of these essays suggest — usually whole most of the essays in this collection implicitly — that feminist historians complement one another, and several key ought to rediink earlier conclusions about questions have been explored. The intro­ die role that matemalist ideology has duction to die book sets some limited played in shaping women's approaches to goals. The articles do take us "beyond die politics. vote," in terms of examining women's Perhaps die strongest common de­ post suffrage activities. And each chapter nominator among die generations of ac­ contributes to the feminist project of re- tivists documented in this collection is die conceptualizing 'politics' in broader, ev­ importance of pacificism as a politicizing eryday life terms. Yet many of the articles force. Women as diverse as Liberal sena­ ask other, newer questions. What are die tor Canine Wilson, Quebec CCF leader differences, for women, in participating Thérèse Casgrain, and hundreds of lesser in politics of die left, centre or right? Why known women (of die centre and die left) do some women choose electoral politics, cut their political teedi in die peace move­ and others social movements, as a route ment. Many audiors comment on dieir to social change? How have patriarchal subjects' interest in peace issues, but few visions of female sexuality contributed to of diem really unpack die vision of gender a conservative political agenda — even which women's peace activism em­ on die left? What kind of family back­ braced. Barbara Roberts, in her survey of grounds and personal lives produce fe­ die women's peace movement, is one of male, if not always feminist, activists, and die few historians who situates her work what is die personal toll that political in­ in historiography, and argues explicitly volvement takes on women? against accepting die matemalist rhetoric Among die most interesting essays of first wave feminism "at face value." So are those which explore die first question. while its true that die 'maternalism = pa­ To understand die choices women make cificism = political activism' equation in terms of where they place themselves often worked to foster a spirit of progrès- 180 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL sive social change, pacifism has always ical life in different ethnic communities. been a rather malleable ideology. Thérèse Two other papers, Janice Newton's study Casgrain, for example, supported a vari­ of Canadian socialists' response to the ety of pacifist causes during most of her 'white slave' panic and Pauline Rankin's political life, but also supported the War analysis of two generations of Ontario Measures Act in 1970. A more thorough farm women's activism also contribute discussion of the contradictions of paci­ new and original insights. fism as a route to politicization would Do feminists write political history have been an interesting pursuit in several differently than others? There are lessons of these essays. to be learned here for others writing about Another theme many of the articles political movements. Several authors deal with is the 'personal' side of political bring a rare sensitivity to their work — involvement. Then as now, women's particularly important for those writing greatest success as political activists — about groups or individuals with whom both of the mainstream and the left — they do not agree. Franca Iacovetta's came under two conditions: when they analysis of Cairine Wilson's political ca­ were either a) single, or b) independently reer displays an appreciation for the limits wealthy. Political activism for women has of Wilson's liberal political vision with­ been limited not only by the prejudices of out dismissing her outright. Frances those holding power in parties or move­ Swyripa's understanding of how deeply ments (that is, men). Politics is an over­ embedded the construction of mother­ whelmingly public activity — one which hood and the fate of the nation were in can produce severe anxiety among those right-wing Ukrainian ideology allows her unaccustomed to having their voices to examine women's involvement in na­ heard or opinions listened to. All women, tionalist political movements in a com­ regardless of political affiliation, experi­ plex manner. Yet feminists still have enced a degree of social or emotional tur­ something to learn about how to disagree moil as they entered public life. As Cal­ with each other. One wishes that more gary labour activist Amelia Turner re­ authors spent some time situating them­ membered her initial involvement, "it selves in terms of other political, histori­ was an ordeal to say present at a study cal or theoretical work on their topic, ei­ group." The biographical articles by ther nationally or internationally. It is cu­ Iacovetta and Trofunenkoff explore these rious that, for a book on politics, there is issues particularly well. remarkably little debate in these pages. The collection also includes some Does the election of one female na­ highly original (and long overdue) research tional party leader signify the sort of po­ on the political activities of women in ethnic litical revolution many of these activists communities. Two papers explore women's had in mind? Hardly. How many Canadi­ involvement on the left: Ruth Frager's ans are even aware that the first female finely drawn work on Toronto's Jewish provincial party leader was elected in housewives and Varpu Lindstrom-Best's 1931? (Casgrain). Yet, as this book demon­ overview of the ever feisty Finnish socialist strates, political involvement at many levels women, while Frances Swyripa takes a fas­ was sustained by lots of different women cinating look at how the right-wingUkrai ­ through the 'lean years' between periods of nian community constructed motherhood to widespread feminist agitation. That so little meet their own ends. This work helps cor­ has changed in mainstream political life after rect several long standing myths in Cana­ the past twenty years of feminism illustrates dian history. Not only does it show that the tenacity of the structures generations of politics — broadly defined — was not the women have fought to overturn. sole preserve of WASP women with a social conscience and plenty of time on then- Karen Dubinsky hands, it also displays the diversity of polit­ Queen's University REVIEWS 181

Allen OottfaeO, Les Juifs progressistes au Donna Mergler) et l'organisation com­ Québec (Montreal: Éditions par ailleurs munautaire (Nancy Neamtan). 1988). Gottheil a posé aux dix personnes choisies les mêmes questions qui mi ont ANCIEN CONSEILLER syndical à la CSN, été posées au fil des années sur la Allen Cottheil a rédigé Les Juifs pro­ définition de leur identité, l'existence gressistes au Québec d'abord pour d'un lien entre le judaïsme et rencontrer des personnes qui, comme lui, l'engagement social, Israel, le partagent sa situation de Juif progressiste nationalisme québécois et la manière dont intégré au milieu francophone et ensuite elles vivent leur intégration dans la pour faire connaître aux lecteurs société francophone. Il nous fournit les québécois cette portion méconnue de la éléments biographiques et des extraits communauté juive. d'entrevues qui nous permettent de suivre La tradition juive progressiste du le cheminement de ces personnes. Québec date du début du vingtième siècle Le milieu familial des témoins en­ lorsque des Juifs originaires d'Europe de courageait la curiosité intellectuelle et la l'Est ont fondé des syndicats dans la con­ discussion. Certains venaient de foyers où fection et mis sur pied divers organismes les idées progressistes étaient à progressistes dans leur communauté. Une l'honneur: les parents de Henry forte minorité, sinon la majorité des Morgentaler militaient au Bund (syndicat membres du Parti communiste du Québec juif d'Europe orientale) et Donna Mergler dans les années trente était juive tandis est la fille de l'avocat marxiste Bernard que le CCF, ancêtre du Nouveau parti Mergler. A l'école, ils étaient des élèves démocratique, attirait les Juifs sociaux- doués, mais souvent indisciplinés et cri­ démocrates. tiques à l'égard de l'enseignement qu'ils L'organisatrice syndicale Léa recevaient Roback, aujourd'hui âgée de 85 ans, est Dans la plupart des cas, la pratique du la seule représentante dans le livre de judaïsme à la maison était souple et cette tradition juive progressiste d'avant- chaleureuse. Dans les familles laïques, la guerre. Gottheil a choisi de ne décrire que célébration des fêtes comme la Pâque des personnes vivantes, ce qui favorise les mettait l'accent sur la résistance du peu­ générations de l'après-guerre. Bien que ple juif à l'oppression plutôt que sur l'âge des témoins s'échelonne entre 28 et l'intervention divine. Les témoins gar­ 85 ans, la majorité sont nés entre 1944 et dent des souvenirs positifs de leur 1951 et font partie de la génération qui a éducation juive et de leur participation à vécu le bouillonnement de la fin des des mouvements de jeunesse juifs, soit années soixante et du début des années d'orientation yiddishiste de gauche, soit soixante-dix. juive réformée. Ils en ont retenu que la L'itinéraire de ces cinq femmes et de judalcité est un mode de vie et une culture ces cinq hommes est varié et les a qui peut s'exprimer autrement que par la fréquemment menés à plus d'une lutte. religion et qu'elle est compatible avec Seul le docteur Henry Morgentaler est l'engagement politique. connu à l'échelle canadienne; les autres Le choix du milieu francophone pour sont connus dans des milieux particuliers les trois témoins nés à l'étranger (Amram comme le syndicalisme (Maurice Amram, est né au Maroc, Bernheim en Suisse et Léa Roback), le désarmement (Andrea Morgentaler en Pologne) s'est fait Levy), la défense des droits des locataires aisément car ils parlaient déjà le français (Arnold Bennett) et des droits des détenus à leur arrivée au Québec. Léa Roback a (Jean Claude Bernheim), la santé dans passé son enfance dans la petite ville can­ une perspective féministe (Donna adienne-française de Beauport. Quant aux Cherniak), l'amélioration des conditions cinq Juifs anglophones nés à Montréal (et de santé-sécurité au travail (Stan Gray, une en Ontario), ils ont amorcé leur prise 182 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

de conscience de la société francophone a Contrairement aux Juifs progressistes l'université en l'intéressant à des causes qui sont principalement engagés dans le où des francophones étaient susceptibles milieu juif, les témoins ne militent pas de participer et en étant influencés par dans des groupes pour la paix au Proche- l'effervescence nationaliste. Orient. Tous critiquent les politiques du Les témoins se sentent bien acceptés gouvernement israélien à l'égard des dans leur milieu et personne ne fait de cas Palestiniens, mais les opinions divergent de leur appartenance juive. Mais s'ils en­ sur Israel. Tandis que plusieurs tendent des remarques stéréotypées à pro­ s'identifient à l'état hébreu et admirent pos des Juifs, ils n'hésitent pas à les corri- certains aspects de la société israélienne, ger. Ils se trouvent donc à faire d'autres comme Gray et Mergler criti­ l'éducation des Québécois francophones quent sévèrement Israel qui n'occupe au­ sur les Juifs et celle des Juifs anglophones cune place spéciale dans leur vie. sur les Québécois francophones. Sans être une enquête sociologique, Si Gottheil avait posé aux témoins les les Juifs progressistes au Québec fournit mêmes questions sur leur identité juive et une réponse i ceux et celles qui se deman­ québécoise quinze ans plus tôt, les dent ce qui arrive aux militants réponses auraient été fort différentes. A aujourd'hui. Gottheil a privilégié des per­ l'instar de Donna Mergler, certains sonnes qui sont restées fidèles à leurs voulaient devenir "plus Québécois que idéaux fondamentaux de justice sociale. les Québécois." En niant leur apparten­ Nous ne sentons de la part des témoins ance anglophone qu'ils associaient à la aucun regret, ni cynisme, même si le con­ classe dominante, ils refoulaient du même tenu de leurs convictions a évolué et coup leur identité juive qu'ils ne pouvai­ qu'ils ont modifié certains modes ent dissocier de la première. Les militants d'action (par exemple, l'abandon des par­ marxistes avaient aussi minimisé leur tis marxistes). judaïcité parce que les partis d'extrême- Gottheil termine ce parcours en com­ gauche ne concédaient aucun rôle aux pagnie de ces Juifs progressistes en con­ identités ethniques et nationales. cluant que leur existence est un exemple Tous admirent la volonté des pour toutes les minorités. Il trace un Québécois francophones de promouvoir parallèle entre la condition de Juif et celle leur langue et leur culture, mais, en de progressiste car tous deux sont général, se sentent spectateurs dans le minoritaires et marginaux et résistent aux débat sur la question nationale. Ils pre'ssions vers l'assimilation et la préfèrent la politique municipale et les conformité. Gottheil admire leur choix de mouvements extraparlementaires à la lutter contre l'intolérance et l'oppression politique québécoise parce qu'ils trouv­ et il a rédigé son livre "avec un parti pris ent que celle-ci est monopolisée par la énergique à leur égard." question linguistique. Sauf Arnold Bennett et Maurice Marie Poirier Amram, aucun témoin n'a de contact avec Université du Québec à Montréal un organisme communautaire juif. Leur tra­ vail pour diverses causes de gauche, leur Nadia Fahmy-Eid et Lucie Piché, Si le appui au nationalisme québécois et, pour Travail m'était conté autrement..Les plusieurs, leur vie avec des conjoints Travailleuses de la CTCC-CSN: quelques québécois francophones les distingue et les fragments d'histoire (Montréal: CSN isole de la plupart des Juifs de Montréal et 1987). ne sont pas toujours compris par leur propre famille. Mais les témoins que ont des en­ fants se sont souvent rapprochés de leur L'HISTOIRB DU TRAVAIL des femmes au parenté juive afin que leurs enfants Québec.est faite d'exploitation, de discrimina­ tion, certes, mais aussi de luttes incessantes et apprennent davantage sur leur culture juive. REVIEWS 183 fortout d'une prise de conscience croiiiante lief la courbe montante de l'accès des des femmes à l'égard de lean droiti. Cet femmes au travail dans les décennies droits, elles les réclameront d'abord à leurs précédentes. Fidèle à sa propre logique employeurs ... Mais graduellement, elles se tourneront vers la société tout entière, pois temporelle, le livre ne discute pas la vers leurs propres syndicats, pour demander marginalisation renouvellée qu'a frappé des comptes. (13) les travailleuses suite à la crise économique des années 1980. Ni l'essor Les "quelques fragments d'histoire" du travail à temps partiel, ni la des travailleuses de laCTCC-CSN, 1921- précarisation des emplois autrefois 1976, interprétés par Nadia Fahmy-Eid et considérés secures, ni la renaissance du Lucie Piché dans leur petit livre Si le travail i domicile, ni tous les autres tristes travail m'était conté, tracent la trajectoire reculs qui servent aujourd'hui à expulser double du rapport femme-travail au les femmes du marché du travail de nou­ Québec depuis 1921. D'un côté il y a veau, ne sont discutés. Aussi bizarre qui l'ouverture lente du marché du travail aux ça puisse apparaître aujourd'hui, a la fin femmes. De l'autre il y a la féminisation des années 1980, le bilan de cette difficile du mouvement syndical lui- trajectoire reste positif. même. Les histoires parallèles de ces En contraste, le bilan offert de la deux processus, et leur interdépendance, féminisation du mouvement syndical est forment le sujet de ce livre. plus sombre, et pas mal amer. La première partie du livre, "le travail Le premier comité de la condition au féminin: une rétrospective," brosse le féminine fut créé par la CTCC en 1954, tableau de la marginalisation des non sans opposition. En 1966 il proposa travailleuses québécoises sur le marché sa propre dissolution, voulant ainsi aller du travail depuis le dix-neuvième siècle. au-delà de sa cantonnisation au sein des Si par marginalisation, nous entendons la instances de la CSN. En 1974, jugeant que discrimination matérielle (touchant les ce "pari sur l'égalité [ne fut qu]'une salaires, les conditions du travail et la leurre," un nouveau comité sur la condi­ sécurité d'emploi), la ghettoisation et la tion féminine fut créé, cette fois-ci dans trivialisation, les travailleuses une optique clairement féministe, et québécoises semblent avoir eues à con­ ouvertement liée au mouvement féministe fronter la discrimination cautionnée par québécois. Pourtant les auteures apport­ les institutions principales et la ent un bilan mitigé de son travail: marginalisation ancrée dans le discours dominant au moins jusqu'aux années Et dans l'état de comptes qu'elles dresseront 1950. au fil des ans — et surtout à partir du milieu des années soixante-dix dans les comités de la Chiffres et entrevues a l'appui, les condition féminine — les passifs se trouveront auteures démontrent la ténacité des écarts à peser bien plus lourd que les actifs. (13) salariaux discriminatoires, le danger que le mariage posa à la sécurité d'emploi Pourquoi? Comment expliquer ce (jusqu'au début des années 1960 une in­ sentiment d'échec? Le livre nous laisse stitutrice perdra son poste lorsqu'elle se sur notre appétit ici, attendant un bilan de mariera), et l'impact de la quasi- l'impact des comités sur l'accès des inaccessibilité de la formation pro­ femmes au travail, sur la pratique syn­ fessionnelle sur la gamme de professions dicale et sur les revendications syn­ accessibles aux femmes. Ce n'est pas dicales. Ou, pas entièrement sur nos avant le milieu des années 1950 que le appétits car il nous dresse un bilan positif marché du travail commença à s'ouvrir et impressionnant de la féminisation des aux femmes, au moins partiellement revendications syndicales lors des grâce à la syndicalisation des emplois dits négociations dans les secteurs public et féminins. privé. Revendications comme le droit au Arrêtant en 1976, ce livre met en re­ congé de maternité payé, le salaire de 184 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

100$ par semaine, etc. dards. Chapters are generally well organ­ Donc pourquoi l'amertume? Parce ized, although tome titles are misleading. que les pratiques syndicales chauvines Chapter nine, entitled "OF MINES AND sont tenances? Parce que les structures MINING MEN," deals primarily with the résistent toujours à la féminisation? Parce difficulties of getting mail delivered to qu'après quinze ans de travail au sein de the Lakehead from the United States in l'appareil syndical les militantes trouvent the early 1870s. Digressions which dis­ le syndicalisme toujours réfractaire et rig­ cuss the general history of the area are ide? ou parce qu'une définition usually informative, but sometimes de­ "opérationnelle" du syndicalisme au tract from the main theme of the book. féminin continue à échapper à ses The story of the mine itself is fasci­ adhérentes? Les auteures passent sous si­ nating. The vein was originally discov­ lence cette question clé. ered on 10 July 1868. Construction of Si le travail m'était conté...autrement facilities began in August 1869. In the est un livre simple, élégant, accessible, un winter of 1869-70 the construction crew bon outil pédagogique destiné aux cours was forced to develop cartridges that de formation syndicale et aux cours uni­ could be fired under water. They also versitaires. Malgré ces qualités il est aussi constructed long-handled shovels and un livre frustrant, car il soulève des ques­ tongs to reach through the ice and water. tions auxquelles il ne répond pas, des By 1870 the men were working 18 hours questions auxquelles une réponse a day to build a crib to act as a breakwater. adéquate aurait été envisageable. It was 460 feet long and 13 feet wide. A coffer dam was built inside the breakwa­ Caria Lipsig-Mummé ter with the help of 300 tons of clay Université Laval shipped from Detroit. It did not survive the severe fall storms, however, and had Elinor Barr, Silver Islet: Striking it Rich to be rebuilt in the winter of 1870-71. in Lake Superior (Toronto: Natural Heri­ Once a shaft had been sunk, it was not tage/Natural History Inc. 1988). easy to keep men employed in a mine which could easily be flooded by storm- SILVER ISLET IS LOCATED just off the tossed waves. In the fall of 1870 the su­ southern tip of Sibley Peninsula, which perintendent, William Bell Frue, brought separates Thunder Bay from Lake Supe­ over a group of Cornish 'drill and hammer rior. Roughly the size of a baseball sta­ men. ' That winter they went on strike, and dium, the island was the sight of one of had left by mid-February to work else­ the first, and certainly most unique, mines where. In the ensuing years many in Canadian history. Between 1871 and Conushmen left or went on strike after 1884, Silver Islet produced 2,589,134 one day on the job. Perhaps most interest­ ounces of silver, valued at $3,250,000. ing for labour historians is the fact that Rarely a paying proposition, but always Frue responded to the original strike by an adventure, the mine had a short but turning to mechanization. He spent spectacular life. $4,510 on a Burleigh drill and air com­ Silver Islet, by Thunder Bay historian pressor, thus reducing his dependence on Elinor Barr, is a lively, well researched, skilled labour. intriguing look at a neglected chapter in Barr has uncovered an excellent ex­ the history of northern Ontario's eco­ ample of a direct cause-and-effect rela­ nomic development The book is short, tionship between labour protest and tech­ but the 129 pages of pictures and text are nological innovation, but fails to do any­ carefully organized. The pictures are thing with it. On this question, and others, first-rate and the reproduction quite good. Silver Islet could have benefitted from Barr's writing style is clear and direct, if references to the work of Canadian labour somewhat anecdotal by academic stan­ historians. Bryan Palmer on labour and REVIEWS 185 capital in the 19th century, Ian McKay omy, and an intriguing tale of shrewd and Allen Seager on the mining industry, business practices combined with an ulti­ and Craig Heron on labour process, mately fatal optimism. among others, would have added a great When I talked to Elinor Barr in De­ deal to Barr's book. cember 1988 she was disturbed by what Silver Islet chronicles how a tiny is­ she considered the biases "academic" his­ land in northwestern Ontario attracted the torians often show toward "amateur" his­ attention of labour, capital, and govern­ torians. I suggested that local histories are ment on both the national and interna­ often unreliable, with lack of footnotes tional levels. The mine property itself be­ and no bibliography a major stumbling came the focus of jurisdictional disputes block for university-trained historians. between the federal government and the She was ahead of me, however, and provinces, and between Canada and the pointed out that Silver Islet contains very United States. Ore mined at Silver Islet good footnotes and a comparable bibliog­ was smelted in Swansea, Wales and New­ raphy. The author fought long and hard ark, New Jersey. Company directors were with her publisher to have them included, based in New York. Labour was recruited and it is to be hoped that more local his­ in Great Britain and Norway. Superinten­ torians will follow her example. Elinor dent William Frue invented a device Barr wants local historians and the history called the Frue Vanner, which separated of northern Ontario taken more seriously the silver from the ore. Granted a Cana­ by academic historians. More books like dian patent, Frue's device was employed Silver Islet will help her get her wish. in a number of countries, of note during the Alaska gold rush. Peter Campbell Silver Islet was a bonanza, but the Queen's University promoters, as well as the workers, took their share of risks. The original find ran Alvin FinkeL The Social Credit Phenom­ out, and by October 1876 the company's enon in Alberta (Toronto: University of books showed a deficit of $335,615. In Toronto Press 1989). the fall of 1876 the stamp mill shut down. In August 1878 a second bonanza was THE ORIGINS AND EARLY YEARS of the discovered, and the mine increased its Social Credit movement in Alberta was labour force to almost 200 men. By 1882, the object of a substantial scholarly effort however, conditions were very serious. In in the 1940s, most of which was published 1883 production dwindled to $2,010. In in the 1950s in the ten volumes of the 1884 the shaft, now some 1,250 feet deep, "Social Credit in Alberta" Series edited flooded right to the top. There was no loss by S.D. Clark. There has been little of of life, but shortly afterwards the mine comparable quality covering the later pe­ closed down. riod which ended with what can be seen Silver Islet is a book of interest to the as the final eclipse of Social Credit as a general reader, but is also of value to political force in Alberta. The author, Canadian labour and business historians. with access to substantial archive nnte- Barr has done a good job putting a face to rial including the Manning Papers, is now labour with very limited resources. There able to reconsider the significance of the was no union on the site, so records are whole phenomenon as well as provide a few and scattered. However, Barr does fairly detailed analysis of the later period convince us that this must have been an so far dealt with largely in journalistic extremely nerve-wracking place to work. accounts. He contends that the earlier For business historians there is a good studies, particularly C.B. Macpherson's deal more — portraits of the three super­ Democracy in Alberta, by concentrating intendents, the impact of American entre­ on social credit doctrine, seriously under­ preneurs on a very young hinterland econ­ rated the populist and radical elements of 186 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

the program and the extent of their sup­ isted even in pockets of the British Labour port within the movement by overstress- Party at that time. As Finkel puts it "In ing the petit bourgeoise nature of the practice, however, if the general member­ movement. Finally the author clearly ship of Social Credit were even aware that hopes that his work will contribute to Major Douglas's theory accorded them so what is now a continuing debate among minor a role, they ignored his teachings. scholars about the nature of populist Social Credit clubs, constituency associ­ movements. ations, and conventions all sought to in­ The book delineates clearly the Social fluence the details of government policy Credit Movement as it transformed itself and strayed well beyond monetary policy into a political party which in the end was in their search for solutions." (47) As the an elitist organization which reflected leadership of the party became more au­ nothing more than the right-wing moralist thoritarian under the influence of views of Ernest Manning. Perhaps the Douglasite doctrines, the popular base of author is right to call it a "phenomenon" the party declined. At its peak the party because, while it began as a populist could claim 41,000 members. This had movement, it moved rapidly to the radical declined to 24,000 at the time of the 1940 right and rarely displayed the normal election, and continued to decline steeply characteristics of a Canadian political as the composition and nature of the party party save for a stem and highly central­ altered. Finkel concludes: "The experi­ ized discipline. ence of Social Credit's first term in office Looking back on the 1930s one can demonstrates that, contrary to what ear­ see how Social Credit was able to move lier scholars of the party claimed. Alberta into a political vacuum created by the was bitterly class-divided and the Social tired regime of the United Farmers of Credit party attracted the support of the Alberta and the low esteem in which both have-nots and the bitter opposition of the Liberals and Conservatives were held in have. Only the authoritarian character of Alberta. Logically, the CCF should have the government itself eventually effected been the natural heirs of the UFA which a split among the have-nots, driving more had been present at its birth in Regina in left-leaning workers and farmers from its 1932. But the Alberta CCF was unable to ranks. It is not the case that most Al- disengage itself from its association with bertans who flocked to the Social Credit the UFA. While Aberhart had carefully cause accepted an authoritarian ideology screened Social Credit candidates to elim­ and an authoritarian leader. As the gov­ inate any who had previous connections ernment proved itself increasingly con­ with his discredited opponents, it is clear servative and closed to grass-roots criti­ that the rank-and-file of Social Credit cism, internal party critics became more grassroots organization were followers of vociferous, and by 1940 many had simply the old progressive tradition. Within five refused to participate within the Social years most of them had left the move­ Credit organization." (71-2) This devel­ ment. opment he has demonstrated convinc­ The first legislative program of the ingly. Much of it was of course visible to victorious Social Crediters was a rich those of us working on the Alberta studies amalgam of traditional populist nostrums, in the late 1940s, and he is less than just although the government's agenda was to these "earlier scholars." dominated by the problems of revenue The author's account of the gradual deficiency and relief of the urban and transformation of the party from its pop­ rural distressed. As far as the still eager ulist origins to a party with the rhetoric of militants at the grass roots of the party the radical right but one which had were concerned. Social Credit was the reached a comfortable accommodation centerpiece of an expansionist and redis- with the oil multinationals and the urban tributive policy not unlike that which ex­ middle class in Alberta whose well-being REVIEWS 187 became increasingly dependent on the en­ sensitive to inspired leaks out of the So­ ergy section is careful and persuasive. He cial Credit caucus which found their way shows how the party gradually ran out of into the local newspapers. Their response ideas and, after Manning, of leadership so was the introduction of the Accurate that it was comparatively easy for the News and Information bill in the autumn Conservatives under dynamic and imagi­ of 1936 which would have compelled native leadership to deprive it of rele­ newspapers to print the government's vance. His account will stand as the defin­ "correct" version of the news. It was also itive study of the rise and ultimate demise at that time that one journalist was sum­ of the party. moned to the bar of the House and con­ There are some episodes that he might victed of contempt charges. have noted. One of them surrounds the An illustration of the panic and hyste­ Recall Act of 1936, which illustrates not ria on the other side, which he might have only the political tension within the party mentioned, is the planned constitutional in the early years but also the extent to coup in 1938 which would have had the which the realities of power have a way lieutenant-governor dismiss the Aberhart of corroding the democratic elements of a Government, install a Liberal-Conserva­ populist ideology. The Act, which had tive Coalition and dissolve the Legisla­ been part of the Social Credit program in ture. This was promptly squelched by the 1935 election, had been introduced Mackenzie King when he got wind of it with some reluctance and seemed harm­ (See The King Diary for May 18.1938). less enough since it had provided that a It should also be noted that a few member must vacate his seat in the legis­ inaccuracies have crept into the author's lature if 65 per cent of the electors in his account He states (42) that three of the bills constituency presented a petition for his (die Credit of Alberta Regulation Act, the recall. This figure seemed high enough to Bank Employees Civil Rights Act, and the make the law almost inoperable. Never­ Judicature Act Amendment Act) were re­ theless Aberhart's electors in Okotoks- fused assent by the Lieutenant-Governor. High River (the seat which had been This was not what happened. He reserved opened for him in a by-election) were assent — as we now know on instructions sufficiently incensed at his lack of interest from Ottawa — so that the final decision in them that they amassed a petition with could be made by die Governor General in sufficient names for his recall. Then came Council. They were then referred to die a standoff. Although the Act had been Supreme Court, which held diem all to be hurriedly repealed, the dissident electors unconstitutional. were sufficiently alarmed lest the petition It is also an exaggeration to say that should fall into the hands of the party that Aberhart "co-operated" with the Federal they were reluctant to have it made pub­ Government in agreeing to the Unem­ lic. In the end the petition was ceremoni­ ployment Insurance Amendment of 1940. ally bumed on the grounds of the Legis­ When the Federal Government sought lature by the Clerk, who was the only provincial approval to proceed with the person whose neutrality could be trusted. amendment no reply was received from Nothing could be a better illustration of Alberta, which Ottawa deemed to signify Aberhart's imperious character or the consent. paranoia of the party leadership. Nevertheless the book is of substan­ Some of this is intelligible. At that tial value to scholars of Canadian politics, time Edmonton had attracted a high pro­ for it fills an important gap and does it portion of representatives of the metro­ well. It is also valuable in another respect politan Canadian and American press, His penultimate chapter is a significant who acted as if they were covering a rev­ contribution to the continuing debate olutionary challenge to the established about the nature of populism which does order. And the government was highly much to correct what seem to be fairly 188 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL common but dubious generalizations by 1827 and 1849 was that the plan reflected recent authors. For that reason alone it the priorities of the profession rather than deserves serious attention in the political those of the general community. He economy literature. shows that there was a lack of public confidence in regular physicians as well J.R. Mallory as a general opposition to public social McGill University welfare measures. Heather MacDougall narrates the way public health reformers Wendy Mitchinson and Janice Dickin persuaded governments to adopt the Brit­ McOinnis, Essays in the History of Cana­ ish "sanitary idea" in Toronto between dian Medicine (Toronto: McClelland and 1866 and 1890, and reveals the strong Stewart 1988). influence of the British public health movement on people in that city. Wendy THIS SHORT (218-page) book contains a Mitchinson focuses on the Toronto insane collection of original essays on a range of asylum in the mid-19th century. She be­ topics by seven quite well-known medical gins with a survey of the great historio­ historians. It provides an interesting graphies debate surrounding asylums. In spread of work typical of the past decade, a bid to reevaluate the issue, she chooses and since there is still not that large a body to focus on grounds for admission — who of good material in Canadian medical his­ were the insane, and what led to commit­ tory, such a collection is welcome. tal? She exposes the inadequacy of the For a long time, medical history fo­ cure/custody debate, and rightly shows cused on scientific developments, the that the social control analysis has been contribution of prominent physicians and overly-simplistic. Michael Bliss offers institutions, and on the evolution of the another shard from the splendid mirror on medical profession. In the past two de­ scientific research that he has fashioned cades, the social history of medicine from the insulin story. In discussing J.P. gained favour. Mitchinson and Dickin Collip's role in the discovery of insulin, McGinnis provide a fair-sized introduc­ he illustrates the well-known phenome­ tion outlining the merits of analyzing non of the struggle for credit in medical medical developments and professional research. But by now we have plenty on activities within the context of social con­ insulin. Janice Dickin McGinnis offers a ditions. They provide a good but short survey of treatment for VD between the review of recent historiography, though turn of the century and World War II. they name few historians except the au­ Though genuinely interesting, her de­ thors in the collection. The first essay, by scription of treatment contains some sig­ J.C. Robert, follows the strong French nificant inaccuracies which undermine Canadian tradition of demographic his­ the case she makes. (Treatment with tory with an analysis of mortality in Mon­ Salvarsan did not last as long as she says treal, 1821-1871. He finds that infant [132], and few people ever imagined that mortality was the major element in the syphilis and gonorrhea could be cured "by city's notoriously high death rate, while one shot" of penicillin [ 143].) Her sources immigration, industrialization, and other are largely Canadian medical journals and aspects of working-class life do not figure she has difficulty linking therapeutic ap­ much at all. The lack of reform he attri­ proaches with general medical practice in butes to public indifference, a conclusion Canada. Suzanne Buckley questions the that only begins to explore working-class long-established view that the decline of realities. There follow two pieces on the maternal mortality was simply the effect politics of public health. Kenneth Pryke of improvements in medical care. She ar­ reveals that the ultimate reason for the gues that the records of two Ottawa hos­ defeat of doctors' proposals for a general pitals between 1895 and 1939 suggest that hospital for the poor in Halifax between other things must be added to the expia- REVIEWS 189 nation, notably improvements in the stan­ ory. The effect of available sources there­ dard of living. fore deserves more discussion by all the The collection, however, has some authors. Given the importance of the na­ shortcomings. It is spotty, jumping from ture of records, it is regrettable that the one topic to another. Many ideas, prob­ editors did not also survey archival lems and topics are only alluded to, either sources alongside their bibliography of in the introduction or the individual es­ secondary sources. says. If the purpose of a collection is to Despite its shortcomings, this collec­ gather together something of note on a tion is useful and, given the quality of range of related issues within a general some of the papers, genuinely desirable. field, then it is not a good sign that in this We still lack a good survey of topics and collection much more is not pursued than methodologies. Such a book would be of is discussed. I had the feeling as I read it greatest use to students, and I imagine, of that I was simply holding an especially greater appeal to the interested public. large issue of a medical history journal. I am sorry that the editors did not arrange Jay Cassel to reprint some excellent essays that have York University appeared in the past decade and are cur­ rently scattered among various journals. Alain Pontaut, Santé et sécurité. Un bilan Article-length essays are generally du régime québécois de santé et sécurité closely focused in both time and place, so du travail, 1885-1985 (Montréal: Boréal it helps if the collection is large or the Express 198S). editors provide connecting commentary to help it all make a certain sense. The GRACE A CET OUVRAGE, Alain Pontaut introduction is clearly aimed at under­ rend accessible une tranche substantielle graduates, but the essays which follow are d'histoire sur un aspect crucial de la vie not enough on their own to serve as a des québécois(es): la santé et sécurité du guide to the field. Several of the authors travail (SST). La lecture est facile, have commented on occasion on the im­ témoignant ainsi d'un professionnel portance of addressing historiographies! chevronné de récriture, journaliste et au­ debates, but in this book most of them do teur de plusieurs livres, dont la biographie not discuss related work very much if at de René Lévesque (1983). Rien n'indique all. This shortcoming is all die more ob­ que M. Pontaut possède des connaissan­ vious from the long and admirable bibli­ ces approfondies en SST mais ses ography that concludes this volume. capacités d'assimilation et sa plume facile The focus of the essays remains sub­ a donné un livre qui mérite une diffusion stantially on the regular medical profes­ très large. sion. There is nothing on irregulars, and Les deux premiers chapitres décrivent little directly on the experience of pa­ les conditions inhumaines de travail tients. The editors note that "until re­ vécues par nos ancêtres au milieu de cently [patients] have remained faceless XKème siècle. Cette époque correspond and passive." (11) Little in this collection à la transformation d'une société agricole substantially alters that, except in stable en un ère industriel nouveau Mitchinson's essay. This shortcoming ap­ d'aliénation, de dépendance accrue et pears despite comments on the impor­ d'appauvrissement de la classe ouvrière. tance of patients' experiences made else­ Les caractéristiques du travail pendant where by several of the authors. Medical cette période choquent: imaginez des en­ historians often find that their sources do fants de 9 ans travaillant 12 heures par not allow for a detailed exploration of jour et six jours par semaine dans des experiences. Into this gap between evi­ conditions de salubrité indescriptibles, à dence and inquiry sometimes creep gen­ savoir le bruit, la cadence, la fatigue et les eralizations and assertions based on the­ risques extrêmes. C'est la propagation de 190 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL l'exploitation de l'homme par l'homme, factures, propose '12 ans comme mini­ des dominants assoiffés de pouvoir, de la mum d'ige, et 60 heures comme maxi­ recherche intense de profits, du mum de durée de travail par semaine pour capitalisme sauvage dénué de charité. enfants au-dessous de 15 ans.'" Afin de brosser une perspective de la sit­ M. Pontaut nous expose ensuite le uation du travail à cette époque, l'auteur débat sur la responsabilisation des acteurs propose quelques images des méfaits de en égard aux accidents du travail: qui est l'industrialisation sur la condition phy­ coupable? Le travailleur négligeant ou le sique des enfants québécois: patron insouciant? L'auteur nous rappelle qu'à l'époque, le seul recours d'un An Québec, où il paie le prix de la mutation accidenté pour obtenir justice était de industrielle, le récent prolétaire dei villes reçoit pour un travail souvent accablant un faire appel aux tribunaux, démarche qui salaire si insuffisant que, s'il est chef de exigeait une expertise juridique afin de famille, sa femme et ses enfants, même en bas prouver négligence, ce qu'il n'était fige, s'efforcent d'être embauchés aussi par la jamais en mesure de se payer. manufacture afin d'obtenir un salaire L'obligation pour les entreprises de d'appoint. s'assurer est alors envisagé. Mais cette initiative, pourtant souhaitable car elle Engagés presque par charité, ces enfants n'en sont pas moins privés d'hygiène et aurait soulagée les tribunaux, ne fait pas exposés à tous les risques, rivés à la produc­ l'unanimité et pour des raisons tion, exploités jusqu'à la limite de leurs forces, qu'expriment bien l'inspecteur Louis soumis aux amendes, retenues sur leur salaire Guyon en 1909: minuscule, aux châtiments corporels, et bien sûr détournés de la fréquentation scolaire. Protégés par une compagnie d'assurance con­ tre les accidents, bien des patrons et la plupart Pressés par un syndicalisme naissant, des grandes corporations ne s'occupent pas les gouvernements tentent d'établir un assez des accidents qui peuvent frapper les âge minimal et des heures maximales de ouvriers. travail face à un patronat dont l'appétit est Cette constatation qui date de 80 ans vorace et qui veut ralentir la tendance est encore vraie aujourd'hui car la inévitable vers un assainissement et une "mutualité" de l'assurance contre les per­ humanisation du milieu de travail. Un ex­ tes financières des entreprises n'est emple de l'avidité des employeurs est sûrement pas une incitation à dépenser exprimé admirablement par Fern and substantiellement en prévention: Morin et repris par l'auteur: l'employeur se protège contre le risque Les amendes imposées par un employeur du­ d'une perte monétaire mais une telle rant une semaine dépassent parfois le salaire sécurité financière n'assure pas la protec­ de la semaine entière. Le taux tion des salariés. d'analphabétisme est très élevé chez les Le chapitre H (1900-1931) nous en­ ouvriers. Les enfants, à partir de 8 ans, et les seigne avec maints détails que l'idée femmes, sont littéralement exploités. La d'une assurance a fait son chemin: en journée de travail est souvent de 12 à 14 1909, Québec adopte sa loi sur les heures. L'enfant désobéissant risque réparations un système "sans faute" et d'échouer dans le "trou noir," petit cachot se trouvant dans certaines usines. crée en 1931 un organisme administrateur du régime de réparation: la Commission En 1882, une commission fédérale des Accidents du Travail (CAT). D faut "...constata la présence d'enfants de huit féliciter l'auteur d'avoir relaté fidèlement et neuf ans travaillant de longues heures l'opposition féroce, souvent surprenante, dans des manufactures. Une loi fédérale de diverses sources envers un organisme présentée en 1883 sous forme d'un projet géré par l'état et financé par les pour définir certains délits commis contre emplyeurs. (43-4) Henri Bourassa, dans des personnes employées dans des manu­ Le Devoir évidemment, l'association des REVIEWS 191 couriers d'assurance et les médecins cri­ premiers ministres québécois successifs ent au "bolchévisme," à "un état dans un — pas moins de sept — sur la question de état," à "l'Italie fasciste" et à la "Russie l'administration du régime de SST. En soviétique." Et tout ça parce que le 1961, Jean Lesage demande à une firme gouvernement cherchait à faciliter l'accès de consultation privée d'examiner le pour les victimes à une indemnisation fonctionnement de la CAT et l'année dans le cas d'un accident de travail! suivante, un rapport révèle que cet or­ Bourassa allait aussi loin que d'affirmer ganisme est sclérosé et exige une que la réparation monétaire mènerait à revitalisation sérieuse, à savoir des des abus et faciliterait trop la vie des salariés plus compétents, de la formation ouvriers! Est-ce possible? Ce chapitre re­ interne élargie, une accélération du traite­ late aussi les efforts investis par le ment des dossiers et une restructuration gouvernement ontarien dans le domaine. organisatioimelle de fond en comble. Le chapitre m (1931-1952) fait état Les risques d'accidents n'ont de la consolidation du régime, plus toutefois pas disparu; d'ailleurs, particulièrement en ce qui concerne les l'épisode du stockage excessif de dyna­ améliorations de la protection. On réfère mite au fond de la mine Campbell- à la loi de 1931, ou comme on l'a de Chibougamau en Abitibi en 1960 illustre toujours désigné, le fameux "contrat so­ bien l'attitude intransigeante des en­ cial": la responsabilisation collective des treprises envers le droit des travailleurs à employeurs en échange de l'interdiction un environnement sécuritaire (66): cet en- de poursuites devant les tribunaux. Cette treprosage avait même obtenu "révolution des idées" est d'autant per­ l'approbation d'un inspecteur du tinente aujourd'hui puisque les "patrons" ministère des Mines — illégale selon le cherchent activement à faire participer les syndicat Evidemment, ces événements travailleurs au financement de la CSST; ont mené à une grève, à la présence de soulignons d'ailleurs que cet épisode de scabs et à des congédiements. Cependant, l'histoire est extrêmement bien décrit juste retour des choses, le conseil dans le volume. d'arbitrage donne raison aux prétentions La description de la mise sur pied syndicales et affirme: "il n'y a aucune loi d'une clinique de réhabilitation du Dr. au monde qui puisse obliger un ouvrier à Doriva Léonard, "avenue Laurier" pour exécuter un travail dans des conditions où les accidentés du travail est révélatrice de sa vie est sérieusement exposée, surtout si l'amélioration de notre système de SST. ces conditions sont la résultante de l'acte Née dans la controverse, cette clinique volontaire du patron." constitue tout de même la genèse de cen­ Dans les années 70, la rapport tres de physiothérapie et de réadaptation Castonguay-Nepveu, le comité Desprès et physique. le rapport Mineau continuent à faire pro­ Etrangement M. Pontaut ignore toute la gresser le dossier de la SST. On met en période de la seconde guerre mondiale place en 1972 une première version du (1939-1945), bien qu'il est du domaine système "mérite-démérite" qui instaure le connu que le nombre d'accidents du travail principe du calcul de la cotisation "trois ait grandement crû durant ces années à ans après la période i laquelle il cause du laxisme des inspecteurs, des ca­ s'applique afin de permettre un délai dences de production substantiellement suffisant pour obtenir des données signif­ intensifiées, des dangers accrus découlant icatives." Un tel système vise à inciter les de la fabrication et de la manutention employeurs à investir davantage en d'explosifs de toutes sortes, du manque de prévention en faisant correspondre du formation des ouvriers, ouvrières qui plus près leur niveau de cotisations à leur remplaçaient les hommes partis à la guerre. performance en SST. Au chapitre IV (1952-1976), l'auteur M. Pontaut insiste particulièrement, fait part en détails des préoccupations des et avec raison, sur le rapport Riverin 192 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

publié en 1975 car il est à l'origine de la reprendre le travail: ce dernier semble être modernisation de l'approche envers la retenu par la majorité. SST et son administration. Sur six pages, Le livre blanc de 1978 reçoit une l'auteur intègre les 35 recommandations grande attention de l'auteur: celui-ci du rapport qui reflètent bien les besoins accorde la priorité à la prévention dans le de changement de la CAT. Par contre, le cadre de la mission de la Commission; ce comité d'enquête sur l'industrie de n'est ni plus ni moins que le précurseur de l'amiante présidé par le juge René la future loi 17 — la loi sur la santé et la Beaudry en 1975 aurait mérité plus sécurité du travail. La position des parties qu'une simple mention. — médicale, patronale et syndicale — est Par ailleurs, il y a sûrement erreur en très bien rendue. Il devient évident que le page 81 et 82 lorsque l'auteur, décrivant contrôle de la réparation passe par la la naissance de l'OSHA aux Etats-Unis prévention. Ensuite, l'auteur analyse la traite de l'indemnisation: "avec in­ loi 17 en insistant sur les droits et obliga­ demnisation à 250 pour cent des gains tions des parties de façon extensive; hebdomadaires moyens des travailleurs." malgré le côté aride du sujet, ça coule très Il voulait probablement plutôt dire que les bien. gains maximaux assurables sont égaux à Au chapitre VI (1980-1985), la nou­ 250 pour cent du salaire moyen de velle CSST devient réalité et M. Pontaut l'industrie; par exemple, au Québec, le nous relate de façon privilégiée les débats maximum assurable est de $40,000, ce qui entourent les premiers balbutiements qui correspond à 150 pour cent du salaire de ce nouveau-né déjà gigantesque. Il tra­ moyen de l'industrie. ite plus particulièrement des problèmes Le chapitre V est capital puisqu'il financiers de la Commission suscités par décrit les réformes (1977-1980) qui trans­ la crise économique de 1981. figureront la CAT en une CSST rajeunie, Les principes de la responsabilisation dynamique, possédant des pouvoirs et des du milieu, du partenariat en prévention, mandats élargis. On confie la présidence de la co-administration de la CSST, de la à Robert Sauvé qui entreprend la difficile création d'institutions en prévention régionalisation des services, la diminu­ modernes — comités paritaires dans les tion des délais et l'établissement de la établissements, associations sectorielles crédibilité nécessaire au fonctionnement paritaires, représentants i la prévention et d'une Commission efficace. L'auteur création de l'IRSST — constituent les nous relate plus particulièrement défis de la fin du millénaire. Les autres l'altercation entre le juge Sauvé et le innovations du régime — retrait Ministre de la fonction publique (95-6) au préventif, réadaptation — sont également sujet de l'effet de cette décentralisation touchées. sur les employés de la Commission. La section sur le projet de loi 42 (qui Quelle délicieux clin-d'oeil! deviendra en 1985, la loi sur les accidents M. Pontaut nous fait également part du travail et les maladies pro­ des multiples amendements aux lois et fessionnelles) qui touche davantage le règlements régissant la Commission. Le volet réparation a droit à une excellente lecteur ressent la force du PDG Sauvé à description. L'auteur retrace la position veiller à ce que les réformes soient des parties patronales et syndicales, de la instaurées telles que prévues. Commission permanente du travail et du La controverse légendaire entourant ministre Frechette. La reproduction des l'article 38.4 de la loi sur les accidents du 22 points du régime d'indemnisation travail est aussi très bien traitée. Ce débat proposé ajoute une information es­ concerne la confrontation entre le sentielle à la compréhension du nouveau principe de l'indemnisation selon projet l'incapacité physiologique et celui de Enfin, l'épilogue "D'hier à demain" l'indemnisation selon l'incapacité à est, hélas, trop bref. REVIEWS 193

Par ailleurs, le lecteur a l'impression Malgré ces lacunes sur le plan de la qu'il existe une connivence entre l'auteur profondeur de l'analyse, l'ouvrage et la CSST car on ne trouve aucune cri­ d'Alain Pontaut est nécessaire à tous ceux tique envers cette dernière. Aussi, M. qui s'intéressent de près ou de loin à la Pontaut n'exprime pas sauf pour deux ou SST et à son évolution car, si on ignore le trois exceptions — ses propres jugements passé, on risque de le revivre! sur l'efficacité et le fonctionnement du système actuel. Bien qu'il faut Bernard Brody reconnaître effectivement un progrès de Université de Montréal la SST au Québec depuis le début de l'industrialisation et la place enviable A.B. McCullough, The Commercial Fish­ qu'occupe notre provice sur le plan mond­ ery of the Canadian Great Lakes (Ottawa: ial, il demeure néanmoins que le nombre, The Queen's Printer 1989). la gravité et le coût des accidents se sont accrus de façon phénoménale au pays. Il IN THE MID-1980t, Alan McCullough pro­ est évident que l'auteur est écrivain et non duced a thematic study for Parks Canada pas expert en matière de SST: il décrit titled "The Commercial Fisheries of the l'évolution du régime plutôt qu'il ne le Canadian Great Lakes". That study, ex­ critique. tensively revised, has now appeared in M. Pontaut a également omis le rôle book form under a slightly altered title. joué par Michel Chartrand dans la défense The book will break new ground. des accidentés et, plus généralement, dans McCuUough's comprehensive history of l'avancement de la pensée en SST: ce Ontario's commercial fishing industry is dernier rappelait à la population vers la the first ever produced. A historian with fin des années 70 qu'il y avait plus the Historical Research Branch of the Na­ d'inspecteurs pour sauvegarder la faune tional Historic Parks and Sites Director­ que pour protéger les travailleurs! ate, he tells a compelling story, although L'auteur tait également les efforts ex­ not entirely a happy one. Ontario's com­ ceptionnels d'Emile Boudreau des mercial fishermen faced recurrent prob­ Métallos à faire avancer la cause de la lems and crises, which were precipitated SST. Il n'y a pas de mention non plus des by but not limited to stock depletion, écrits du colloque de 1984 organisé par American control of the Canadian fisher­ l'université Laval: Régimes de santé et ies, low fish prices, fisheries mismanage­ sécurité et relations du travail, dont les ment resulting form divided actes devaient être disponibles au mo­ federal-provincial jurisdictions, internal ment de la rédaction de ce présent ouvr­ industry conflicts arising from fishing age. L'auteur ne mentionne pas notam­ gear disputes, and competing user group ment l'immense défi auquel fait face la conflicts. commission, celui de la reconnaissance Indian people, of course, were the des maladies professionnelles, first users of Ontario's fishery resource, particulièrement en ce qui concerne le initially for subsistence but later, during stress et le burnout. the fur trade era and beyond, for both Il est nécessaire aussi de souligner la subsistence and commerce. They were quasi-absence de références infra- therefore also Ontario's first "commer­ paginales (19,51.50,122,151.158,172) cial" fishermen, trading surplus fish with qui empêche le lecteur de vérifier les Hudson's Bay Company traders and later sources ou de poursuivre sa propre re­ with itinerant American fish merchants. cherche. Some Indian people became active play­ Il faut tout de même féliciter l'auteur ers in the developing non-Indian commer­ pour son choix très judicieux de citations, cial fisheries. Most did not, for economic multiples d'ailleurs, en particulier celles and political reasons. McCullough ac­ du PDG Robert Sauvé. knowledges and discusses both the sub- 194 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL sistence and commercial components of and 1930s, gillnet fishermen would fre­ the Indian fisheries, though not in great quently set their nets near poundnet leads detail. (which directed fish into the pound's crib User group conflicts emerged be­ area); the gilmets thus captured the fish tween commercial fishermen and Indian before they entered the crib. Poundnet people in the Lake Huron and Georgian fishermen launched vigorous protests Bay fisheries as early as the 1860s, and, against this action, but the gillnet fisher­ drawing from my own research between men justified it by claiming that they too commercial fishermen and recreational had the right to fish the inshore waters, fishermen, in a number of the provincial where the majority of fish were clustered fisheries by 1910. Today, Indian people during the spring and fall spawning runs. are struggling to repatriate their Aborigi­ The dispute caused much distress among nal and Treaty fishing rights, while com­ producers. The Ontario government fi­ mercial fishermen, not similarly covered nally intervened by enacting legislation by Treaties, battle well organized recrea­ which forced gillnet fishermen to set their tional fishermen for their entitled access nets further offshore. They were initially to the resource. McCullough discusses restricted to no less than 10 miles from the resource allocation question among shore. This was subsequently reduced to competing users in the second last chapter five miles and with the disappearance of of his book. He notes that while almost all poundnets by the late 1930s, the gillnet American Great Lakes fishermen have exclusion zone was rescinded. been legislated out of existence because Commercial fishing was then (and is of the economic strength of sport fishing, now) hard work but it was not, paradoxi­ their Canadian counterparts have not But cally, always very profitable. As McC­ this may be just a matter of time. ullough suggests, many Canadian fishing Ontario's commercial fishermen will tell operations (particularly on Lake Huron you that recreational fishing interests now and Georgian Bay, but also on Lake Erie) pose the single greatest threat to the sur­ were partially or wholly owned by Amer­ vival of their industry, with water quality ican fish buyers (buyers held the mort­ degradation a very close second. gages on many boats), or controlled by As many as 3,000 fishermen (the ma­ them through debt-obligation ties (or a jority small petty producers and their combination of both). They would ad­ crews) at one time lived in the isolated vance money to Canadian fishermen for coastal tier communities of the Great gear and twine in return for fish. Such ties Lakes to harvest their abundant fishery resulted in fishermen's perpetual indebt­ resource. McCullough devotes an entire edness to the fish buyers and effectively chapter to labour and working conditions, entrenched existing relations of unequal suggesting that many of the fisheries were exchange between them with catastrophic family-based, and two chapters to techno­ consequences for the resource. logical developments. He notes that fish­ McCullough does not suggest (at ermen first employed small sailing craft least not explicitly) that American control and later steam and diesel tugs, and that of Ontario's Great Lakes fisheries was they captured the resource with a variety of catalytic to their demise. But the data lend nets, including seines, trapnets, poundnets, support to this hypothesis. Directed and gillnets and bottom trawls. The trawls were controlled by large American corporate introduced to the fishery in 1960, and are fishing interests through debt-obligation now used almost exclusively in the com­ ties and low fish prices, Ontario fisher­ mercial smelt fisheries of Port Dover and men, the majority operating small-boat Wheatley, on Lake Erie. fisheries, were virtually powerless to reg­ This mix of fishing gear often created ulate the intensity of the harvest and lay conflicts among fishermen. McCullough claim to their industry. By 194S, the stur­ writes that on Lake Erie during the 1920s geon, herring, white fishan d pickerel fish- REVIEWS 195 cries had either been overfished, or worse, of the Great Lakes were obviously mis­ had collapsed. One may well ask two managed and unregulated under divided questions: Could this tragic outcome have jurisdictions (McCullough suggests that been averted had American interests not even under Ontario's management, they controlled and directed Canadian Great remained unregulated as late as 1950). Lakes fish production and the fish trade? Accordingly, the fisheries were viewed as A provincially managed marketing a "commons" free for the taking, resulting scheme had been proposed to the provin­ as it did in free-for-all fishing activities cial government by Commissioner Kelly largely orchestrated and driven by Amer­ Evans in 1911, as a solution to the Amer­ ican fishing interests. But then, this was ican "fish trust" problem, but it was never in some measure to be expected. Weak implemented. And, given the controlling and often contradictory legislation, inde­ role played by the American "fish trust", cisively enacted by the bordering Great can we in fairness continue to hold the Lakes states, meant that intensive un­ forefathers of Canadian commercial fish­ abated commercial fishing also reigned ermen directly accountable for having south of the border. Why would the fished the resource so intensively? Americans direct Canadian fishermen to Judging from McCullough's account, fish otherwise? it is clear that the Canadian Great Lakes The Commercial Fishery of the Cana­ fisheries were knowingly conceded to the dian Great Lakes is an outstanding and American "fish trust" by the federal and scholarly contribution to the social and provincial governments. As he suggests, economic history of Ontario. McC­ both governments apparently knew as ullough includes an extensive bibliogra­ early as the 1880s mat the Americans phy of sources cited (there is no index), were controlling the provincial fisheries. and has accompanied the text with maps, Ontario certainly knew by 1911, when line drawings and numerous photographs. Kelly Evans tabled a report that directed His writing style is refreshingly candid the Government of Ontario's attention to and jargon-free, which ostensibly this issue. But the problem was not ad­ strengthens his well-crafted and stimulat­ dressed politically because the two gov­ ing storyline. The Commercial Fishery of ernments were hopelessly deadlocked in the Canadian Great Lakes is sure to in­ a jurisdictional (or Constitutional) dis­ spire further research. It should be read. pute regarding their respective propri­ etary rights to the fisheries under the Brit­ John J. Van West ish North America Act, 1867, and follow­ Ontario Native Affairs Directorate ing the 1898 Privy Council fisheries judgment, which framed such rights re­ Louis Caron, La vie d'artiste. Le spectively for both governments, over the cinquantenaire de l'Union des Artistes responsibilities of the two jurisdictions (Montréal: Les Editions du Boréal 1987). regarding provincial fisheries manage­ ment and enforcement. The jurisdictional POUR CÉLÉBRER SES cinquante ans, issue was seemingly laid to rest by 1912 l'Union des Artistes faisait appel à (certainly by 1926), but not before many l'écrivain Louis Caron, auteur du célèbre of the provincial fisheries had been over­ roman Le Canard de bois. Le produit fished, some beyond recovery (such as, final, qualifié de "très beau livre" par le for example, the sturgeon fisheries of président de l'Union, a peut-être enchanté Lake Erie, the Rainy River and the Lake les membres, mais il laissera les of the Woods). McCullough traces the historiens sur leur faim. Le volume est history of this dispute, and provides a composé pour la moitié de photos balanced view of the issues and their im­ d'artistes et d'illustrations de spectacles, pact on fisheries management. fort bien choisis d'ailleurs. Le texte est un The Canadian commercial fisheries mélange de réflexions personnelles de 196 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL l'auteur sur l'artiste, de souvenirs sur sa bien rapidement sur cette question. découverte du monde du spectacle, de Peut-être en saurons-nous davantage références au contexte socio-politique et i l'occasion de son soixante-quinzième aux principaux épisodes de la vie anniversaire si l'UDA s'avise de faire artistique, et enfin d'observations sur appel à un "professionnel" de l'histoire. l'action du syndicat. Il n'y a finalement Sinon les grands débats qui ont animé le qu une trentaine de pages réservées à syndicat resteront dans l'oubli, sans l'histoire de l'Union des Artistes, placées pouvoir éclairer et inspirer ses membres à la fin de chacun des chapitres en encart et ses décideurs de demain. comme si c'était la portion la moins intéressante du volume. La division de Jacques Rouillard celui-ci en treize chapitres dans un ordre Université de Montréal chronologique n'a rien à voir avec les grandes étapes de la vie de l'UDA. André Beaucage, Syndicats, salaires et Et pourtant, l'auteur effleure des ques­ conjoncture économique, L'expérience tions qui auraient méritées d'être davantage des fronts communs du secteur public approfondies, dont celle d'un syndicat qui québécois de 1971 à 1983 (Sillery: regroupe des membres avec un statut les Presses de l'Université du Québec 1989). situant entre celui de salarié et d'entrepreneur indépendant. Ses LES NÉGOCIATIONS collectives dans les négociations avec les grandes entreprises de secteurs public et parapublic québécois communications ne M; ùciuulciiî pss sous l'emprise des lois fédérales ou provinciales dépenser beaucoup de salive. Que ce soit des relations de travail. C'est pourquoi de la plume de l'éditorialiste, des propos l'UDA qui regroupe comédiens, chanteurs du citoyen touché, de l'analyse uni­ et annonceurs, réclame depuis le début des versitaire aussi bien que du discours années 1980 une loi spéciale qui la politique, le nombre d'écrits et de com­ reconnaîtrait comme seule interlocutrice mentaires qui ont pu être faits sur ce sujet pour négocier avec les maisons de produc­ depuis les 25 dernières années pourraient tion. On fait valoir le statut professionnel de même être difficilement recensé. Est-il l'artiste, ce que finalement le gouvernement donc nécessaire ou utile d'avoir une autre du Québec leur reconnaîtra en décembre étude sur le sujet? Tout n'a-t-il pas été 1987. dit? Née en 1937 sous forme d'amicale, Malgré effectivement le nombre de l'UDA, qui s'appelait alors l'Union des publications dans le domaine, l'écrit de artistes lyriques et dramatiques, se joint la Beaucage, trouve sa place. Il analyse en même année à une union américaine, effet un aspect des négociations qui avait l'American Federation of Radio Artists. auparavant plutôt été ignoré à savoir Sa fondation est directement reliée à l'atteinte des objectifs syndicaux. Ainsi à l'avènement de la radio où beaucoup travers la description des événements des d'artistes trouvaient de l'emploi et son fronts communs de 71 à 83, l'auteur se expansion doit énormément à la livre à une évaluation de la réalisation de télévision. A la fin des années 1950, elle la politique salariale syndicale en la con­ quitte le syndicat américain pour s'affilier frontant aux transformations de la con­ directement au Congrès du travail du joncture économique durant cette Canada. Ce lien ne l'a pas empêché dans période. Pour atteindre son objectif, les années 1970 d'appuyer le Mouvement l'auteur nous fait part de sa démarche et Québec-Français et la souveraineté-asso­ nous livre ses résultats en 5 chapitres. ciation du Parti québécois. L'affiliation Le volume, qui est vraisemblable­ au CTC a provoqué un débat déchirant en ment le fruit d'une thèse de doctorat com­ 1962 alors que le conseil d'administration mence par une très brève présentation démissionnait en bloc. L'auteur passe globale des fronts communs ainsi que de REVIEWS 197

l'enjeu salarial. fronts communs les objectifs syndicaux Puis, sachant que l'évaluation du ont été relativement constants à savoir succès de la politique salariale des fronts une réduction des écarts, une garantie communs ne peut être réalisée en faisant d'enrichissement intégrant à la fois la abstraction du contexte, l'auteur débute hausse des prix et la croissance réelle de son deuxième chapitre par une descrip­ la richesse nationale ainsi qu'une volonté tion sommaire de la conjoncture de définir de façon autonome la politique économique dans laquelle se sont salariale syndicale du secteur public et déroulées les rondes de négociations d'influencer la structure salariale du reste étudiées. Cette conjoncture est vue par le de l'économie. Par ailleurs, s'il y a une biais de la valeur de la production globale constance, leur importance relative a intérieure du Québec, de l'indice des prix varié d'une ronde à l'autre. Par exemple, à la consommation de Montréal et de la l'ambition égalitaire s'est surtout situation du marché de la main-d'oeuvre manifestée en 71 et particulièrement en par le taux de chômage et la croissance de 75 comparativement à 82 où la volonté de l'emploi. L'évolution globale des remettre en question la structure salariale effectifs des secteurs public et parapublic a cédé le pas à la protection des gains des sert aussi d'indicateur supplémentaire. négociations antérieures. Quant à savoir On y constate que, d'une façon dans quelle mesure ces objectifs ont été générale, les négociations des trois pre­ réalisés, il faut attendre le chapitre 4 pour miers fronts communs ont été préparées y trouver une réponse. dans un contexte d'enrichissement C'est en effet dans ce chapitre que le économique moyen comparable à celui de chercheur s'hasarde à évaluer d'une façon 61-71 mais confrontées à une empirique les résultats obtenus. Cepend­ détérioration progressive et presque ant, il concentre son appréciation sur les soutenue du taux de chômage. Quant au deux premiers objectifs. Pour ce qui est quatrième front commun, c'est une con­ du troisième, il se borne à quelques obser­ joncture de crise économique mêlée à une vations générales reprenant essentielle­ très forte poussée inflationniste qui a ment d'autres travaux théoriques portant entouré la préparation des demandes syn­ sur la même problématique. Cette dicales. dernière partie est en fait la plus faible du Par la suite, le chapitre nous décrit volume. cette fois le contexte syndical. On y retro­ Selon les conclusions de l'auteur, les uve dans cette partie l'orientation deux premiers objectifs à savoir la idéologique des trois centrales en rapport réduction des écarts et l'enrichissement à leurs objectifs salariaux. Basé sur auraient été atteints. D'après les indices d'autres recherches, l'auteur nous fait utilisés, une réduction des écarts de IS à part de la radicalisation du discours 20 pour cent aurait été absorbée. idéologique. Toutefois, il n'est pas clair que cette C'est au troisième chapitre qu'on réduction ait été faite contre les objectifs entre au coeur de l'étude par l'analyse des gouvernementaux. Syndiqués et électeurs politiques salariales du Front commun se retrouvant plus nombreaux parmi les intersyndical. On y tente ici de dégager bas salariés, il est concevable qu'il y ait les points de convergence et de diver­ une certaine harmonie d'intérêt en dépit gence des politiques salariales syndicales des discours officiels. d'une ronde de négociation à l'autre. Pour ce qui est de la participation à Ce chapitre introduit d'abord une l'enrichissement collectif, il se dégage définition de la politique salariale syn­ des données fournies par l'auteur que la dicale en y distinguant les trois dimen­ croissance a été supérieure aux in­ sions suivantes: son objet, son contenu et dicateurs économiques choisis. Evidem­ sa signification. Il ressort, à la lecture du ment, en fonction de la conclusion chapitre, que tout au long des quatre antérieure, les gains sont supérieurs au 198 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

bas de l'échelle. création culturelle. Le Chapitre 2, intitulé Dans le dernier chapitre, l'auteur "Itinéraire," exprime de façon claire et résume les observations faites mais tout succincte le contexte historique global en concluant au bien-fondé de remettre en dans lequel ce virage s'est effectué. question les déterminismes économiques Les Chapitres S (Mouvement pop­ souvent proposés comme force ulaire et action politique) et 6 (Mouve­ prépondérante en relations industrielles. ment populaire et État) sont des résumés Somme toute, le volume présenté est de travaux antérieurs de l'auteur ou intéressant et permet d'apporter un d'autres chercheurs oeuvrant dans le éclairage additionnel à l'expérience même domaine. Le premier esquisse un québécoise de négociation dans les portrait très rapide des principaux secteurs public et parapublic. Même s'il groupes politiques progressistes nés sur la est basé sur une recherche académique, la scène politique montréalaise depuis vingt lecture en reste très facile. Pour ceux qui ans: Front d'action politique (FRAP) de s'intéressent à la problématique discuté, 1968 à 73, groupes marxistes-léninistes c'est un livre à ajouter à la collection. de 1975 à 1982, Rassemblement des citoyens et citoyennes de Montréal à Maurice Lemelin partir de 1980. Le second est une illustra­ Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales tion bien courte, à partir de l'expérience des Centres locaux de services com­ Louis Favreau, Mouvement populaire et munautaires (CLSC), des rapports con­ intervention communautaire de I960 à flictuels entre l'État et le secteur com­ nos jours. Continuités et ruptures munautaire. Ces deux chapitres s'insèrent (Montréal: Le Centre de formation pop­ assez mal dans l'ensemble de l'ouvrage: ulaire. Les Editions du Fleuve 1989). ils auraient pu constituer des articles publiés séparément. "ORGANISATEUR COMMUNAUTAIRE Le Chapitre 7 (A l'aube des années socialement engagé depuis vingt ans dans 1990) présente à la fois une excellente des quartiers populaires de Montréal," synthèse des travaux de l'auteur sur le Louis Favreau est maintenent professeur mouvement populaire québécois, et une en travail social à l'Université du Québec réflextion sur le sens que cherchent à lui à Hull. Dans ce volume, il essaie d'élargir donner différentes théories des vers une réflexion globale sur le mouve­ mouvements sociaux: courant "culturel" ment populaire et communautaire de Gagnon et Rioux (A propos québécois les résultats d'une recherche d'autogestion et d'émancipation. Institut sur les corporations de développement québécois de recherche sur la culture, économique communautaire (CDEC) de 1988), courant "économico-politique" de trois quartiers populaires défavorisés de Hamel et Léonard (Les organisations Montréal: Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, Cen­ populaires, l'État et la démocratie. Ed. tre-sud et La Petite Patrie. St-Martin, 1981), courant "institutionnel" Effectuée à partir d'entrevues et de Godbout (La démocratie des usagers, d'observation participante, l'étude des Boréal, 1987), démarche trois CDEC et de leur environnement historiographique de Lévesque et local est originale et bien menée, même si Bélanger (Animation et culture en mouve­ elle n'occupe qu'environ un tiers d'un ment, PUQ, 1987). Prenant la suite des volume de trois cent pages. On y voit très travaux de ces derniers auteurs, Favreau bien comment la crise du début des conclut à la fois (2S2-4) sur le repli années 1980 a incité le mouvement com­ idéologique et politique simultané du syn­ munautaire à concentrer davantage vers dicalisme et du mouvement populaire les services immédiats et l'économie des québécois et, paradoxalement, sur leur activités consacrées plutôt jusqu'alors au capacité de rebondissement face aux nou- militantiste, à la solidarité sociale ou à la veaux défis que constitutent les REVIEWS 199 problèmes de l'emploi et du particulières au chercheur en quête de développement local. documents. La plupart du temps ces or­ En fin de volume (Chapitre 8 Pistes et ganisations laissent peu de traces. Nées perspectives), le militant ne peut dans des conjonctures spécifiques pour s'empêcher de dépasser les conclusions répondre à un besoin momentané, elles plus interrogatives du sociologue pour es­ ont, règle générale, un rayon d'influence quisser une "stratégie renouvelée de (géographique et sociale) peu étendu, transformation sociale" fondée sur elles font preuve d'une faible longévité, l'autonomie et l'autogestion des elles sont souvent isolées les unes des travailleurs, des usagers et des autres et finalement, le besoin satisfait, collectivités territoriales. leur disparition se fait la plupart du temps Tout compte fait, ce volume se dans l'indifférence. présente plus comme un recueil d'articles Dans ce contexte, l'ouvrage de Rob­ que comme une monographie détaiUée ou ert Boivin sur la Clinique des citoyens de une synthèse globale. Il constitue cepend­ Saint-Jacques est un apport très précieux. ant une excellente introduction à Cette monographie, au demeurant fort l'histoire, a la morphologie et à bien écrite, nous fait entrer dans l'intimité l'idéologie de la branche montréalaise du de l'histoire d'un organisme com­ mouvement communautaire québécois, munautaire montréalais qui fut longtemps où l'implication du militant donne vie et considéré comme un modèle pour clarté supplémentaires aux analyses du plusieurs intervenants. Fait exceptionnel, sociologue. la Clinique fut aussi un des rares or­ ganismes populaires dont l'activité se soit Gabriel Gagnon étendue sur plus de quinze ans. Université de Montréal Robert Boivin a choisi pour l'essentiel de respecter la chronologie des Robert Boivin, Histoire de la Clinique événements. Après une très brève des citoyens de Saint-Jacques (1968- "parenthèse sur les années 1960," 1988). Des comités de citoyens au CLSC l'ouvrage se compose de cinq chapitres du plateau Mont-Royal (Montréal: VLB substanciels qui sont autant de tranches éditeur 1988). de l'histoire de la Clinique des citoyens de Saint-Jacques. Ainsi les premiers pas LES MOUVEMENTS sociaux et les or­ de la Clinique, la phase des pionniers ganisations communautaires en milieu (1968-1969 et une partie de l'année 1970) urbain, au 20ième siècle, à Montréal et au est l'objet du chapitre 3. Au cours de cette Québec en général, n'ont pas été souvent première étape, la seule où la Clinique analysés. Il existe, bien sûr, quelques loge dans le quartier dont elle porte le études d'ensemble qui, dans le cas de nom, le Comité des citoyens de Saint- Montréal, ont porté principalement sur les Jacques, de groupe de pression qu'il était mouvements de réforme urbaine des à l'origine, se transforme pour l'essentiel années 1910, d'une part, etsur les comités de ses activités en groupe de service. de citoyens et organismes populaires du Dans ce passage du statut de comité de bas de la ville dans les années 1960 et citoyen à celui d'organisme populaire, 1970, d'autre part. Mais faute d'une passage qui caractérise, à l'époque, compréhension des dynamiques locales, l'ensemble du mouvement populaire que seules des monographies fouillées montréalais, on tente de concrétiser d'expériences typiques peuvent nous l'exercice d'un pouvoir populaire en de­ apporter, l'on s'en tient le plus souvent à hors des sentiers battus et surtout en de­ une vue aérienne de ces mouvements, de hors de l'État, ou plus précisément leur importance et de leur influence rela­ parallèlement à l'État. Les premières tive. Il faut reconnaître que l'étude de ces années de la Clinique sont marquées par organisations pose des difficultés une "approche humanisante" de la pra- 200 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

tique médicale (qui n'est pas sans des structures de participation très au­ rappeler celle du médicin de campagne, dacieuses, différentes formes souligne R. Boivin) jumelée à une volonté d'intervention médicale sont ferme de déprofessionnalisation de la expérimentées, la clientèle visée des pe­ médecine. Comme dans les autres tits travailleurs est rejointe. (161) cliniques de santé "populaires ou com­ Néanmoins, cette clientèle plus munautaires,*' il en résulte quelques inno­ nombreuse et plus diversifiée ne participe vations reprises au milieu des années pas aux structures décisionnelles qui sont 1970 par les Centres locaux de services dans les faits monopolisées par les mili­ communautaires (CLSC). tants politiques de l'une ou l'autre ten­ Dans les années 1970-1974 (chapitre dance m.-l. La Clinique se vide pro­ 4), la Clinique veut rompre avec gressivement de ses ouvriers et de ses l'animation sociale caractéristique de ses ménagères bénévoles et, choisissant ses premières années. "Elle n'est plus seule­ relations selon des critères idéologiques, ment une clinique pour soigner les se met en marge du réseau com­ pauvres. Elle devient un corps militant," munautaire du quartier. (139) (61) elle se présente "comme un or­ Au début des années 1980 (chapitre ganisme politique offrant des services 6) lorsque les difficultés du financement médicaux." (94) L'implication très forte vont croissantes, sans véritable force de dans l'expérience du Front d'Action mobilisation, c'est par la pro- Politique (FRAP) en 1970 inaugure une fessionnalisation des opérations que l'on décennie au cours de laquelle l'activité cherche à sauvegarder l'autonomie de la médicale est subordonnée à l'action Clinique. "L'illusion égalitariste" (208) politique. Cette montée du politique, qui prévalait depuis les débuts de la jusqu'à l'adhésion aux positions des Clinique est abandonnée. Le bénévolat marxistes-léninistes, coïncide avec la cède graduellement la place au travail constitution d'une équipe de permanents, rémunéré. La place des professionnels de autour de laquelle dorénavant tout grav­ la santé s'accroît à mesure que les ser­ ite, (102) d'une part, et avec la vices se diversifient. En fait ce sont les redéfinition et l'augmentation sub­ premiers pas de l'intégration au "Réseau" stantielle de la clientèle, d'autre part. En public des affaires sociales du Québec qui effet, à la faveur de deux déménagements, sont ainsi franchis. Au cours des quatre la Clinique "choisit de délaisser les années que durent les négociations avec assistés sociaux (du quartier Saint- le gouvernement du Québec (1982-1986, Jacques) au profit des petits travailleurs chapitre 7), la Clinique n'a en aucun (du Plateau-Mont-Royal." (119) temps l'initiative. D'ailleurs, il est Au milieu des années 1970 (chapitre vraisemblablement plus approprié de S), la Clinique des citoyens de Saint- parler de désintégration de la Clinique des Jacques doit relever deux nouveaux défis: citoyens de Saint-Jacques que de son la réforme des services de santé et des intégration dans le CLSC du Plateau- services sociaux au Québec et la corro­ Mont-Royal. sion du marxisme-léninisme. Au premier, Malgré cette fin peu glorieuse, ainsi elle répond par la réorganisation en pro­ que le fait bien valoir R. Boivin dans son fondeur de ses structures internes et de ses chapitre de conclusion, l'histoire de la activités. La pièce maîtresse de cette lutte Clinique des citoyens de Saint-Jacques a pour protéger à tout prix toute son au­ un sens qui ne doit pas être minimisé. "En tonomie face à l'État est l'adoption d'une 17 ans d'existence, écrit-il, la Clinique nouvelle culture organisationnelle faite Saint-Jacques a soigné quelques 25 000 de cogestion avec balance du pouvoir aux patients. Selon les années, elle a mobilisé usagers. Sur ce terrain, comme le de façon soutenue entre 50 et 150 per­ démontre R. Boivin, "la Clinique connaît sonnes (et même parfois davantage) qui, un certain nombre de succès: elle possède les une à titre de bénévoles, les autres REVIEWS 201 comme employés, se sont dévouées à la l'illusion égalitariste de ses débuts. faire fonctionner. Cela fait, en définitive, Globalement, il faut cependant beaucoup de monde, surtout si on souligner la grande qualité de cette considère que la Clinique était un or­ monograhie dans laquelle Robert Boivin, ganisme de quartier opérant avec des par son souci constant de situer les moyens de fortune." (239) Surtout, au- événements propres à la Clinique dans delà de toutes les statistiques qui pourrai­ leur contexte plus large, dépasse ent être alignées, cette clinique aura été résolument la simple description pour al­ une expérience de médecine populaire hors imenter une analyse de l'histoire de du commun. Elle a d'autre part été "un l'ensemble du mouvement populaire à couloir où a circulé un ensemble de courants Montréal. Cette "Histoire de la Clinique alternatifs des années 1960-1970: des citoyens de Saint-Jacques" est à lire l'animation sociale, la social-démocratie par tous ceux qui s'intéressent aux formes radicale du F.R.A.P., le féminisme, le les plus diverses du mouvement ouvrier et marxisme-léninisme." (250) du pouvoir populaire. Mais la principale faiblesse de cette expérience aura justement été de carburer Jean-Pierre Collin à l'idéologie, selon l'expression de INRS Urbanisation l'auteur. A ce propos, il me semble que, pour répondre à la question posée en con­ Keith Dix, What's a Coal Miner to Do? clusion ("L'histoire de la Clinique Saint- The Mechanization of Coal Mining (Pitts­ Jacques a-t-elle un sens?), ce dernier au­ burgh: University of Pittsburgh Press rait été avisé de comparer plus 1988). systématiquement l'histoire de la Clinique avec celles d'organisations com­ HISTORIANS OF MINERS and mining com­ parables. R. Boivin le note au passage munities make difficult choices between (33-5): la fondation de la Clinique Saint- particularism and généralisai, between Jacques s'inscrit dans un mouvement plus emphasizing what is exceptional about large, celui des "free clinics" qui ont the coal miners and stressing the links proliférées dans l'ensemble de between miners and other workers. Take, l'Amérique du Nord à la fin des années for instance, the coal miners' notorious 1960. Il aurait été nécessaire, me semble- political radicalism. Over-emphasizing t-il, de revenir sur cette parenté pour in­ the particular problems that push miners diquer ce qui dans l'histoire de la clinique towards socialism can make their political du quartier du Plateau-Mont-Royal choices seem so eccentric and deviant as n'aura été que la reproduction de ce qui to be of very limited interest to the world s'est passé un peu partout dans les gran­ outside the mining camps and coal towns. des villes américaines et ce qui fut, peut- Yet under-emphasizing what it was about être, tout à fait ou en grande partie origi­ mining that predisposed many people to nal. Surtout, plus près de nous, une com­ socialism can mean that we lose the spe­ paraison plus systématique avec le sens cific texture, and the utter centrality, of de l'histoire de la Clinique com­ the miners in our history. One notices, for munautaire de Pointe-Saint-Charles instance, the ease with which the miner (quartier populaire du sud-ouest has been assimilated into the ranks of the montréalais), pour laquelle une documen­ "artisan" and the "skilled worker," cer­ tation assez fournie existe, aurait dû tainly a useful move in the difficult strug­ s'imposer. Cette dernière, contrairement gle to sustain the Thompsonian thesis that à la Clinique Saint-Jacques, a su se tailler 19th-century "skilled workers" in Canada un statut particulier (que le gouvernement constituted some sort of "vanguard" lead­ québécois continue à lui reconnaître en­ ing the other non-capitalist classes to­ core aujourd'hui) et surtout elle a su gar­ wards radicalism. Yet this is an der vivante, en partie tout au moins, essentialist and reductionist move which 202 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL privileges one aspect only of an infinitely earlier work he refers, for example, to the more complex situation — no less so, "hand-loading era.") Apart from the re- indeed, than the "isolated mass" stereo­ ductionism implicit in this, one can fault type of the 1950s and the "race apart" it on empirical grounds: Dix's own very imagery of the 1920s. Inscribing the min­ useful tables suggest that the percentage ers within the grids founded on those du­ of mechanically undercut underground alisms labour historians tend to find so coal rose from 24.9 in 1900 to 32.8 in tidy and so seductive (eg., "work­ 190S and to 553 in 1915. Yet even by shop/factory," "artisan/industrial 1940, only 35.4 per cent of underground worker," "formal control/real control" coal was mechanically loaded. (217) Un­ etc.) sometimes has seemed to suggest a less we implausibly minimize the impor­ rich multiplicity of parallels and diver­ tance of coal-cutting machinery, the com­ gences, but it has often seemed like the plete overhaul of haulage and hoisting, scholarly equivalent of strip mining — a the dramatic intensification of surveil­ method which violently reduces the com­ lance within the mines, and so on, we plexity of landscape to the gaunt simplic­ have to treat with considerable caution an ity of its mineral essence. approach that would make the transfor­ In What's a Coal Miner to Do? The mation of hand-loading the major key to Mechanization of Coal Mining, Keith Dix technological change. makes a choice for a particularist interpre­ The first four chapters of this book do tation of coal-mining technology. (Dix not really succeed in making sense of a will be known to coal-mining historians sea of technological detail. Materials for his 1977 monograph Work Relations from the earlier monograph are lumped in in the Coal Industry: The Hand-Loading with loosely-edited interviews and Era, 1880-1930.) Not many non-mining overly-long sketches of entrepreneurs, historians are going to read or be influ­ companies and mining machines (there is enced by this book, for it is an unrelent­ one entire chapter devoted to the Joy ingly detailed examination of the micro- Loading Machine). Coal-mining histori­ politics of technological change in the ans will find some very good material American coal industry. The scope of the here — Dix's microscopic analysis of the work is further limited by Dix's use of the costs of production of the Greenbrier Coal work technology to denote "a mechanical Company in West Virginia could provide process, simple in design and function, material for some very interesting com­ which was developed for the purpose of parative work on labour costs and the eliminating the hand loading of coal." financial returns from company stores — (vii) Dix has things to say to the wide but I suspect other labour historians will world of labour scholarship, but he is simply give up: the focus is simply too mainly addressing very particular issues particular and the arguments too narrowly in coal-mining history. pitched. This is in some ways a puzzling book. And that would be a pity, because It continues the argument Dix made in Chapters Five to Eleven are of much more 1977: that the key to much of the coal general interest Dix eases up on his idée miners' history lies in loading technol­ fixe about loading technology and starts ogy. He makes a valid observation — to explore the intricate story of rank-and- loading did represent a big technological file resistance to, and trade-union collab­ bottleneck in coal mining, in Canada as in oration with, corporate designs for the the United States, and overcoming this Brave New World of Coal Mining. bottleneck was an important consider­ Dix makes a particularly valuable ation for capitalists and their mining en­ contribution to our growing knowledge of gineers — but he then tries to make this the dynamics of industrial legality, that the essence, the key periodizing principle, heaven housing at least three great man­ of coal-mining history. (Here and in his sions (formalization, institutionalization, REVIEWS 203 and legalism) whose analysis is surely the that had completed, in three short de­ key problem of students of the 20th-cen­ cades, the transition from the enthusiastic tury working class. Dix brings out the rhetoric of the sect to the infinite casuistry irrational, religious element in the United of a state church. Carter Goodrich's hope Mine Workers' approach to the contract that the "Miners' Freedom" mightprosper — the deep appeal to old ideas of chivalry under mechanization proved illusory. and romance that we hear echoing in a We have heard this story before — in statement from an employer/union con­ biographies of John L. Lewis, from Good­ ference in 1902: "We recognize the sa- rich himself — but never told with quite credness and binding nature of contracts this emphasis on the losses sustained by and agreements thus entered into, and are the rank-and-file, and never told so suc­ pledged in honor to keep inviolate such cinctly and with such compelling detail. contracts....,'' and the almost millenarian Dix characteristically sticks with the em­ intensity of John Mitchell's discussion of pirical detail; he does not press the history the contract in the same year: "They may he records for its wider significance. His destroy our union but they cannot make book is detailed, his prose sinewy, his us violate our contracts." (119) arguments always precisely focused on By 1920 the UMW's governing phi­ coal. His is the archetypal particularist losophy had become one that anticipated monograph, whose general arguments for Thatcherism in spirit and in detail. The other labour scholars are left unexplored. union embraced mechanization. Penalty Put in a more general framework, the clauses in post-1917 agreements stated UMW's formula of formalization, institu­ that any union officer or member who tionalization, and legalism can be seen as caused a mine to be shut down over any a fundamental force in North American dispute "shall have deducted from his trade union history, as the refashioning of earnings the sum of One Dollar ($1.00) Gompersism in the age of monopoly cap­ per day for each day or party of a day they ital. And it was a formula that worked. remain idle." (129) Left programs for na­ Emerging from the coalfields, and so tionalization were sidelined and forgotten often spread by a coal mining leadership as the union embraced a strategy of capi­ (from John L. Lewis to Silby Barrett), talist "rationalization" — what Dix use­ industrial legality provided the decisive fully calls a "Darwinian" strategy of in­ formula for the historic compromise of dustrial restructuring. (147) Asked for his capital and labour in the post-war period. prescription for the industry, Ellis We have here a particular study whose Searles, editor of the UMWA Journal, general significance to the field as a said in May 1923: "Shut down 4,000 coal whole should not be overlooked. mines, force 200,000 miners into other industries, and the coal problem will set­ Ian McKay tle itself. The public will then be assured Queen's University of an adequate supply of low-priced fuel." (160) At the core of this proletarian Builder Levy, Images of Appalachian Thatcherism was a strategy of both insti­ Coalfields (Philadelphia: Temple Univer­ tutional stabilization (with an entrenched sity Press 1989). union bureaucracy, contracts of much longer duration, and — after laissez-faire PHOTOGRAPHS OF MINING communities do proved a disaster — increasing state inter­ not make for your usual coffee-table pic­ vention) and active support for mechani­ ture books. These photographs, all in zation. By the late 1930s the machines hard-as-coal black and white, depict life came to the mines, and the miners' mili­ in some of the most impoverished of the tancy, tempered by hard times, was im­ working poor towns in North America mobilized by a centralized union and the today. At the same time, these photos also hegemony of a contractualist theology demonstrate the sustained struggles 204 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

which characterize these people's lives, within the dominant discourse. and the continuing vitality of what might Two things, however, strike me as on the surface appear to be a dead com­ problematical. The first concerns the me­ munity. While I would wish to duck the dium of black and white photography as problematics of "one picture is worth a it is used in this context. These are starkly thousand words," this collection is a re­ beautiful photographs, and the format markable portrait of people and places too heightens the bleakness and austerity of easily ignored. Yet, as I will discuss Appalachia. There seems to be a tension below, their presentation and the accom­ between the beauty of the photographs panying text undermine much of that and the ugly reality we know is there; achievement there are some striking, even pretty piles Builder Levy is a New York high of sludge here. Conversely, black and school teacher and a documentary pho­ white also adds an otherworldliness to tographer in his spare time. Between 1970 what we see, perhaps too much so. There and 1984 he spent his summers photo­ is something of an unabridged ethno­ graphing the people and places that make graphic distance between the photogra­ up the Appalachian coalfields of the pher and the subject, one reinforced by United States. There is much to admire in the surrealism of black and white. These Levy's work. On the whole, these are people, the subjects, become of another impressive photographs, both technically world, of another time and place. Para­ and aesthetically. And, it seems evident doxically, then, it seems that black and that his heart is very much in these works. white may heighten the impact of the pho­ There are about one hundred photos, all tos, but reduce their effect by creating a black and white, and reproduced very greater distance between the image and well on high quality paper. A great deal the viewer's understanding of reality. can be learned from these photos. They The second problem is with the cap­ reveal much of the technical side of min­ tions below the photos, and is a related ing, the skills required and the contrasts problem of interpretation. There is, in of heavy machinery and pick and shovel general, an entirely uncritical presenta­ work, as well as the omnipresent black­ tion of this work. The photos, and here ness and the claustrophobic space of the more centrally the captions, move along mine. Levy also takes us outside the mine with an unproblematical objectivity, of into the homes and the communities truth and finality. Many of the captions which have survived the industry's post­ are useful, but too often there is a discon­ war decline. Most of the communities certingly tenuous link between the photo consist of badly run-down buildings, and the description. Yet the caption tells once company houses, blackened with us what we are seeing, and in large part coal dust and decaying, but punctuated by what we should think about these repre­ attempts at improvement and great evi­ sentations. The photos are already dence of pride. Photographs of union framed, printed and selected to present a meetings and Black Lung Association ral­ particular view of some reality. Then lies clearly point to the male-centred someone (else?) gives it the final author­ world of institutional life in coal towns. ity of words. Some of these messages But Levy also records the equally central achieve an amazing level of banality and place of the household, and the increased political naivety. The caption below one employment of women in the mines. We portrait-like photo of a coal-blackened get brief glimpses "inside" Appalachian young miner tells us: "Today's miner is working-class life, of social affairs at the more safety conscious, better educated, tavern, and the union picnic. And we get and better paid than his or her father or a sense of how this shared material cir­ grandfather". Comments like that serve cumstance fosters an oppositional cul­ only to undercut the strength of the photos. ture, one too easily dismissed as redneck Finally, something must be said about REVIEWS 205 the accompanying texts. Given the exis­ upsurge during the spring and summer of tence of an earlier collection of mining 1907 and the creation of a new labour photos and essays. Mining Photographs council which sought to organize the en­ and Other Pictures which came out of the tire industrial workforce. The fifth chap­ Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in ter considers the 1907 general levee strike 1983, the publishers might have ad­ which shut do wn the port of New Orleans dressed some of the challenges of that for twenty days. The sixth chapter excellent work. But the introduction, sketches the Port Investigation written by Helen Matthews Lewis, is a Committee's assault on the practice of quick once-over on the region and half-and-half, the reorganization of dock coalmining in general. While potentially work, changes in waterfront technology, useful to someone totally unfamiliar with work process, labour force, and work mining, it is marred by factual errors, rules after 1910 and the decline of inter­ uninformed interpretations (coalminers racial unionism and cooperation on the became skilled workers with the introduc­ levees. A ten-page conclusion summa­ tion of machines), and an unrestrained rizes the book's argument and considers romanticism. The value of this collection the place of labour solidarity in a segre­ has been greatly diminished by its weak gated society. presentation. Having missed the opportu­ The port of New Orleans moved cot­ nity to complement the photographer's tonseed, sugar, rice, lumber, and bananas; work with more pertinent commentary, but most importantly cotton. Dock work the photographs are left to stand on their relied on the coordination of a 10 thou­ own. Fortunately they do so quite well. sand-man workforce equally divided be­ tween black and white. Teamsters moved Danny Samson the cargoes from railroad yards through Queen's University town; roustabouts performed unskilled but widespread labour on upriver vessels; Daniel Rosenberg, New Orleans yardmen unloaded cotton carts and Dockworkers: Race, Labor, and Union­ moved the bales into warehouses, onto ism 1892-1923 (Albany: State University scales, and into cotton presses; in turn, of New York Press 1988). longshoremen moved the freight from dockside to the ship's deck and hold. THIS SMALL VOLUME considers a notable Screwmen used jackscrews and their own and local chapter in the strange career of muscles to compact the bales within those Jim Crow as it "investigates the condi­ holds. The "screwmen, skilled and deci­ tions which made possible a remarkable sively placed were central: Their unions instance of black-white solidarity, and were older, stronger, their labor most re­ contributes to the study of lower-class inter­ spected, the backing most essential to racial cooperation during an especially dif­ other locals." (178) ficult period in race relations." (11) Dock work was seemingly well-paid, Rosenberg's first chapter sets up the but seasonal, hard, and biracial. That local and national context of race rela­ meant that employers used the racial divi­ tions and organized labour at the turn of sions within the workforce to maintain the 20th century. The second analyzes the their control over both the labour process labour process on New Orleans' docks, and levee unionism. But separate black the interaction of the workforce, and the and white unions emerged in the 1890s, development and programs of their and from their beginnings had to consider unions. The third chapter recounts the cooperation and solidarity. "Black and emergence of mixed crews, equally di­ white screwmen responded to the changes vided between black and white workers in the work pace and work lead by formu­ and their unions, on the docks between lating their half-and-half plan, [which] re­ 1900 and 1906. The fourth describes the quired the equal hiring of Black and 206 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

white, and their working abreast of each degrades the white man." The successful other in the same hatch." (55) That plan tactics of the past, including white su­ limited speedups: New Orleans screwmen premacist rhetoric, the threats of "Black asserted longstanding agreements on the Republicanism," and a new White division of labour on the docks and League, failed to split the strikers. The loaded fewer bales per crew and per day strike ended on the promise of arbitration, than in other Southern non-union ports. with a five-year contract that specified a "During the early twentieth century, the workload well below employer's de­ half-and-half principle prevailed on the mands, and with the survival of the half- levee [and) signified the equal sharing of and-half agreement. The open shop did work between white and Black locals in not come until World War I when changes each trade. At the very least, it connoted in ship design and dockside technology, interracial cooperation — even if not the expansion of legal segregation, and quite equal — to prevent employers from white flight from the docks had eroded using the workers of one race to undermine riverfront unionism. the other's working conditions." (69) This is a convincing and provocative Rosenberg is fascinated by the phe­ argument, well researched and well ar­ nomenon of solidarity, arguing that "the gued, but the book may be too concise, half-and-half agreements went beyond too succinct. The reader needs several the division of work: whites and blacks maps of the levee, a better sense of the formed joint bodies, put forward joint de­ port's geography and structure, and more mands, appointed joint negotiating teams, on the shipping business. Rosenberg's re­ spoke in alternating sequence at meet­ search is strongest on the general strike, ings, constituted black-white 'juries' in weaker on the decline of solidarity. Be­ intraunion judgements, and generally re­ cause New Orleans was unique we need fused to take a single step on any issue to know more about other Southern indus­ without interracial agreement." (69-70) tries, their workforces, and the processes In the face of a changing levee workforce of biracial unionization: a comparative and changing technologies, the half-and- dimension might have broadened the ar­ half principle severely restricted the gument. Those reservations aside, this employer's ability to control gang size, book is a useful study of one Southern work load, and work pace: it became al­ port, of interracial organization, and of most impossible to pit Black and white labour solidarity in the face of Jim Crow. against one another on the docks. The General Levee Strike of 1907 Bruce C. Nelson began as a lockout designed to destroy the Central Michigan University screwmen's union. It tapped long-stand­ ing grievances and produced a startlingly John D'Emilio and Estelle B. Freedman, united front: "a sympathetic industrywide Intimate Matters: A History of Sexuality action of solidarity with the screwmen." in America (New York: Harper & Row (122) Screwmen, longshoremen, yard­ 19&8). men, coal wheelers, cotton teamsters, freight handlers, markers — the whole of No AREA OF LIFE has proved so central — the dock workers — walked off the job or problematical — in the development of and stayed off. As they imported strike­ North American societies as sexuality. As breakers, the railroad and steamship com­ D'Emilio and Freedman show in this panies rerouted cargoes to other Southern path-breaking synthesis, sex in America ports as they sought to split labour's during the past 350 years reveals a com­ ranks. That kind of racial solidarity was plex mosaic, closely tied to dynamic cul­ not unprecedented, but it remained unex­ tural forces, related in turn to issues of pected: employers rejected the half and race, gender, and class. Far from depict­ half, "it doesn't elevate the negro, and it ing a national sexual history that reveals REVIEWS 207

unsullied linear progress — from repres­ issues of sexual behavior, including birth sion to freedom — the authors point out control, marital fidelity, abortion, homo­ that definitions of sexuality have been sexuality, prostitution, and sexually reshaped continuously by the evolving transmitted disease. They address differ­ nature of the economy, the family, and ing views of sexuality advanced by such politics, broadly construed. social historians as Peter Gay, Carl Most previous interpretations of sex Degler, and Michel Foucault, as well as and gender in American life reflect the the "repressive hypothesis" advanced by work of white, middle-class men and feminist scholars Carroll Smith-Rosen­ women, tied — either as defenders of, or berg, Judith Walkowitz, and Linda Gor­ challengers to — a monogamous, hetero­ don. sexual paradigm. Names like Alfred Kin- D'Emilio and Freedman caution read­ sey, Margaret Mead, and even Shere Hite ers that research in the history of sexuality earned recognition through research may flounder on the distinction between methods that, although exploring most what actually was, and views of what sexual parameters, belied assumptions of ought to be. Often the latter dominated a dominant sexual culture. D'Emilio and official and popular discourse on sexual Freedman stand outside this tradition. matters, while more important realities Their personal experiences and previous remained hidden from public view. To writings within gay and lesbian commu­ meet this problem, the authors examine nities, respectively, allow them more dis­ both ideology and behavior, under three tance and, arguably, objectivity and com­ analytical headings — sexual meanings, passion in assessing important changes in sexual regulation, and sexual politics. the sexual lives of Americans. At the The first category includes various pri­ same time, their research clearly repre­ mary meanings that attached to sexuality sents an effort to comprehend an area of over time, including procreation within social history of abiding personal interest families, to populate frontiers and secure and importance. a sufficient labour force; physical inti­ No polemic. Intimate Matters con­ macy and pleasure, emerging in the 19th veys a nuanced, subtle reading of a wide century, as a booming industrial economy range of published and unpublished inter­ supplanted family-centred production, disciplinary sources. The authors argue and birth rates declined drastically; spiri­ that the meaning and place of sexuality tual transcendence, as mirrored in the have altered from their family-centred, myriad communes and experimental liv­ reproductive emphasis in the 17th cen­ ing arrangements that have dotted the tury; to a more-intimate yet conflicted American landscape over the past three sexuality within 19th-century marriage; centuries; and power over others, as in the and to the commercialized sexuality of numerous strategies with which the cor­ our modem era, a sexuality loosed from porate order uses sexuality to sell goods, its reproductive moorings and widely per­ and — in a more sinister vein—the many ceived to provide the basis of personal ways in which sexuality has facilitated identity and individual happiness. As­ the social control of minorities by white, sessing the changing significance of middle-class, American males. Here the birth, adolescence, courtship, marriage, authors investigate the changing dis­ divorce, and death, D'Emilio and Freed­ course of sexuality — its terms, meta­ man show how sexual relations and the phors, and connotations within sacred and construction of gender have served as a secular, and personal and public realms potent source of inequality for racial mi­ — during the great transformation from norities, the working class, immigrants, marriage-bed to marketplace. They dem­ and those men and women who would onstrate that real cultural differences sep­ challenge dominant views. The authors' arated the sexual attitudes and behavior of matrix includes discussion of numerous middle-class whites from economic, ra- 208 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

cial, and ethnie minorities in such areas sexual pontics, reveals ongoing conten­ as birth rates and views of extramarital tion, involving conservatives and liberals sex. But these differences in no way ac­ and radicals. Among conservatives, one count for the pervasive discrimination encounters middle-class women, who in and violence historically visited upon the 19th century attempted to define a these minorities. Images of sexual de­ singular morality and sought to enlist the pravity, the authors conclude, have aid of state power to check sexual im­ served as a powerful ally to class, gender, pulses and to preserve premarital chastity and racial hierarchies. and marital fidelity; physicians, who A second major category includes the criminalized abortion; and censors like social channeling of sexuality. Here, Anthony Comstock, who tried to purge D'Emilio and Freedman seek to deter­ the mails of "obscene" material, which mine how and why, over time, certain included birth control information. On the groups assumed responsibility for distin­ other side of this tension stood propo­ guishing sexual deviance from normality. nents of birth control like Margaret The authors contend that the centrality of Sanger; early advocates of free love like familial, reproductive sexuality in the Emma Goldman and Stephen Pearl An­ 17th century generated a unitary system drews; and those persons in the 20th cen­ of regulation by family, church, and state. tury who have defined sexuality as not The 19th century, characterized by signif­ circumscribed by marriage, but as the icant economic and geographical mobil­ prime source of pleasure and personal ity, witnessed a diminution of power of happiness, to be sought out whenever both church and state. In their stead consent was present emerged a new arrangement, with the Throughout American history, the au­ family — especially mothers — assaying thors conclude, impulses of sexual liber­ the primary role in defining limits of sex­ alism have been offset by contrary im­ ual behavior, guided still by denomina­ pulses of those who — like the contempo­ tional ministers, but moreso by aspiring rary New Right — would uphold the medical professionals and by voluntary nexus between sexuality and marriage. associations concerned with sexual purity Male authorities usually have led these as part of larger programs of social re­ crusades, although the organization of form. These organizations often directed women to confront perceived socio-sex- their attention at marginal groups — im­ ual ills also underlines how sexuality has migrant workers, prostitutes, and blacks, served over time — and no doubt will for example — seeking to involve the continue — as a battleground to secure state to regulate and contain sexual mo­ and to contest gender inequality. Sexual rality. More recently, sexual politics have politics, finally, never stand alone. They involved state and federal government connect, often symbolically, with other alike, concomitant with the augmented cultural concerns, especially those related complexity and legal significance of sex­ to perceived social disorder and impurity. ual issues. Yet if middle-class whites Discrimination against immigrants owed sought hegemony over sexual matters, much to unwarranted charges that immi­ immigrants and blacks found ways to grant women swelled the ranks of Amer­ withstand this drive. Preindustrial pat­ ican prostitutes, while economic compe­ terns of community control exerted over tition between whites and blacks—rather sexual behavior by both subcultures often than actual sexual assaults by black men proved impervious to the middle-class on white women — figures most promi­ drive for order that affected sexual life as nently in wholesale lynching of black it did so much else in American life. men in the South. While intertwined fears This drive for sexual regulation in­ of prostitution and immigration underlay volved numerous interest groups. nativist legislation. Southern fears of in­ D'Emilio and Freedman's third category, terracial sex powerfully buttressed the REVIEWS 209 system of racial segregation and control narrative with the ability to connect dis­ that developed after 1890. parate topics, D'EMilio and Freedman an­ One may quibble with some conclu­ swer well historian Thomas Bender's re­ sions in Intimate Matters, primarily with cent challenge to social historians — to the authors ' discussion of the recent past. continue to work with discrete units, but One would like to know more, for exam­ to connect these units to larger, historical ple, on how class and racial divisions per­ wholes. sist, even in this era of sexual liberalism. Sex education, in fact, seems not to affect Geoffrey S. Smith the behavior of much of middle-class Queen's University youth, as continuing high rates of teenage pregnancy and STDs attest One would Jessie Lloyd O'Connor, Harvey like to see more on the putative connec­ O'Connor, and Susan M. Bowler, Harvey tion between commercialized sex and in­ and Jessie: A Couple of Radicals (Phila­ dividual activity. How have Hugh Hefner delphia: Temple University Press 1989). and Bob Guccione influenced behavior? What of the role of advertisements like IT IS, ON THE FACE of it, hard to imagine a the Jordache and Calvin Klein pitch for more unlikely couple. Jessie Lloyd was a jeans that look painted on? Does wearing Smith graduate, an heir to the Chicago those jeans lead to a more permissive at­ Tribune money with a family tradition of titude and behavior? Does taking the Pill? good works and bohemian protest Har­ And what should one conclude about the vey O'Connor was a foundling who was relationship between long-term socioeco­ working in the lumber camps of the Pa­ nomic change and actual sexual practices cific Northwest before he was twenty. De­ — in and out of bed? D'Emilio and Freed- spite their very different upbringings, man say little about these things, but do they evolved similar political attitudes, suggest increasing concern in contempo­ and in 1930 began a marriage that was to rary sexual lives with record, measure­ last until Harvey's death in 1987. Perhaps ment, and performance. These categories more remarkable than their marriage was certainly also describe core concerns of their commitment to socialism, a commit­ our commercialized culture. ment that was reflected in their daily Such carping aside — and it is carping lives. They devoted themselves to the — the authors dissect skillfully and with struggle, working as labour journalists good humour what many consider an in­ and muckrakers. Combining elements of tractable subject. Not merely a history of Marxism, pacifism, the IWW, and an sexuality. Intimate Matters offers a American tradition of dissent, they cre­ clearly written and engaging assessment ated a pragmatic politics and a socialist of the problematical ways in which evolv­ vision that put the individual, not the ing sexual mores moved from behind party, in the forefront The two rejected closed doors to the front of national con­ hair-splitting sectarianism and aided a sciousness. More than any other force, number of causes and movements that capitalism, prefigures this transforma­ sought to empower working people. They tion, as the sexualization of commerce led opposed the authoritarianism of the Com­ inexorably to the commercialization of munist Party, but supported many of its sex (a point not comprehended by the efforts; avid civil libertarians, their radi­ New Right). The authors do not evade calism went far beyond the Bill of Rights. pointing to the contradictions that beset Their book, a joint memoir written contemporary sexual liberals and conser­ with the help of Susan Bowler, is an inter­ vatives alike, contradictions that seem esting and optimistic story that traces two more pointed with each passing year, and very different paths to radicalism. Unlike which make a unified effort combatting a number of books in this genre, the taped AIDS more difficult. In combining strong recollections of the O'Connors were 210 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL checked against their diaries, articles, and needs. The League blended reform, lab­ books of earlier years. In this way, the our, and feminism under the leadership of tricks played by memory and a desire to Margaret Dreier Robins, president of the improve upon history were kept in check. WTUL from 1907-22. Payne's study A Couple of Radicals does suffer combines a biographical treatment with from other defects common to memoirs. an examination of the League from its What is obviously significant to the au­ inception in the Progressive era to its thors is not always so to the reader, while eclipse during the New Deal. With access events and people that seem to deserve to private family papers, Payne traces detailed treatment are often barely men­ Robins' roles as financier, director and tioned. We learn, for example, perhaps ideologist, roles which gave her pre-emi­ more than we need to about Jessie's work nence in the history of the WTUL. in writing about the Oastonia textile Robins' retirement from that role in 1922 strike, but are told almost nothing about explains the changed priorities of the or­ encounters with people such as Jay ganization in the 1920s. Lovestone or factional disputes in the Like other writers, Payne has noted Communist Party. Too often the reminis­ the importance of cross-class alliances; cences are anecdotal, almost trivial, and working-class and immigrant women it is difficult to know just what to make of were joined by middle-class allies in at­ the things we learn. In part, this may be tempts to improve their position as "un­ the result of the authors' politics. While skilled'' workers, needs usually ignored the absence of spiteful polemics and by the trade union movement. The Hegelian debates is refreshing, we do not WTUL's juxtaposition of laundresses and get a keen sense of what the O'Connors club women, garment workers and social thought about specific divisive issues, workers, was unusual and demonstrated and it is difficult to pick out just what the the heritage, and possibly the high point, radical content of their thought was. according to Payne, of a distinct female There are too many details and too few culture in the United States. glimpses of their own view of the big Reform, labour and feminism are the picture. What does come through clearly themes of the central chapters. Payne and beautifully is their life-long commit­ views Robins as both typical of Progres­ ment to building a better world, a world sive reformers and yet different, because based on a moral vision that borrowed of her conviction that labour in general from many sources. A Couple of Radicals and women workers in particular were does not give us a plan for the future, but central to the social regeneration of the it does give us hope. Progressive vision. Robins moved to Chi­ cago from New York in 1904 and carved MarkLeier out a new niche for the WTUL by chal­ Memorial University of Newfoundland lenging the hegemony of Jane Addams and Hull House when she succeeded in Elizabeth Anne Payne, Reform, Labor moving meetings from Hull House to and Feminism: Margaret Dreier Robins Federation of Labor territory, thus signi­ and the Women's Trade Union League fying stronger ties to working-class (Urbana: University of Illinois Press women. 1988). Under Robins' guidance the League identified with and continued the Ameri­ IN THE EARLY 20th century, the Women's can tradition of labour reform which in­ Trade Union League (WTUL) brought to­ cluded the Knights of Labor and Susan B. gether women reformers and women Anthony's Working Women's Associa­ workers dedicated to the organization and tion; the Knights in particular took pains protection of women workers and the ed­ to include women, ethnic workers and the ucation of the general public about then- unskilled in their organization. The REVIEWS 211

League thus followed reform unionism's male sociability through parties, games ideals and challenged the American Fed­ and sports in an attempt to bridge the gaps eration of Labor's more limited version of between women of different classes and unionism based on the organization and ethnic backgrounds. Union-linked socia­ protection of skilled craftsmen. Caught bility assisted women who faced ridicule between the two positions, the WTUL or disapproval from co-workers and fam­ achieved limited success. For Payne, the ily and gave them recognition for the long successes consisted of strong strike sup­ hours they put in as activists. Payne's port, especially among the garment work­ analysis insists that women's culture rein­ ers, as well as campaigns for protective forced union solidarity in League activities. legislation foT women workers and educa­ In the post-war world of the 1920s, tional initiatives. The conflicts with the other brands of feminism, however, chal­ AFL and the limited success of the lenged the social feminism of the League League were explained not by class or which fought to organize working women gender tensions, but rather by Robins' and enact protective legislation simulta­ understanding of the need for labour sol­ neously. The National Women's Party op­ idarity and her unwillingness to sacrifice posed protective legislation and chose to that unity completely. This analysis dis­ pursue the Equal Rights Amendment; tinguishes Payne's views somewhat from Robins led WTUL opposition to these previous authors, such as Nancy Schrom- goals and to what she termed "individual­ Dye who examined the New York WTUL istic'' feminism. After her retirement she in a previous monograph. Payne specific­ was alarmed by the League's retreat from ally attributes the League's tensions with union organizing and its preoccupation the AFL to Robins' faith in labour unity; with fighting the ERA. The move of from the perspective of Chicago where WTUL headquarters to Washington, DC Robins had close ties with the Federation in 1929, closer to AFL domination, deep­ of Labor, labour solidarity took pre-emi­ ened her unease over the direction taken nence. Revisionist in her interpretation of by the League. With the onset of the De­ the League, the author also rejects previ­ pression and the emergence of New Deal ous emphases on the 1910s as the turning politics in the 1930s, Robins found the point away from unionizing and towards Progressive era's emphasis on social re­ educational goals, based on her assess­ form, particularly through the voluntary ment of the importance of Robins' leader­ activities of women, undercut and re­ ship until retirement in 1922. placed by a bureaucratic, state-led ap­ Equally important in the fate of the proach she despised. Reform unionism WTUL was the brand of feminism Robins and social feminism no longer fit the and her associates subscribed to. Social needs of post-Depression America. feminism with its emphasis on social Payne's study is revisionist in its in­ housekeeping and motherhood defined terpretation and brings a wealth of per­ the context of women's roles. Robins be­ sonal and psychological insight from the lieved that women "more fully embodied voluminous correspondence between the public because they alone understood Robins and her sister, Mary Dreier, a the social consequences of private acts." leader of labour, suffrage and peace orga­ (127) Motherhood was a shorthand de­ nizations. At times, however, Payne iden­ scribing all women's social mission, if tifies too closely with Robins' version of not their biological experience. Thus, the the world. The leader of the League usu­ League's activities embraced the vast ma­ ally downplayed clashes between the jority of single working women but also middle-class allies and the working-class working mothers and League women women, for example, an issue which is used the language of motherhood to de­ only partly addressed by Payne. One is scribe their activities. Under Robin's also left wondering how Robins felt about leadership the WTUL also promoted fe­ the new unionism of the 1930s, the sit- 212 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL down strikes and the challenge to AFL established acceptance by mainstream hegemony presented by the CIO. Occa­ American historians of inevitability, or sional slips such as Payne's rendering of secularized Calvinism, as adequate expla­ the labour theory of value as "the labor nation of nearly every major aspect of theory of wealth" are also troubling. The American history — from the city-on-a- volume has many merits, nevertheless, hill, to the Revolution, to the Civil War, for those interested in women's labour to America's rise to world power and history and its intersection with the his­ Alan Ne vins* triumph of corporate capi­ tory of middle-class women. Payne has talism as the preordained instrument for revised our understanding of the WTUL, saving the free world. Today, when so­ not only by underlining Robins' impor­ cialism, however defined, is going down tant guiding role, but also by illuminating the tube, it is more than likely that the the regional differences that existed bastions of inevitability are in little dan­ within the organization and by suggesting ger of collapse. Unless, of course, Paul that ethnic conflicts within the League Kennedy is taken seriously, in which case deserve further attention. a new inevitability may replace the old, as the sun rises in the East Linda Kealey The great merit of Socialist Cities is Memorial University of Newfoundland that Judd rejects mainline predestinarian assumptions and joins the honest brigade Richard W. Judd, Socialist Cities: Munic­ of those who seek to understand Ameri­ ipal Politics and the Grass Roots of Amer­ can history rather than simply to celebrate ican Socialism (Albany: State University it. Anyone who has read Peter Novick's of New York Press 1989). That Noble Dream: The 'Objectivity Question' and the American Historical Now ALMOST A CENTENARIAN, the ques­ Profession (Cambridge Mass., 1988) will tion "why no socialism in the United understand the professional risk accepted States?" remains a vital one. At least, it by Judd when, albeit in the excellent com­ should remain so. Postwar consensus pany of scholars such as John Laslett, scholars in the United States, from Daniel Sally Miller, James Weinstein, Milton Bell, Louis Hartz and Martin Lipset to Cantor, David Montgomery, Christopher Richard Hofstadter, laboured mightily to Tomlins, Leon Fink, et al., he swims de­ bury the question beneath a mountain of terminedly against the prescriptive cur­ inevitability. Bell proclaimed that social­ rent. With careful scholarship Judd de­ ism could be in but not of the American picts the formidable network of roots put political landscape; Hartz wrote that be­ down by socialist politicians up to World cause Americans had no feudal legacy War I in scores of cities and towns across and, therefore, no entrenched conserva­ the United States, and examines in detail tism against which to struggle, they could several municipal experiences. only be liberal perhaps the most absurd Drawing from and adding to the im­ dictum ever uttered by a sociological his­ pressive range of evidence in 'grass roots' torian; Hofstadter, elaborating a pattern studies such as Bruce Steeves' Socialism discerned by J.D. Hicks in an early study in the Cities and Donald Critchlow's So­ of the Populists, announced a handy little cialism in the Heartland, Judd records law covering not only socialism but all who voted socialist and suggests that, political dissent: third parties in the "viewed from the local level, the party's United States, like bees, having stung, political maturation and adaptation must die. within the American political culture can To the writers of American national be seen time and again." He reviews the history surveys the consensus line proved debate about 'internal' an 'external' most congenial. It was agreeable not least causes of the withering away of socialist because it meshed closely with the long political strength after 1917 and argues REVIEWS 213

that urban socialists were "too successful of immigration which ended in the mid- too soon.^ The urban parties, he believes, 19208. Weinberg's reliance on in-depth failed to adjust the "deeper concerns of interviews with 46 women, supplemented their working-class constituents'' to mid­ by material drawn from published mem­ dle-class interests and didn't appreciate oirs, enables her to provide a deeply per­ "the impact their ideology and rhetoric sonal portrayal of Jewish women's had upon the local middle class, particul- transition from the Old World to the New. ary those caught up in the progressive The author's intense focus on the family movement." This failure provided the enables her to explore this crucial area of springboard from which elitist main­ women's experience in considerable de­ stream progressives launched devastating tail, and this is welcome. However, her anti-socialist campaigns. The pattern is analysis of family life is flawed, at times, best described in Judd's close-in analysis and she slights other important aspects of of Flint, Michigan where, by 1912, the these women's lives. city's business leaders "had resolved to Weinberg's evaluation of the impact end the socialist threat to political consen­ of immigration on family relations is sus in their city." grounded in a solid understanding of Without defining 'class,' Judd de­ Eastern European Jewish culture, thus ploys his evidence, with something very providing an important corrective to re­ close to objectivity, to depict a hegemonic cent works such as Elizabeth Ewen's Im­ class victory. And the outcome, he makes migrant Women in the Land of Dollars: clear, was by no means the result of any Life and Culture on the Lower East Side, Hartz-Lipset-Hofstadter-Bell liberalism 1890-1925. Weinberg provides percep­ favoured by the political edict of an tive insights about Jewish family tensions American deus ex machina. Without resulting form the pressures of American­ claiming preeminence for any one factor, ization, and she presents an interesting Judd describes well the complexities of a examination of decision-making prac­ political process. Lacking an appreciation tices within the immigrant Jewish family. of the deep socialist reality in pre-World Yet, it is here, at the very centre of War I America, and of how the socialist Weinberg's focus, that significant analyt­ presence was emasculated, the evolution ical problems arise. Her treatment of of today's vulnerable leviathan is not re­ Americanization sensitively emphasizes ally possible. Judd has made a substantial the younger generation's common desire contribution to our understanding of a to "fit in," but she does not take American passage in American history which most anti-Semitism into account Such incom­ of the American historical profession still pleteness weakens her analysis of family prefers to sweep under the rug. strains and their relation to American as- similationist pressure. Her omission of Kenneth McNaught American antiSemitism also leads to a University of Toronto romanticized view of opportunities for immigrant Jewish families in the United Sydney Stahl Weinberg, The World of States. Furthermore, even though Wein­ Our Mothers: The Lives of Jewish Immi­ berg investigates family decision-mak­ grant Women (Chapel Hill: The Univer­ ing, her analysis of family dynamics ulti­ sity of North Carolina Press 1988). mately does not examine female attitudes toward male privilege in sufficient depth. IN The World of Our Mothers: The Lives In addition. The World of Our Moth­ of Jewish Immigrant Women, Sydney ers does not do justice to other important Stahl Weinberg has produced a distinctly aspects of immigrant Jewish women's family-centered account of the experi­ lives. Despite extensive reliance on mate­ ences of Eastern European Jewish women rial drawn from published memoirs, Stahl who came to the United States in the wave Weinberg generally ignores the fact that 214 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL these very memoirs point to important white-collar settings, Weinberg paints too dimensions beyond the family. For exam­ rosy a picture of women's white-collar ple, Anzia Yezierska (on whose work employment. Emphasizing that "sales­ Weinberg draws heavily) was a renowned women enjoyed being admitted to the all- writer, not a full-time mother. Similarly, American world of the department store," Mary Antin and Elizabeth Stem were for example, she ignores the harsh work­ writers and social workers, as well as ing conditions that retail clerks experi­ wives and mothers, while Rose enced in this period. (202) Schneiderman and Rose Pesotta were Weinberg's treatment of women's life-long union activists. Although these unionism and radicalism is similarly in­ particular women were, of course, excep­ complete. Although she acknowledges tional, it is inadequate to use their mem­ that "Jewish working women became fa­ oirs to portray the history of immigrant mous for their rebelliousness and radical Jewish women in a way which does not tendencies," her main section on the crit­ take the full range of these memoirists' ical issue of worker resistance consists of own experiences into account. a mere two and a half pages. (200) Caught Nor does Weinberg explore certain sig­ in a liberal framework which stresses the nificant facets of her interviewees' own eventual upward mobility of the Jewish lives. Although the Appendix indicates that community, the author does not grasp the half of the interviewees did volunteer work extent of Jewish women's class con­ (usually within Jewish organizations), the sciousness in this period. Nor does she book devotes little more than a page to analyze gender dynamics within the Jewish women's organizational activities. unions and radical organizations. While This neglect is striking in view of Jewish women's class activism extended Weinberg's statement that Jewish women well beyond the shopfloor to specifically tended to join organizations at a much female actions such as rent strikes and higher rate than women from other ethnic boycotts against the high prices of food groups. Weinberg's brief treatment of staples, Weinberg devotes but one para­ women's organizational lives does not con­ graph to these important activities. sider gender roles and power dynamics Finally, Weinberg does not ask whether within Jewish organizations which in­ Jewish women's "rebelliousness" led to cluded both males and females. feminism (a question which goes far beyond Labour historians will be especially internal family dynamics). Although she in­ disappointed by the author's discussion of cludes a quotation from an interviewee who paid labour. Although her examination of stated that "in those 1920s, I was for women's patterns of paid and unpaid work women's equal rights.... I should have or­ is valuable, her account of women's expe­ ganized Women's Lib," Weinberg does not riences in the paid labour-force is superfi­ analyze the nature of women's conscious­ cial. In view of her assertion that women's ness between the two waves of feminism or "experiences in the world of work were the relation between class consciousness crucial in shaping the personalities of and feminism. (210) these young women," this defect is partic­ The World of Our Mothers is an un­ ularly serious. (192) As Weinberg points even book. It helps to fill significant gaps out, young Jewish women were typically in the neglected field of immigrant concentrated in the needle trades. How­ women's history, particularly through its ever, she not only glosses over the notori­ moving personal accounts of the impact ously harsh sweatshop conditions but she of immigration on Jewish women's fam­ also glosses over the confinement of ily relations. The book's shortcomings women to female job ghettoes both in this are serious, however, and mar Weinberg's sector and in other areas of employment contribution. Apart from a constructive examination of Ruth A. Frager sexual harassment in both blue-collar and University of Toronto REVIEWS 215

Marc Scott Miller, The Irony of Victory: owners, and helped open the door for World War II and Unwell. Massachusetts unions, higher wages, and greater job (Urbana: University Illinois Press 1988). choice and mobility. Government con­ tracts, the War Labor Bureau, Govern­ TWENTY YEARS AGO historians began to ment agencies that set prices and wages, investigate the past of those who had been manpower and resource allocation, all left out of traditional histories — to do worked to undermine Lowell's traditional history from the bottomup. In order to tell structure of authority, and to open up pos­ the story of these people's lives and strug­ sibilities for increased worker power. Yet gles, historians have had to look past the Miller also argues that wartime changes methodologies developed when the pro­ did not go all in one direction. Capital fession was primarily concerned with used the war to further profits, while elites state formation, adminstration, diplo­ dominated many of the wartime govern­ macy, and the biographies of national and ment agencies and used their domination industrial leaders. to their advantage. Labor militants com­ Cultural analysis, quantitative tech­ plained that the draft board, controlled by niques, hermeneutics, and oral history local elites, used its power to ridth e com­ were added to the historian's method­ munity of "trouble makers." Women ological black bag. These techniques did gained job mobility, but not authority. much to open up new areas of research, Women found that the war opened up new helped in answering the new questions and better paying jobs, but these were still historians were posing, and gave a voice jobs that paid less than those of men. to those whom past historians had left Women also did not have the possibility mute. Marc Miller's The Irony of Victory of promotion. reflects the concerns of historians for a Ultimately, as the title of his book history from the bottom up, and uses the indicates. Miller argues that the war new tools available to historians, particu­ changed Lowell but failed to put the city larly of oral history, to do so. The new on a trajectory for future growth and pros­ questions and the perspective from the perity. With the war's end, Lowell's war bottom up gives his book its strength and plants closed, its mills continued a divest­ interest iture begun two decades before the war, World War II had a dramatic and until its shops closed, and its youth looked to recently under-analyzed impact on Amer­ other towns and cities for work and ican society, politics, and economics. The homes. catastrophic depression of the pre-war The question of the consequences of years, and the dramatic initiative of the the war for Lowell is of central impor­ New Deal have in the past captured the tance for Miller. Unfortunately, it is un­ imagination of both historians and the clear form either his evidence or his anal­ public. Recent work on both the war and ysis what the ultimate impact of the war the New Deal have shown that the war had was. While Miller begins and ends his a far greater impact By looking at Low­ book with the suggestion that the war did ell, Miller investigates the impact of the not change the history of Lowell, he also war on the everyday life of the people of suggests that the war altered people's one city, and attempts to understand just lives, creating "new patterns.'* The ques­ how significant the war was for them. tion of whether these new patterns were Miller is best in his discussions of permanent is not answered. What was the blue collar workers. His combination of significance of the "new patterns?" Miller traditional sources and oral histories concludes on a deterministic note: the brings out how the war opened up new people of Lowell were victims of larger and better paying jobs for working-class forces. This conclusion seems to be at women. He shows how the war under­ odds with Miller's sympathy for the mined the authority of the traditional mill power of human agency, which is re- 216 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

fleeted in his choice of oral history as a creating that evidence. I am not asking a methodology. The confusion about question of objectivity here, but rather of change and persistence might be resolved methodology. Miller does attempt to ad­ by arguing mat the war changed people's dress these questions, but more needs to histories, but not the city's. This unfortu­ be done. The problem of oral history is nately would raise other difficulties, how­ not that interviewees might be confused ever. The relationship between the history about dates, nor is it solely a problem of of a city, and the collective history of the projecting a positive image of the past people of the city would have to be ad­ The problems of using oral history are dressed, for example. I am in sympathy deeply rooted in the nature of the practice with Miller's conclusion that the war ul­ itself. Unfortunately too often oral history timately did little to change Lowell's his­ is counterposed to existing documents tory, but that raises the question of the with a class bias. To be sure, most tradi­ choice of Lowell as a subject of study. tional sources are documents of the dom­ Late-19th century historians prided inant group. But it is the skill and talent themselves on avoiding theory or theoriz­ of the historian to transcend that bias. To ing. History for them was simply an act of hunt for other sources is part of a process faith. One looked to the documents and of writing good history, but to deal with the documents provided truth. But Miller the elite bias of one source by throwing is not a 19th-century historian. He begins up another biased source is not the an­ with a historical question, and that ques­ swer. Ultimately as historians we should tion should have led him away from Low­ not let our sources dictate our history, our ell. Detroit, Pittsburgh, Gary, Los Ange­ history should dictate our sources. What les, or Oakland would have been far better we produce should be neither the cities to study. Lowell would have been relativists' "everyman a historian" of Carl an appropriate choice for study for the Becker, nor the history as self-evident history of decline, or the impact of the war truth of the late-19th century antiquarians. on older mill towns specifically. What the Miller's book adds much to our un­ study of Lowell tells us about the impact derstanding of the impact of the war on of the war on America is, unfortunately, the people of Lowell — particularly unclear. working-class Americans. Despite some Miller's work also raises another his­ problems, there is much of value in this torical problem. Although Miller's use of study, and it adds an important chapter to oral history personalizes the story of our understanding of the war years. Lowell and gives the reader a sense of how the people of Lowell understood John T. Cumbler their wartime experiences, it is not with­ University of Louisville out problems. While much of Miller's oral history evidence is placed within the Ronald L. Filipelli, American Labor and context of other historical sources, at Postwar Italy, 1943-1953: A Study in times his oral history sources lead him to Cold War Politics (Stanford: Stanford anecdotal reminiscences. The question of University Press 1989). the significance of evidence seems to fade from view, and with it the critical and THE FORGING of United States hegemony analytical analysis which allows a histo­ in the "Free World" in the immediate rian to transcend simple antiquananism. postwar period has been the subject of Miller should have given more time to a much attention from historians in recent detailed discussion of the problems of years. Western Europe in particular has selective memory, the impact of ideolog­ been analyzed acutely in works by ical formations on memory, and the prob­ Charles Maier, Alan Milward and most lems for the historian who is not only in recently, Michael Hogan. The appearance dialogue with historical evidence, but is of Filipelli's book in the same year as REVIEWS 217

Federico Romero's impressive Gli Stati shifting fortunes of AFL leaders inter­ Uniti e il syndicalisme» europeo, 1944- ested in Italian affairs (very few and 1951 rounds out a small literature of high largely concentrated in the ILOWU) and quality on American labour and efforts to the Italian social democrats with whom defeat popular forces in order to institute they mainly dealt He shows well how the a politics of stabilization in Italy. deepening Cold war pushed aside consid­ Filipelli carefully analyzes the evolu­ eration of the specific national peculiari­ tion of American labour's foreign policy ties of the Italian situation. David and its anti-Communism. He notes that Dubinsky, Jay Lovestone, George initially the AFL saw fascism as a bul­ Meany, Irving Brown, and Thomas Lane wark against Communism, fascist dicta­ increasingly took control of AFL efforts torship as perhaps necessary in some in­ in Italy and identified unequivocally with stances to prevent Communism. During State Department initiatives. The rela­ the Depression, as a result of the rise of tionship between the AFL, the US gov­ Hitler and the panoply of repressive mea­ ernment and the CIA is here exposed as sures he initiated in Germany, the AFL extremely close. became firmly antifascist Through its ef­ Filipelli argues convincingly that the forts to rescue European antifascist (but effects of US intervention in Italy unnec­ not Communist) trade unionists before essarily weakened the non-Communist US entry into World War H, the AFL had unions. State Department and AFL poli­ valuable contacts throughout the conti­ tics, which he regards as indistinguish­ nent These were placed at the disposal of able after 1947, increasingly intruded into the wartime OSS, the forerunner of the the Italian labour scene. Social democrats CIA. An important aspect of this cooper­ dependent on US financing were bullied ation concerned Italy, parts of which were by them into courses of action and time­ liberated by the Allies in 1943. tables they considered unwise. The AFL Labour was particularly important in was instrumental in forcing a split of the US strategy. In Italy as in a number of Italian labour movement into three. For countries, workers and their organiza­ Italian workers, the result for the next tions emerged from World War II as cen­ decade was relegation to among the lowest tral components of a popular front of paid in the developed world despite high broad dimensions determined to institute annual growth rates and profit margins. changes that would redistribute wealth Even US government aid packages, and power in society on an equitable especially the Marshall Aid program, basis. Italy's capitalists and traditional come under fire from Filipelli. American ruling class were hopelessly discredited policy, based upon assumptions regard­ by their embrace of fascism and their hos­ ing industrial cooperation, productivity, tility to social change. and pure-and-simple unionism were sim­ The OSS and AFL committed re­ ply alien to Italian conditions. In trying to sources and money to resurrect elements force square pegs into round holes, the within the Italian labour movement with Americans made out of the non-Commu­ which they could feel comfortable. nist labour movement "an international Serafino Romualdi, who worked for both charity case" (189) and for Italian labour organizations, simultaneously expended as a whole the Marshall Plan was, in the great efforts to bolster the non-Commu­ words of one CIO official, "a miserable nist Italian left. Initially, AFL policy an­ failure." (201) For the AFL, however, ev­ ticipated that of the government on the erything was fine. The plight of Italian issue of anti-Communism and then fol­ workers was secondary to stopping the lowed it. expansion of Communism which they be­ Filipelli is at his best in describing the lieved they had accomplished. small worlds of the Italian-American lab­ Filipelli has brought to readers clearly our leadership of New York City, the and cogently a case study of the effects of 218 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

US labour's intervention in the postwar pretations of American labour foreign world. He has also underlined the close policy given us by Ronald Radosh on the relationship of US labour and its govern­ one hand and Roy Godson on the other. ment in supporting conservative elements More interesting for students of modern in societies they regarded as threatened Italy, it offers a balance to studies concen­ by Communism. From the point of view trating on government-to-govemment or of this European observer, the book political party relations. would have been even better if Filipelli had drawn out the incompatibility of in­ Stephen Burwood terests involved when labour subordi­ Alfred University nates itself to bourgeois governments in dealing with foreign workers. Workers Howard Jacob Karger, éd.. Social Work­ themselves can only suffer. ers and Labor Unions (New York: Green­ Criticisms of the book cannot out­ wood Press 1988). weigh the achievement of the author. However, there are a few. Filipelli con­ THIS BOOK IS a collection of thirteen es­ centrates overwhelmingly on the activi­ says, nine of which are authored or co-au­ ties of the AFL. It was indeed the major thored by Howard Karger, a professor of American labour participant in Italy. CIO social work at the University of Missouri. involvement was consistent but not Several of the essays appeared previously backed by the same resources or intimate elsewhere. Only one essay examines the links to the US government. Neverthe­ history of social work and unionism, less, Filipelli offers us tantalizing Karger's "A History of Early Social Work glimpses of major CIO influences like and Labor Union, 1900-1947," but others George Baldanzi and Walter Reuther. do use historical information in attempts After 1952, CIO involvement in Euro­ to place their themes in perspective. pean affairs strengthened, especially with Karger's other essays examine "Common the advent of Walter Reuther to the CIO Goals of Labor and Social Work," presidency, the appointment of Jacob "Unions and Social Work Licensure," Potofsky to chair the CIO International "Reclassification: NASW and the Affairs Committee and of Walter's Unions," "Compatibility of Labor and So­ brother Victor as CIO European Repre­ cial Work," "Labor Relations Laws and sentative. In addition, we see little of the Social Workers." "De-Skilling Social Italian participants in this period beyond Workers: The Industrial Model of Pro­ those most intimately involved with the duction and the Delivery of Social Ser­ Americans. The thinking of Italy's vices," "Social Workers and doomed social democrats is extremely Public-Sector Labor Relations: A Case well revealed, but less so that of the Chris­ Study of the Missouri Department of So­ tian Democratic trade unionists and still cial Services and the Communications less that of the Nenni Socialists and the Workers of America," and, with Larry W. Communists. Individual leaders like Kreuger, "Computer Technology and Pastori, Nenni and Di Vittorio are made Human Services." In addition, David to carry the entire burden of filling this Stoesz contributed "Privatization: Pros­ gap. In other words, Italian workers and pects for Unionizing Social Workers," their families do not find here too much Frederic G. Reamer, "Social Workers and of a forum to express their own feelings Unions: Ethical Dilemmas," Milton Tam- during the period. bor, "The Social Service Union in the Filipelli has made an important con­ Workplace," and Leslie B. Alexander, tribution to our understanding of the ori­ "Professionalization and Unionization: gins of the AFL role in the postwar world. Compatible After All?" In examining Italy he has gone a long way One of the realities that a reader of toward reevaluating the standard inter­ Social Workers and Labor Unions must REVIEWS 219

contend with are factual errors owing to What we don't learn is exactly what types different estimates of similar phenomena of social workers by field of practice (for made at the different times the essays example, mental health, child welfare, were originally written. A glaring error is family counselling, medical social work, the estimate of the number of unionized school social work, corrections, etc.) and social workers in the United States. The professional education and training were author states in the "Preface" that there and are attracted to unionization. Also are 125,000 unionized social workers relevant is whether or not that social work (xiii); in Chapter 1, which he wrote ap­ activity was or is carried on in "public" proximately four years before the preface, settings, those supported principally by he tells us there are more than "72,000 tax revenues or in government-sponsored unionized social workers." (27) social services or in "private" contexts, George Bernard Shaw's often-quoted those funded by insurance vendors, char­ maxim that "professions are conspiracies itable contributions, or a mixture of "pri­ against the laity" seems relevant in re­ vate" and "public" funds. In fact, many viewing this book, particularly when the persons who earn their livelihood by em­ author waxes somewhat nostalgically ployment in social service work may about the rank-and-file movement of the never have received any professional so­ 1930s and early 1940s which attempted to cial work education and training; never­ unionize some social workers and whose theless, they may be given die title "social failure is the subject of one of the best worker" by either "public" or "private" scholarly debates in the book — the de­ social service organizations. bate between Karger and John Earl Much of the book explicates contem­ Haynes on the reasons for its demise. It porary problems faced by professional so­ should be pointed out that there is still a cial work in the United States as seen in vocal and effective segment of US social the struggles of social work's major na­ workers who believe unionization is most tional professional association, the Na­ compatible with social work values and tional Association of Social Workers, to goals. Catalyst: A Socialist Journal of gain membership and legitimacy to repre­ Social Services regularly publishes these sent social workers. Karger writes, "By perspectives. 1985 mere were 448,000 persons employed Of special interest to the Canadian au­ as social workers: out of that number only dience are Leslie B. Alexander's comments about 200,000 held social work degrees; on the differences in attitudes towards lab­ about 140,000 had an MSW or higher de­ our unions between C anadian and US social gree; and about 60,000 had BSW degrees. workers. She cites Joan Pennell, who found Over half of the social service labor force that Canadian social workers find unioniza­ has no formal social work training." (47) tion to be compatible with their professional Karger's case study of social workers objectives in a contrast to the experience of and public-sector labour relations, "The most US social workers. Missouri Department of Social Services A recurrent theme is one by now fa­ and the Communications Workers of miliar to students of social work history: America," asks if the industrial model of a central reason why social workers did labour relations can work effectively for not (and have not universally) embraced professional social work employees who unionism was because of the "lure of pro­ often find that the "crisis-related nature of fessionalism" (24), a term used loosely to their work" undermines capacity to deter­ signify a quest for status and credibility. mine the specific number of hours they Karger admits, however, that "despite may have to work. In this case, profes­ antiunion feelings, (inherent in a quest for sional ethics demand that clients' needs professional status?) greater numbers of be met, and responding to that need might social workers have joined and are ac­ be impossible in a setting where a strict tively participating in union activities." labour relations contract sets specific 220 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL work hours. This is not a mundane profes­ World War II. While this conclusion is sional dilemma for professional social not unexpected, it is useful to have the workers. It presents very real value dilem­ process examined in detail and to have the mas for a field which has historically seen consequences for workers of seemingly "client needs" as determinative of profes­ neutral measures such as liberalized de­ sional social work "practice. " preciation allowances for labour-saving Contemporary social work interest in machinery spelled out. "practicing" — note the analogy to legal Truchil's view is that few actions are or medical practice, a term used to repre­ neutral; all of the antagonisms which sent what social workers "do"—in indus­ characterize labour-capital relationships trial settings is in large measure a re­ are interdependent. He describes pre- sponse to the gradual recognition by busi­ World War II textile manufacturing as a ness that it may be more economically competitive industry in which many small beneficial to assist workers with prob­ mills competed with each other and with lems than to "fire" them. Social work foreign firms. Although the industry had practice in employee assistance programs been a pioneer in the introduction of fac­ (EAPs) is an emerging specialization tory production methods in the 19th cen­ today. This phenomenon must be under­ tury, Truchil argues that in the first half stood within the context of a central of the 20th century it was technologically theme of this book: as Straussner and stagnant Labour productivity was low Phillips have asked, "Can labor unions and labour costs formed a high proportion and private industry (or the public sector) of total costs. Because labour costs were work together with the social work pro­ high (although wages were low) textile fession to ensure the provision of social capital was unusually antagonistic to any welfare service for workers?" form of labour organization. Tradition­ Karger's book, despite its eclectic ap­ ally, textile labour had been weak; much proach, is an important contribution to the of the work was unskilled or semi-skilled study of the peculiar history of social and roughly half of the labour force was work and unionization. It explores the female with little tradition of labour activ­ dilemmas of a profession which purports ism. In spite of these disadvantages, or­ to be "client-centered" as it functions in ganized labour made considerable strides bureaucratic and industrial settings in organizing textile workers in the years whose purposes may run counter to those immediately prior to World War JJ. of social work. Reamer's essay, "Social At home, the industry relied on cheap Workers and Unions: Ethical Dilemmas," labour to remain competitive; abroad, it presents well these historical and contem­ depended on tariff protection. Just as the porary dilemmas. union drive of the late 1930s threatened its supply of cheap labour, the post-war John M. Herrick move towards freer trade removed much Michigan State University of the industry's protection against for­ eign competitors. This opening of the Barry E. Truchil, Capital-Labour Rela­ American textile market occurred at the tions in the US. Textile Industry (New same time competition from low-wage York: Praeger 1988). countries on the Pacific rim was increas­ ing. Textile capital's reaction to the twin BARRY TRUCHIL'S study of the evolution threats of militant labour and foreign of capital-labour relationships in the US competition forms the core of this book. primary textile industry concludes that a Labour received the brunt of the combination of factors, technological in­ counter offensive; lower tariffs were part novation, the relocation of textile capital, of a shift in American global policy which and state policies, have weakened textile capital could not reverse although labour's position vis-a-vis capital since it did blunt the effects by seeking import REVIEWS 221 quotas and government assistance in re­ industry. The Canadian cotton industry storing its competitive position. The at­ which, until recently, was the key seg­ tack on labour followed two lines. One ment of the primary textile industry, has was to reduce labour requirements been oligopolistic since the 1890s when through increased mechanization. New the predecessors of Dominion Textile and machinery, more efficiently designed Canadian Cottons were formed. In spite mills and the widespread use of synthetics of the lack of competition in the industry, allowed the industry to reduce employ­ Canadian capital has viewed labour ment by 27 per cent between 1950 and unions with a hostility equal to that shown 1976 while productivity increased 124 by American textile capital. In the 1950s per cent. The other line of attack was to and 1960s the Canadian industry faced roll back organized labour's gains. The challenges similar to those of the Ameri­ industry accelerated a transfer of mills can industry and used tactics similar to from the northeastern states where unions those used in the United States to roll were comparatively strong to the south­ back the gains which textile unions had east where they were weak. It sought, and made during the 1930s and 1940s. Be­ generally received, aid from the state in tween the end of the war and 1968, Do­ defeating the unions; this ranged from minion Textile, the largest Canadian firm, police assistance in breaking strikes at the reduced employment from 13,000 to local level to the Taft-Hartley Act, which 8,500 while doubling its sales. permitted state governments to pass right- In his conclusion, Truchil states "the to-work laws, at the federal level. Gov­ unfolding of the system is neither prede­ ernment economic aid, designed to raise termined nor subject to the control and productivity and make the industry com­ wishes of any specific social class." (153) petitive with foreign producers, also However, his own very thorough account weakened labour as it reduced the number of the recent history of the American tex­ of employees. Finally, capital weakened tile industry makes it difficult to conceive the appeal of unions through wage in­ of any other unfolding of events within creases and improved benefits for non­ the present capitalist framework which union plants at the same time it fought assumes the basic right of capitalists "to organization drives and strikes with every locate production facilities and to trans­ weapon at its command. The industry's form the labor process as they see fit in anti-union drive was greatly strengthened order to control labor and maximize prof­ by growing concentration in the industry; its and competitiveness." (152) When this large firms with several plants were gen­ framework is internationalized through erally better placed to resist labour's de­ the medium of liberalized trade policies, mands than were smaller, single-plant, the possibility of any conclusion other firms. Although organized labour re­ than the weakening of labour's position sponded to capital's counterattack with a becomes increasingly unlikely. number of innovative measures, such as the boycott of J.P. Steven's products, it A.B. McCullough suffered serious losses; between 1948 and Canadian Parks Service, Ottawa 1973 union membership in the textile in­ dustry fell from 38 to 23 per cent Peter Novick, That Noble Dream: The Truchil relates textile capital's strong "Objectivity Question" and the American anti-union attitude to the competitive na­ Historical Profession (Cambridge: Cam­ ture of the industry and contrasts it to the bridge University Press 1988). more tolerant attitude of capital in more monopolistic industries such as automo­ PETER NOVICK'S That Noble Dream is a bile manufacture. Perhaps. However, this monumental history of the formation and assertion cannot be supported by refer­ development of the American historical ence to the experience of the Canadian profession over the last one hundred 222 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

years. In the 1880s, inspired by the tech­ sion regrouped to defend the ideal of ob­ nical achievements of German historians jectivity and to reassert a consensual op­ and by the positivism that dominated in­ timism in the progress of the liberal West tellectual life, a group of university histo­ The period after World War U also wit­ rians formulated a new conception of nessed the maturing of the profession as their activity. Against the earlier, un­ an institution. There was an unprece­ abashedly "literary" — that is, overtly dented expansion of universities and rhetorical and moralistic — histories of hence demand for historians; history de­ Francis Parkman and George Bancroft, partments became fully autonomous (no these new historians believed that histor­ longer did wealthy patrons and college ical writing should adhere to the same presidents make faculty appointments); standard that governed the natural sci­ and the profession became more oriented ences: namely, the idea of objectivity. For to research and more meritocratic — that historians such as Herbert Baxter Adams last development shown in the putting and Frederick Jackson Turner, the past aside of much of the antisemitism that was to be treated as an independent, ex­ once kept Jews from being hired. ternal reality that could be apprehended By the early 1960s harmony and pro­ by the direct empirical observation of a fessionalism seemed to have triumphed; disciplined, unprejudiced mind. historians and others now spoke of the A new research program based on "end of ideology." But these self-congrat­ these assumptions quickly came to domi­ ulatory proclamations of having entered nate university departments, but, as an era of total objectivity were followed Novick points out, the histories that were in the late sixties and early seventies by actually produced were no more objective an intense, "hyperideological" conflict. than those of earlier historians. The self- The student opposition that appeared styled objectivists subscribed uncritically against the Vietnam War produced, espe­ to many of the prejudices of their age, cially at Wisconsin and Columbia, radical allowing, for example, the prevailing rac­ historians who turned against the assump­ ism to ground their interpretations of tions of their teachers. In the acrimony slavery, the Civil War, and Reconstruc­ and debate that followed—which Novick tion. Objectivity was able to serve as the illustrates with a discussion of revision­ "founding myth" of the profession only ism in American diplomatic history — the because there was a general agreement profession became polarized. This col­ and optimism about certain social issues, lapse of consensus was accompanied in and that happy consensus, in turn, was made the late 1970s with a collapse of the aca­ possible by the profession's religious, eth­ demic employment market — a develop­ nic, class, and gender homogeneity. ment that aggravated the profession's The ideal of objectivity was reevalu­ sense of crisis. ated before and especially after World By the early 1980s, many of the ideo­ War I by progressive and "relativist" his­ logical tensions in the profession were torians such as Charles Beard and Carl mitigated as New Left historians were Becker. Some of the objectivists' concep­ incorporated into departments, but the tions of Anglo-Teutonic supremacy and turmoil of the Vietnam War era wrought of the advance of the West were chal­ changes in the profession that are still lenged in new interpretations of the with us. It reoriented the mainstream of American Revolution and slavery and in the profession away from the writing of the debate over the question of war guilt. national political history to the writing of But this dissension with the reigning be­ social history. It provoked a conservative liefs of the profession was beaten back by reaction — a "hyperobjectivist" backlash the ideological mobilization that came that, in the notorious David Abraham af­ with and after the next World War. From fair of the mid-1980s, destroyed the ca­ the 1940s to the early 1960s, the profes­ reer of a promising young historian. And REVIEWS 223 it resulted in a "fragmentation'' of the ism leads him to embrace "perspectivism" profession, in the emergence of certain — namely, the view that one's particular groups, mainly, in black and feminist his­ interests, sensibility, background, etc., tory, that rejected die objectivist assump­ crucially determine one's understanding tion that everyone was capable of attain­ and representation of the world. On this ing a position of unprejudiced historical theory, the position of all-knowing neu­ observer. According to this "particular­ tral observer is impossible and hence ob­ ism," an accurate history of an oppressed jective history unattainable. But although group could only be written by members Novick offers a searching analysis of the of that group. Novick concludes that this profession's crippled objectivism and al­ last development, combined with recent though he professes to have repudiated "hyperrelativist" theories, especially that troubled principle, in one important from literary criticism, have left the ideal respect he has not fully thought out the of objectivity in near ruins. The profes­ consequences of his analysis and the sion is on the verge of collapsing into problems surrounding the issue of objec­ atomized groups no longer able to speak tivity. This can be illustrated by consider­ to each other. ing a striking inconsistency in the book: Novick is highly suspicious both of Novick rejects the ideal of objectivity and the profession's assertions of objectivity its privileged historical point of view, but and of the philosophical coherence of that he still writes as t/he subscribes to both. idea. His awareness of problems with In his examination of New Left revision­ both the profession's claims and with the ism in diplomatic history, for example, he idea in itself enables him to point out tells us that "there were errors and exag­ many of the ironies and self-deceptions of gerations in revisionist work, along with objectivist historical practice. He shows, other defects.... Gabriel Kolko consis­ for example that the original claims to tently overestimated calculation and con­ doing scrupulous scientific history were tinuity in American policy... and he could based on thinly-researched doctoral the­ be reasonably charged with giving Soviet ses. The notion of professional excellence versions of events a benefit of the doubt ended up institutionalizing mediocrity. which they did not deserve." This judge­ The profession's call for relentless criti­ ment is clearly objectivist in its assump­ cism was all too frequently compromised tions: Novick is saying that some histori­ by a need to ensure consensus and comity: ans have failed to get the world right, hence editors of the American Historical implying thereby that he knows how to Review would excise reviewers' negative tell what it means to get the world right remarks about works of leading histori­ There is a discrepancy between his skep­ ans. The success of the profession has ticism about objectivism and a rhetorical resulted in the separation of historians and argumentative mode that presupposes from a larger public — and ultimately it. The typically objectivist form of the from each other. The profession has be­ book runs counter to its message — its come so prolific in its research that it has story of objectivism's impossibility. disabled the individual historian: one can Novick fails to confront the question of no longer be more than the master of a whether modern non-objectivist histori­ narrow specialization. The belief of radi­ cal representation is logically and rhetor­ cal feminist historians that men and ically possible; of how it could operate or women have incommensurate natures what it would look like. By not dealing was successfully used to justify work dif­ with those issues and by assuming instead ferences and pay differentials in the that an anti-objectivist can simply go on 1980s legal case of the Equal Employ­ writing in an objectivist mode, he leaves ment Opportunity Commission v. Sears, us in a logical quandary — what a Roebuck and Co. deconstructionist would call an "aporia." The profession appears to be trapped in a Novick's critical analysis of objectiv­ 224 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL structure of contradictory, self-subvert­ relatively recently organized by the ing intention: historians assume their ob­ RWDSU and UFCW. Two groups of pro­ jectivity, but their writings repeatedly fessional workers were included, both demonstrate that objectivity is impossi­ largely female and mostly unorganized ble; they claim to do without it, but they before the 1960s: nurses in non-profit then write as if it were already true. hospitals (organized by the ANA) and public school teachers (NEA/AFT). With Harold Man extensive co-operation from the unions Queen's University and managements involved, the authors surveyed and interviewed participants in David Lewin and Richard B. Peterson, the grievance process for a sample of em­ The Modern Grievance Procedure in the ployers in each industry, and carried out United States (New York: Quorum Books a content analysis of the grievance-re­ 1988). lated files maintained by one employer in each group. FORMAL GRIEVANCE procedures, culmi­ The authors found that while griev­ nating in some form of binding arbitra­ ance, settlement and arbitration rates var­ tion, are almost universal in North ied by industry, the number of grievances American collective bargaining. Their declined during the 1980-82 recession ubiquity is not a matter of empty form: the and grievance activity generally in­ procedures are heavily used. Lewin and creased just before contract negotiations. Peterson estimate that 1.2 million written These findings suggest a positive rela­ grievances were filed by unionized work­ tionship between grievance rates and ers in the United States in 1986; if griev­ union militancy. There were also interin­ ances settled informally before being dustry differences in the perceived impor­ reduced to writing are included, the num­ tance of grievance issues (highest in steel; ber swells to nearly 11 million. Despite lowest in retail trade) and fairness of set­ the apparent significance of these proce­ tlements (highest in teaching; lowest in dures, their workings and outcomes have nursing and trade). Several factors consis­ received much less scholarly analysis tently contributed to higher grievance and than such other collective bargaining in­ arbitration rates, lengthier proceedings, stitutions as contract negotiation or arbi­ and more widespread perceptions that the tral decision-making. Lewin and Peterson issues were important and the outcomes supply an extensive review of the existing fair: these included management or union literature, which they find to be limited in insistence on taking certain grievances scope and sophistication, or overly anec­ through the whole procedure, union poli­ dotal. Modern Grievance Procedure is an cies requiring that grievances be in writ­ ambitious attempt to redress the balance ing; the availability of expedited arbitra­ through an extensive, highly-structured tion procedures; and adversarial labour quantitative study. relations. Expedited procedures appeared Lewin and Peterson study the organi­ to be the most effective, both in terms of zation, operation and outcomes of griev­ the speed of settlement and perceived eq­ ance procedures in four United States in­ uity. There were interindustry differences dustries. The steel industry, composed of in the subject matter of grievances: disci­ many employers and heavily organized pline, health and safety, and management by the USWA for two generations, repre­ rights figure prominently in steel; union sented largely male, blue-collar occupa­ security and work assignment in retail tions in private industry. Female, white- trade; discipline and workload in the hos­ collar workers in the private sector were pitals; health and safety and work assign­ represented by clerical and sales workers ments in the public schools. In all indus­ in the retail department store industry, tries, grievers were more likely than non- dominated by multi-plant employers, and grievers to be young, male, black, and REVIEWS 225

relatively well-educated. travel long distances across quite arid pla­ Union and management officials re­ teaux between what are undeniably arrest­ port that grievance activity has a direct ing observations and insights. The jour­ and substantial impact on collective bar­ ney, though exhausting, is worth the trou­ gaining: issues that are raised first in ble. grievances tend to make their way onto the negotiating agenda. This suggests that Paul Craven grievances serve a useful and important York University role not only in solving immediate prob­ lems but in shaping the terms and condi­ Alexander Cockbum, Corruptions of Em­ tions of employment generally. Indeed, pire: Life Studies A. The Reagan Era both managers and union officials ex­ (London: Verso 1988). pressed satisfaction with the procedure. But at the same time, the immediate out­ THE PAST DECADE in the US has seen comes tend to deter its use. There was increased concentration of ownership in some evidence that non-grievers were de­ the media/publishing/entertainment in­ terred from using the grievance procedure dustries. Gannett Corporation bought up by fear of reprisals. Such fears would not local newspapers at a rapid rate and pro­ have been unfounded. One of Lewin and duced the first national newspaper, USA Peterson's clearest and most important Today, better known as "Newt McN- findings is that in the year following uggets". Rupert Murdoch invaded the US grievance settlement, both grievers and market, buying newspapers and assem­ the supervisors against whom they bling a fourth television network. Vener­ grieved had lower performance ratings, able NBC was bought by General fewer promotions, poorer attendance re­ Electric. Time and Warner Brothers have cords and higher turnover rates than their merged to form Time-Warner. peers. Among grievers, those who won Decisions affecting the integrity and their grievances fared the worst. independence of the press are thus made This volume can be distinguished by an ever decreasing number of individ­ from other studies of the grievance pro­ uals. Independent and local voices are fast cess not only by its coverage but also by being submerged in the corporate bottom the range and complex interactions of the line. A.J. Liebling's comment, "Freedom variables examined and by its focus on of the press is limited to those who own grievance outcomes and the effectiveness one," never seemed more apt. of grievance procedures. The authors de­ Alexander Cockburn's Corruptions velop a sophisticated analytic model and of Empire stands in stark contrast to this apply rigorous statistical tests for the in­ brave new world of 'infotainment'. The terrelations between a whole battery of book is a collection of articles which dependent and independent variables. Cockbum, a British journalist resident in Unfortunately for the general reader, the the US since 1972, wrote from the mid- very complexity of the research apparatus 1970s through 1988 and which appeared — which makes this study so much more in such improbably diverse publications as interesting and useful than most of its House and Garden, The Nation, The Wall predecessors — tends to get in the way of Street Journal, and Village Voice, among assimilating the principal findings. Lewin others. The articles from Village Voice were and Peterson have attempted to address co-written with James Ridgeway. this problem with section and chapter Cockbum made his mark as an acer­ summaries, but the fact remains that this bic critic of the mainstream press. A typ­ book is as much about research design as ical Cockbum article examines — and about grievance procedures, so that those sometimes parodies — the way the press more interested in labour relations than reports a story and then provides an alter­ methodology should expect to have to nate view. In a sense, Cockbum is a spir- 226 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL itual heir of I.F. Stone, though neither placed it in the context of other US efforts kinder nor gentler than Stone. to support non-existent moderates against It is often difficult to construct a co­ progressive or communist movements. In herent book from previously published "The Tricoteuse of Counterrevolution," articles, and Corruptions of Empire is he examines Shirley Christian's reporting best read as a chronicle of the Age of from Argentina, Chile and Central Amer­ Reagan. Its purpose is to show how polit­ ica for The Miami Herald and The New ical and journalistic culture changes be­ York Times and finds in her work a prime tween Watergate and the Iran/Contra example of "the rightward swerve of scandal and to expose "the role of the mainstream journalism." press in articulating and hence validating Perhaps more than any other journal­ the concepts and images of the Reagan era." ist, Cockburn works consistently at dis­ Corruptions of Empire is less suc­ pelling the subjective fog surrounding the cessful in the former, but succeeds bril­ concept of terrorism. When the Iran/Con­ liantly in the latter. Cockburn and tra scandal broke in 1986, reporters scur­ Ridgeway together do a better job of an­ ried to find out about Michael Ledeen, the alyzing electoral politics than Cockburn mysterious consultant on terrorism. In on his own. Cockburn's greatest success 1981, Cockburn had already cast his spot­ lies in demystifying the symbols of light on him and his role in formulating Reaganism. He punctures its overblown the Reagan view of terrorism. Cockbum's and self-congratulatory rhetoric and articles show the way the US administra­ makes a good case for the press's com­ tion has used counterterrorism as a justi­ plicity in Reaganism. fication for a myriad of otherwise unsale­ Cockbum writes about the newly-re- able policies. commissioned battleship, U.S.S. New But Cockbum does more than analyze Jersey, as embodying "Reagan's armor- other reporters' work. He makes a con­ plated relationship to the modern world." scious effort to report the views and work In reality, as events in Lebanon showed, of people who are not the usual sources battleships can do little to advance unten­ for other journalists. Corruptions of Em­ able policies. pire includes an extensive interview with A short article, "You Just Mugged Boris Kagarlitsky, a supporter of Boris My Heart," shows Cockburn at his irrev­ Yeltsin, which gives the reader adifferent erent best, stringing together a series of perspective on the early days of glasnost seemingly unrelated items to draw a sar­ and perestroïka. "Karl and Fred: Driving donic conclusion. Starting with the Jarvik into the Sunset" provides the reader with artificial heart, described as "a giant step a lively commentary on Reaganomics forward in the commodification of the from the perspective of radical political human body," Cockburn moves to the economists at University of Califor­ newly-introduced standup toothpaste dis­ nia/Riverside. penser, described as a symbol of a newly Cockbum's strength as a weekly erect America and a "simulacrum of a commentator on Reaganism is that he has male Caucasian sexual member," until he a memory. His articles are not written in reaches his destination — a nuclear mis­ the vacuum of today's news. He obvi­ sile. In six paragraphs, Cockburn ties it all ously keeps a voluminous clipping file together and sets it against the invasion of and he presents his reader with context Grenada. When someone starts playing the same Cockbum's articles on Central Amer­ old song, Cockbum exhumes the original ica are invaluable in exposing the biases and puts the two side by side. The polem­ in the US press coverage of that region. ical style and caustic language may put In 1981, he showed how the press pro­ off some people and provide people with moted the notion of US support for a an excuse to ignore his work. But his middle way in Central America and articles are a powerful antidote to the in- REVIEWS 227 creasingly homogenized and sanitized shares with Levine—although for differ­ news now being marketed. At a time when ent reasons — a respect for Malthus), the distinctions among news, corporate since Macfarlane's excessively self-as­ public relations, and entertainment are sured and heavily-ideological stance in nebulous, Cockbum's jaundiced eye is his Marriage and Lave in England lead needed. only to confusion. Levine's is very much One final note. His adversarial atti­ the better book, although Macfarlane's tude toward official Washington may in will get more attention. part be explained by genetics: "I came Alas, the clarity and logic of this first from a family whose earliest connections chapter do not always command the cen­ with America had been the brusque torch­ tral sections of the book, which cover ing of the White House and Capital by early modern times and the industrial rev­ Admiral Sir George Cockbum in the War olution, where Levine's growing exper­ of 1812." In Corruptions of Empire, tise (he can call upon his Terling and Cockbum continues to torch the White Shepshed reserves) leads him to incau­ House and Capitol. The book is worth tion. The writing becomes uneven, with reading as a chronicle of the golden Age suggestive and original hypotheses lying of Reagan. It also will shed light on the alongside commonplaces, with a didactic same themes as replayed by George Bush. style (punctuated with heavily-italicized key-words: cottage economy, proletarian John Peter Olinger demography model, protoindustrializa- Washington, DC tion) alternating with somewhat self-con­ scious and hesitant exploration. In the David Levine, Reproducing Families: final chapter Levine romps off on a long The Political Economy of English Popu­ (and not very expert) discourse on pri­ lation History (Cambridge: Cambridge mary school education, which the alert University Press 1987). reader will note has been occasioned by a half-hidden polemic against propositions I AM GLAD THAT this book has happened, of J.C. Caldwell in two articles in Popu­ but it has to be said that it is a book in lation and Development Review, articles search of an editor. At times it is less like which only specialists in demography are a book than a long private letter written to likely to have read. another congenial scholar, in which ideas I do not mind books which are eccen­ are tossed around and tried out. The style tric, enthusiastic, exploratory, or even and manner change abruptly. I found the whimsical. Levine tells us this book "was Introduction so whimsical that it blocked written in an exuberant period of five my entry into the rest of the book for months." This is a good way to write the several months. Then I found the first first draft of a book, and greatly to be chapter (on "Feudalism and the Peasant preferred to the warmed-over doctoral Family") fascinating. Presumably this is thesis or the textbook tailored to course the period with which David Levine is assignments which we more usually get least familiar (as I am) but he made up for Yet such writing does require a little revi­ this by careful documentation, and by de­ sion, and can benefit from editorial assis­ ploying his argument with clarity and tance. The book appears in a series rigor. I was glad that he paid attention to ("Themes in the Social Sciences") which masters in the field (Postan and Hilton), has a stable-full of prestigious "editors" and to the ongoing researches of such — John Dunn, Jack Goody, Eugene A. scholars as Christopher Dyer, R.M. Hammel, Geoffrey Hawthorne, Charles Smith, Rosamond Faith and Zvi Razi. I Tilly — but perhaps editors too presti­ was glad that he refuses to tangle with gious and too busy to do any editing? Alan Macfarlane (there is no mention of What Levine's book needed was a rigor­ him in this book, despite the fact that he ous in-house editor, who could have 228 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL pointed out to him the many repetitions careful use of the findings of Wrigley and and breaks in logical flow, perhaps send­ Schofield's Population History to note ing it back with suggestions for revision. moments of acceleration or deceleration. Maybe such editorial intervention was of­ The cottage economy was given a pro­ fered and refused, and maybe not. Cam­ longed lease on life by the proto-indus- bridge University Press historical publi­ trial phase, which, however, saw a shift cations in the past few years have not towards a "proletarian model" in the de­ given one confidence, and excellent, me­ mand for children's labour and in facili­ diocre and plainly poor books have been tating earlier marriage. Then towards the thrown out pell-mell, one after another. end of the 19th century the cottage econ­ There is little evidence of the kind of omy, which had been under the pressure editorial disciplines (and the support-net­ of the increasing land-deprivation and work of expert publisher's readers) that proletarianization of the peasantry over one should expect from a major academic the previous two hundred years, collapsed press. Everything these days is hype and rapidly as agriculture (assisted by the presentation. One has to make these great wave of parliamentary enclosures) points, because Reproducing Families became fully capitalist in character. In could, with editorial attention and with response the "peasant demography some revision, have been a much better model" gave way to the "proletarian de­ book. Again and again one feels that mography model," in which the age of Levine's structure of historical argument marriage fell by several years, illegiti­ could have been presented not only with macy rates rose sharply, and celibacy de­ more brevity but with greater clarity. clined. The demographic consequences The central structure of the argument were very marked. Levine estimates that is clear enough. After the Black Death "the replacement rate of the proletarian and the demographic crises of the 14th demography model was far above that of century, a peasantry with a greatly im­ the peasant demography model — each proved bargaining power settled into a generation of proletarian demography self-regulating (homeostatic) regime, in meant a 52 per cent increase in the base which by deferred marriage (especially of population as opposed to a 17 per cent rise women) population grew only slowly and in the peasant model." (90) Such rates of the rural surplus, in the late 17th and in increase are found during the French the 19th centuries, was in good part car­ wars, and Levine sees a "Malthusian mo­ ried to the growing towns (London espe­ ment" at which time Malthus's arguments cially, with its decades of deficit) or ex­ were well-founded and, in particular, he ported in emigration to the colonies. shares Malthus's view that parish allow­ At the centre of this demographic re­ ances encouraged a lowering of the age of gime was the cottage economy, in which marriage and the breeding of children. the working population was not fully pro- This is all fascinating. Sometimes it is letarianised, but still had some access to well illustrated and sustained; sometimes use-rights in land through dwarf land- it is not. At one point Levine says that this holdings, garden plots, common rights to demographic history might be written out grazing and fuel, and looked to wage lab­ in terms of the history of the Poor Law; our not as the sole resource of subsistence but he does not give us this history in any but as a supplement in harvest or in time detail, and, indeed, his references to the of need. In such a regime the community working of the Old Poor Law are some­ more or less found spaces for newly-weds what distanced. If we are now shown in (either through the death or retirement of any detail how the parish allowance sys­ parents or by other means) but weddings tems worked out, it is difficult to judge might be delayed until such space was how far Mai thus (or Levine) have identi­ found. Population growth was moderate fied the mechanisms and pressures at and was "marriage driven." Levine makes work. A number of marginal issues might REVIEWS 229 have been given less space, and an exam­ right usage, also bears this out The long- ination of the workings of the Poor Law submerged English peasantry is coming between 1780 and 1830 might have been back into view; demographicalry, it was a given more. potent force. Levine's book has come at Central to the study is the very wel­ the right time and his "cottage economy" come emphasis on the "cottage econ­ is moving into the center of scholarly omy." In this Levine is swimming with concern. the tide of healthy historical revision. In David Levine has written a provoca­ the decades when a certain kind of eco­ tive and stimulating essay on the political nomic history agenda dominated the economy of demography at a time when study of the social history of the 17th and this is needed. He insists that "demogra­ 18th centuries, there was a common error phy and economy were fused together and of confusing acres and products with the it is misleading to split them in an arbi­ fortunes of people. We had as the central trary manner." We must locate "the im­ problematic the "agricultural revolution" pact of social relations of production with (was it to be pitched in the 16th, 17th, or the grid of private relations of reproduc­ 18th centuries?) and all was resumed in tion." Reproducing Families is continu­ the growing product for the market. What ally drawing attention to the economic, this overlooked was that in many village social, and cultural determinants upon re­ communities, the majority of people (and production, and the reproductive determi­ demography arises from people and not nants upon economic possibility, social from acres or markets) did not take much norms and cultural expectations: "the ar­ part in this triumphal market process. rows" (as Levine says) flow both ways. They clung on to marginal use-rights, This book has demolished an academic supplemented by wage labour from time Berlin WalL which segregated demogra­ to time, and were recruited into the grow­ phy from economic and social history. ing proto-industrial and outwork sectors. Even if some parts of it are better than In pastoral districts — as Kussmaul has others, it is a significant event and I am shown — the practice long survived of very glad that it has happened. living-in farm servants, who saved their earnings until they could set up a cottage E.P. Thompson household on marriage. Linden's upward Rutger's University revision of Gregory King's estimates of those in (often rural) industrial occupa­ E.A. Wrigley, Continuity, Chance, and tions is part of the same revision of em­ Change: The Character of the Industrial phasis as we find in Levine, as indeed is Revolution in England (Cambridge: Cam­ much of the protoindustrialization discus­ bridge University Press 1988). sion, as are recent overviews of the 18th century (from Malcolmson, Rule, Maxine IN THIS SLIM VOLUME, comprising the Mc- Berg, Pat Hudson, Sonenscher and oth­ Arthur Lectures at Cambridge University ers), and as are the increasingly expert in 1987, E.A. Wrigley offers a sweeping studies of early modern historians (for reinterpretation of the industrial revolu­ example, John Walter, "The social econ­ tion. Wrigley agrees with recent scholar­ omy of dearth in early modem England," ship in stretching out the period over in Walter and Schofield, éd.. Famine, dis­ which the industrial revolution occurred. ease, and the social order in early modern Like other recent scholars, he emphasizes society). Close attention being given by the slowness of the process and its limited 18th-century historians (Searle, J.M. impact on per capita real income until Martin, Snell, and others) to the long sur­ sometime after 1830 (or 18S0), which has viving forms of copyhold and of common led some to advocate jettisoning the term right, and (especially in the work of J.M. "industrial revolution" altogether, though Neeson) the actual practice of common Wrigley, who conceded the inappropri- 230 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL ateness of the term, is not among them. tations have been either ignored or re­ But here the similarities end. jected. Wrigley's revolution is one-di­ For Wrigley, there were two revolu­ mensional, a supply-side explanation tions: the first, a revolution of the "or­ based upon natural resources. Demand, ganic economy" (the old agricultural rev­ technological advance, and the contribu­ olution writ large), occurred in the 17th tion of human resources, especially lab­ and 18th centuries during which agricul­ our, are ignored or taken for granted. The ture greatly increased the per-capita out­ expansion of overseas and domestic mar­ put of food, supplied the raw materials for kets and the stimulus they afforded to industry, and fodder for horses. By the improved technology are missing. Is beginning of the 19th century, according there, as Wrigley would have us believe, to Wrigley, this revolution had attained no causal connection between agricul­ its limits, which is reflected in the pessi­ tural and industrial growth? Although the mism of the classical economists, who, focus is Anglocentric, are we to conclude Wrigley argues, saw the situation clearly. that countries without plentiful supplies Already, growing population was press­ of cheap coal could not, and did not, in­ ing hard on limited organic resources, dustrialize? making for an uncertain future. By supplying economic historians Then, to the rescue of this stagnating with material for debate, Wrigley's thesis organic economy, came a second revolu­ will contribute to the destruction of a siz­ tion, that of the "inorganic economy." able number of trees ( a replaceable re­ This revolution, which began after 1830, source) until, like Rostow's take-off hy­ was based primarily upon the use of coal pothesis, it fades from view. In the mean­ for energy. Though coal had long been time, the debate he has generated will used in England, as Wrigley recognizes, contribute to sharpening methodology it only realized its full potential with the and add to our storehouse of knowledge. advent of a predominantly mineral-based For this reason alone, it should be wel­ economy. The coming of the second rev­ comed. olution was "accidental" in that it bore only a casual, rather than a causal rela­ Charles E. Freedeman tionship with the first. Since the supply of SUNY, Binghamton coal and other inorganic raw materials was (until recently) seemingly inexhaust­ Christine Collette, For labour and for ible, the limitations of the organic econ­ women: The Women's Labour League, omy were transcended, opening up the 1906-18 (Manchester: Manchester Uni­ prospect for an end to poverty, and, by versity Press, 1989). raising per-capita real income, constitutes the true industrial revolution. THIS IS THE STORY of the Women's Lab­ This, in brief, is Wrigley's thesis, and our League from its inception in 1906 to although it loses much of its persuasive its disappearance as a separate body in power in this summary, there are some 1918. It seeks to show how, in the early points in its favor. In stretching out the days of feminism and socialism, it was timing of the revolution(s) over several vital for women to form separate organi­ centuries, and lowering the assessment of zations from those of men, but separate the progress that had been achieved by bodies that would be intimately involved 1830, Wrigley is undoubtedly right. And, in, and seeking to improve the shared he does well to remind us of the impor­ public and private worlds of both genders. tance of energy supplies and inorganic Its aim is commendable, its execution is raw materials to industrialization. But be­ flawed. fore jumping on the bandwagon, it gives For one thing, one is left with the one pause to observe that most of the strong impression that this is not only a usual "causes" found in current interpre­ history for Collette, but is, in fact, a dirge REVIEWS 231 for a separatist League and a call to re­ League could not achieve consensus: form such political bodies today. I think such things as sweating, suffrage and the it quite justifiable for a concerned and endowment of motherhood. For it was active historian to come to such a conclu­ this disagreement that led, in Collette's sion. Yet I wish Collette had been more own words, to "the League as the voice of "up front"abou t it, had discussed it more women at work [being] lost". Perhaps a directly, rather than just smuggling it into fuller exploration of the controversy be­ the text in small inflections and nuances. tween Mary MacArthur and Margaret I will return to the latter. In addition I Macdonald might have explained how have three problems with this book, as this came to be. well as a few quibbles. Finally, I am not entirely persuaded One of the book's gravest flaws is its by Collette's central assertion, than the neglect to place the League in its interna­ MacDonald-Middleton era.was character­ tional context The League was only one ized by having an amateur style, an en­ manifestation of what American and Ca­ abling rather than a controlling form of nadian historians have described as "ma­ leadership. It seems to me that, despite ternal feminism" which was so significant Collette's fondness for MacDonald's at­ a force for social reform in mis period tractive and potent mixture of babies and throughout the western world. Again and politics, she generally underestimates the again, I was struck by the parallels; the steeliness of her character, the imperious- discussion of suffrage as a tool of "social ness of her manner. housekeeping," the references to the "sep­ The quibbles are mainly over infelic­ arate spheres" of male and female compe­ ities of style ("Socialism thrust into the tence and concern. A greater reliance on twentieth century") and substance. the international material might also have Names are thrown out without context or sharpened the book's analytic edge. In her explanation (who is Eliza Orme, other study of American women's movements than a friend of Lady Dilke's?). Women of this period, Meredith Tax makes the are far too often called by their first valuable comment that the nature of an names. Frequently the beginning of a organization is profoundly influenced by story is told without the end. For example, where it draws its funds. Perhaps this no­ Collette describes the efforts of the Glas­ tion might have helped explain some of gow League's women to obtain industrial Margaret Mac Donald's domination of the training for unemployed women but never League in its early days (even Collette tells the reader whether or not the effort admits that "a certain ruthlessness in succeeded. Most troubling is the use of Margaret's character" could occasionally judgmental adjectives without the be seen in her dealings with the League) grounds of the judgement being given. since she contributed heavily to its oper­ Thus Collette notes that "another omi­ ational funds. nous change in League priorities" oc­ Second, I think the interesting points curred when the League made a 1912 res­ that the book makes are often raised, and olution which condemned militarism, but dropped, with insufficient discussion. For does not explain what she finds ominous example, the domination of much of the about such a stance. League's activities by women whose hus­ For Labour and for Women contains bands were active in the Labour party is interesting material about a fascinating only considered, with the exception of time and an enduring problem. Unfortu­ James and Margaret MacDonald, in pass­ nately its story is marred and its purpose ing. What happened when the League unclear. went one way, the Party another? Another important, though un- Donna T. Andrew derexplored topic, is those issues on University of Guelph which, even at quite an early date, the 232 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

Mary Drake McFeely, Lady Inspectors: eleven. She rushed off, arriving late and some­ The Campaign for a Better Workplace, what embarrassed. (27) 1893-1921 (New York: BasU BlackweU The book is comprised of a series of 1988). anecdotes and "day-in-the life" vignettes arranged into nineteen chapters. "[McF­ THIS IS THE TYPE of book that offers great eely] wears her learning lightly," a review promise. The jacket declares that the au­ on the back cover declares, as if to de­ thor, Mary Drake McFeely, provides "a scribe an achievement case study of class and gender relations" The author is prepared to make one in her tale of the first women factory observation based on her collection of inspectors in England. "This is the story," intriguing material: pioneer women fac­ the jacket continues, "of their adventures, tory inspectors had to overcome great ob­ struggles, successes and failures." The stacles, from government inaction, to women who became the first "Lady In­ male co-workers' resistance, to employer spectors" were pioneers who participated hostility, in order to improve the lot of in Britain's transition from a liberal state working women and to carve out a profes­ into one "active in social welfare." It would sion for themselves. McFeely's straight­ be fair to assume, then, that McFeely might forward account of their feats derives di­ locate her study within debates over rectly from the "lady inspectors'" diaries broader issues such as the impact of the which apparently convey confidence in welfare state on the status of women the legitimacy of their calling. workers, the questionable merits of gen­ der-based protective legislation, or the There are many opportunities for Mc­ nature of women's inter-class relations. Feely to add her own critical voice to the Unfortunately, Lady Inspectors does not inspectors' version of their work but she live up to its promise. opts to let her subjects tell their own story. At one point, she quotes from Lucy McFeely bases her book almost ex­ Deane's inspection checklist, including a clusively upon primary sources. Granted, reminder to herself not to accept workers' the diaries and memoirs of the first gen­ complaints without independent evidence eration of women to oversee the working since "women and girls lie awfully." conditions of factory women are inher­ Where McFeely could have commented ently interesting. The book opens, for in­ on this misogynistic and classist assump­ stance, with an excerpt from inspector tion from a woman whose job it was to Irene Whitworth's account of her mid­ investigate women workers' grievances, night raid on a tailor's shop in London's she lamely offers that Deane's remark is a East End in 1907. Daring, night-time for­ "curious codicil." (26) McFeely is content ays into dingy alleys certainly offered ad­ to accept the inspectors' self-righteousness venture for these genteel women who, with the same brand of faith that her sub­ like the white slavery investigators and jects felt when they described themselves as foreign missionaries of the same period, "missionar[ies] of the State...." (93) rejected domesticity in the name of a higher duty. The problem is that Lady Inspectors would have been far McFeely's account of their experiences more insightful had McFeely considered often reads like a diary itself. Passages her evidence in light of turn-of-the-cen- such as the following sketch of a tury debates over women's work. Aside inspector's first day on the job abound: from a few quotes from trade unionists who objected to the appointment of bour­ On 27 April, Lucy Deane began work. Having geois women inspectors she provides lit­ planned to meet [inspector] Abraham at the tle evidence that anyone, other than dis­ women inspector'i office in the afternoon, gruntled, male inspectors, felt that "la­ Deane went to early church and then to lunch dies" should not be bursting into pottery at 76 Sloane Street. There she discovered that sheds and brickworks to ensure the wel- Abraham had expected her at the office at REVIEWS 233

fare of women workers. write about women factory workers. Her In fact, there was a great deal of dis­ interest clearly lies with the bourgeois agreement within the women's labour women who ministered to working-class movement over the merits of protective women's needs. Nevertheless, the inspec­ legislation, no matter how "disarmingly tors were workers themselves: they were attractive and poised" the inspectors. paid far less than their male counterparts, These qualities, along with "a natural they had fewer possibilities for advance­ ability to be charming" and a "solid ment, and they worked well beyond the grounding of knowledge and experience" hours stipulated for factory workers. Mc­ as an investigator of working conditions Feely could have enriched her analysis of were die principal qualifications of the first these bourgeois working women had she inspector, May Abraham. (15) McFeely compared her inspectors to the educators admits that members of the women's labour whom Martha Vicinus discusses in Inde­ movement regarded the introduction of pendent Women. The first factory inspec­ women inspectors as "a real loss to the tors belonged to a cohort of genteel, sin­ cause of women's trade unions" yet at no gle women whose work was a "revolt point does she discuss their objections. against redundancy." The Women's Industrial Council and the McFeely would do well to consider National Union of Women Workers both Vicinus's caution against praising rejected the 1901 Factory Act, for exam­ women's achievements without question­ ple, because they felt that the enforcement ing their personal and political costs. In of protective legislation could lead to a most professions, middle-class women decline in women's wages by restricting who worked in the service of working- their hours and the conditions of their class subjects did more to liberate them­ work. The Anti-Sweating League and selves than their charges. Still, as Estelle other labour and feminist organizations Freedman argues in regard to the first pointed out that restrictive measures in generation of female prison reformers, factories drove women's jobs into private tum-of-the-century professional women homes where conditions were more diffi­ "clung to a definition of women's sepa­ cult to police. rate nature that limited their own power As Angela John has shown in her and often stifled [those] they sought to study of women in the mining industry, aid." Where Vicinus and Freedman trace the efforts of middle-class social reform­ subtle tensions, unequal opportunities ers to shorten women's hours and restrict and open conflicts in the relations be­ their occupational range was anything but tween working-class and professional "protective" for working women who women, McFeely perceives harmony. found their wages lowered or their jobs The sensitive reader is bound to pick out prohibited. Women factory workers did the discords that the author ignores. complain about their jobs to factory in­ spectors and it appears from McFeely's Carolyn Strange evidence that they were inclined to solicit Rutger's University the aid of a woman over a man. Yet even when working women took advantage of B.J. Ripley and J. McHugh, John the Factory Act and its women watchdogs Maclean (Manchester and New York: they did not necessarily seek "protection." Manchester University Press 1989). One group of laundresses sent a complaint to the women inspectors, citing their em­ THIS ADDITION TO the Lives of the Left ployer for paying low wages and failing to Series presents a tightly argued and stim­ provide beer. The "ladies," however, were ulating reappraisal of the legendary Scott­ empowered only to fine employers, not to ish Marxist, John MacLean. Mac Lean's improve wages or "benefits." popular reputation is of a courageous and McFeely, to be fair, did not set out to unyielding agitator, hounded by the Brit- 234 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

ish government, appointed Soviet Consul great project of a Scottish Labour College after the Bolshevik Revolution, too un­ remained uppermost until his death). compromising in his leftism and national­ Moreover, they argue, he located his so­ ism to join the Communist Party of Great cialist agitation within the mainstream of Britain, cut down by poverty and pneu­ existing working-class forms, notably the monia at the age of forty-four. cooperative movement, and was respon­ Ripley and McHugh seek to rebut an sive to new developments such as the accretion of interpretations. There is first growing industrial unrest on the eve of the the version set down by former comrades war. These emphases provide a valuable such as Willie Gallacher and Tom Bell corrective to the common view of MacLean who fell out with Mac Lean over the estab­ as incorrigibly intransigent and sectarian, lishment, control and early course of the but they are not without ambiguities. A Communist Party. Writing as leading member of a tiny socialist grouplet embed­ Party figures, they presented Maclean as ded within an overwhelmingly non-social­ a misguided dogmatist who lost direction ist labour movement, the valency of his and emotional stability as the result of his social democracy was necessarily differ­ wartime mistreatment and afterwards suc­ ent from that of continental socialists cumbed to quixotic isolation. Second, whose adherence to a mass party strategy there is the more recent revisionist treat­ was more plausible. And as the pedagog­ ment by historians such as Iain McLean ical, utterly humorous son of an improv­ who portray Red Clydeside as a myth and ing, strict Calvinist household, his temper Maclean as the embodiment of its fantasy was vehemently judgmental — this emo­ of an insurgent proletariat. Finally, there is tional side and the whole texture of his the Scottish nationalist account of Maclean personal life receives only fragmentary as the leader lost, who spumed subordina­ attention. tion to Moscow for an authentically Cale­ Yet if their argument about his typi­ donian form of national liberation. cality is accepted, then some attention to The authors bring limited new infor­ this aspect is necessary to explain why he mation to their study. Perhaps its chief emerged during the War as the most no­ advantage is that they write in hindsight torious Scottish seditionary. Unlike about a Communist tradition that is no Gallacher and other celebrated heroes of longer so insistent as to arouse sectarian the industrial unrest on the Clyde, he had hackles; about the revisionist mode of no direct membership of the Clyde Work­ academic scholarship whose substantial ers Committee; unlike Dollan and others arguments they can acknowledge while who mostly finished as members of the resisting its barren empiricism; and about Independent Labour Party, he was not an a nationalist standpoint with which they initiator of the Glasgow rent strike. are sympathetically critical. The result is Rather, he was the most prominent of the a temperate restatement of Maclean's anti-war publicists. His initial refusal to originality and significance. pay a fine of just £5 imposed for making They see him up to the outbreak of speeches designed to undermine recruit­ World War I as an orthodox social demo­ ment heralded a series of prosecutions, crat of the Second International whose defiant speeches from the dock, imprison­ politics revolved around the idea of the ments and hunger strikes that created his mass party engaged in agitation, educa­ popular following. Ripley and McHugh tion and propaganda, the primacy of the offer a judicious treatment of the allega­ political over the industrial, and the insis­ tions that he was mistreated — they dis­ tence on working-class internationalism. count the allegation of poisoned prison MacLean, they suggest, was no theorist food; they reveal that he was not force-fed and indeed they query his grasp of some but rather artificially fed (though they do elements of Marxism, but he placed great not explain the distinction); they add that store on working-class education (and his he received special privileges (such as REVIEWS 235 books) and early releases as a political Mary Lynn Stewart, Women, Work and prisoner; and they indicate the traumatic the French State: Labour Protection and effect of these repeated ordeals on his Social Patriarchy, 1879-1919 (Kingston: mental state. The crucial missing element McGill-Queen's University Press 1989). is his persistence; he was by no means the only radical to suffer persecution, but PROTECTIVE LEGISLATION for women has unique surely in his refusal to abstain. The long been a controversial issue. On one cover picture, taken from a prison photo side are those who argue that women's in Peterhead in July 1916, is eloquent testi­ interests in the workforce are no different mony: a stocky, rough-hewn man, head from men's and therefore should receive shaven, he stands in three-piece suit and no separate treatment, that separate treat­ winged collar, hands pressing on his breast, ment only worsens women's position; withdrawn, inanimate, defiant Yet the book they also insist that women must define takes the martyrdom as a given. and protect their own interests through The final chapters consider his post­ trade unions and other organizations. On war trajectory that left him marooned on the other side are those who maintain that the declining eddies of working-class un­ women's special needs, particularly as rest. Here the authors again emphasise his mothers, require not only distinctive pol­ consistency to the politics of social de­ itics but state intervention since histori­ mocracy at a time when the left fissured cally women have been excluded from into warring blocks. They suggest that he (male-dominated) trade unions and also was unable to adapt to crucial elements of slow to organize on their own behalf. Bolshevism, especially the doctrine of the Mary Lynn Stewart makes a persua­ party, and temperamentally incapable of sive case for the first of these positions accepting the leadership credentials of through a careful study of protective leg­ those who decked themselves in the au­ islation in France. She shows how deeply thority of Moscow. I think they are con­ the legislation was affected by assump­ vincing in their continued insistence that tions about women's dependence and vul­ MacLean was no ultra-leftist of the sort nerability and how the implementation of now labelled infantile, less convincing in legislation reinforced those notions. Re­ their claim that his Scottish nationalism formers who were reluctant to interfere should be discounted — the problem with "the individual liberty of (male) cit­ there is that by treating nationalism and izens," (51) had no such difficulty with internationalism too much as alternatives, women. Since women were not citizens they lose much that is distinctive and im­ and were presumed to have no direct ac­ portant in his assertion of a radical Scot­ cess to political power, they were consid­ land. Nor do I see that much hangs on ered dependent and in need of protection. MacLean's rejection of the Leninist doc­ Women's vulnerability was described trine of democratic centralism and the in many ways: their bodies were weaker vanguard party, since the British com­ than men's; work "perverted" the repro­ rades so conspicuously failed to adopt ductive organs, rendering women unfit to these practices until later in the 1920s. bear and nurse healthy babies; employ­ They make the valid point that Mac Lean's ment distracted them from domestic fate should not be read retrospectively as tasks; night jobs exposed them to sexual if the political boundaries were final and danger in the shop and on the way to and exclusive and it was apparent to all that from the workplace; working alongside MacLean was entering a wilderness; and men or under male supervision carried the yet the final chapters of his life still have possibility of moral corruption. All of this the pathos of a preordained tragedy. led to the need, it was maintained, for state protection. The republican legislator Stuart Macintyre Jules Simon argued at the International University of Melbourne Conference on Labour Legislation in Ber- 236 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

lin in 1890 that maternity leaves for work­ night work. These distinctions further jus­ ing women ought to be mandated "in the tified pay differentials and the ascription name of the evident and superior interest of different characteristics and statuses to of the human race." It was, he said, pro­ men and women. Stewart's conclusion is tection due "persons whose health and apt: "Overall the most striking outcome of safety can only be safeguarded by the sex-specific hours and standards was an State." (175) entrenched and exaggerated sexual divi­ These justifications, whether physi­ sion of labour." (119) cal, moral, practical or political, con­ The evidence presented in the book is strued women workers as a special group telling and extensive with many fine ex­ whose wage work created problems of a amples carefully examined; the argument different order from those typically asso­ forceful. Women, Work and the French ciated with male labour. They were part State is an important contribution not of a larger discourse which constructed only to French labour history, but also to the woman worker as an anomalous figure ongoing discussions about political strat­ and which implemented a sharp sexual egies for working women. division of labour in 19th century Prance. Although its proponents talked in Joan Wallach Scott general terms about the needs of all work­ Princeton University ing women, the legislation that was passed was narrowly circumscribed. Roger Bourderon and Yvan Stewart shows that laws limiting the Avakoumovitch, Détruire le PCF — Ar­ hours of women's work were usually ap­ chives de V Etat français et de l'occupant plied only to factory work and to those hitlérien 1940-1944 (Paris: Messidor/Edi­ trades where men predominated. Many tions Sociales 1988). areas of work were entirely excluded, among them agriculture, domestic ser­ WHEN WAS THE FRENCH Communist Re­ vice, retail establishments, family-run sistance launched: in 1940 or in June shops and domestic workshops. These 1941? The debate over whether or not the usually constituted the major employers French Communist Party (PCF) of women in the first place. In France, embarked on an anti-Nazi crusade imme­ some three-quarters of all working diately following the strange defeat of women were not covered by the laws France in 1940 is an enduring one. Most passed in the 1890s. Stewart sums up the historians of French Communism, among impact of the legislation this way: them Annie Kriegel, Philippe Robreiux and' I.M. Wall, have stressed in recent Exemptions accommodated industries accus­ years the internal chaos which plagued tomed to cheap female labour, accelerated the life of the PCF between 1939 and women's movement into unregulated sectors and thereby accentuated female crowding in 1941. These scholars contend that the Hit­ the backward industries. Administration of the ler-Stalin pact of August 1939, combined law reinforced these effects. Inspectors imple­ with Daladier's decision to outlaw the mented the letter of the la w in masculine trades PCF on 26 September of the same year, yet overlooked infractions in feminine occupa­ had left the party traumatised and con­ tions. In short, sex-specific labour legislation fused. It was not until the final collapse of sanctioned and enforced the assignment of the Stalin-Hitler entente in June 1941, women to lower paying secondary labour mar­ they feel, that the PCF officially began an kets. (14) efficient and fearless resistance against Vichy and the Germans. Torn apart by Even in industrial employment, the intense fratricidal tensions, the PCF is laws had the effect of intensifying the thus widely perceived to have only nar­ segregation of male and female workers, rowly escaped extinction in 1940. While whether to accommodate the need for dif­ French Communist leaders generally felt ferent shift lengths or to separate day and REVIEWS 237

compelled to follow les directives de Pétain régime and the Nazis after 1940, Moscou, party members were predictably "l'aspect de la politique de collaboration anything but unified in their responses sur lequel pétainistes et nazis pouvaient towards the Pétain régime or the German se mettre le plus aisément d'accord." occupation of France. Persecuted by (14) It was symptomatic of their common Vichy and the Nazis from the outset, sev­ perception of the PCF as a formidable eral Communists chose to oppose the new threat to social peace in France that the rulers regardless of party guidelines de­ préfet of Seine-et-Oise spoke in 1940 of nouncing the war as a bourgeois conflict French Communism as a secretive, shad­ which should not concern workers. Ac­ owy and well-organized movement with cording to Robreiux, the PCF had proba­ a seemingly supernatural ability to thrive bly trickled down to a mere 2,000 on persecution. organized members by the end of 1940, As Bourderon and Avakoumovitch and as many as 18,000 Communists had acknowledge in the introduction, the been imprisoned. And yet it was this di­ book is based on sources suffering from minutive clandestine network of Commu­ "ideological cecity." (11) Indeed, one nist Resistance, in open rebellion against cannot help wondering at times whether the leadership of the PCF, which saved Vichy and the Nazis were not exaggerat­ the party from falling into oblivion. It was ing the strength and influence of Commu­ resistance against Vichy which allowed nism between 1940 and 1941. The authors French Communism to regain its momen­ point out, for example, that the Nazis tum and unity in the wake of June 1941. were unable to determine the where­ This traditional account of the history abouts of Maurice Thorez during the first of the PCF between 1940 and 1941, which half of the war, thus suggesting that then- underlines the internecine feuds paralyz­ information on the PCF was anything but ing the party during these chaotic years, complete. The German assessment of the was challenged in 1984 by the publication membership of the party was never accu­ of German documents dealing with the rate and sometimes widely inflated: in French Communist Resistance. In his in­ January 1941, the Gestapo spoke of troduction to these sources in La Gestapo "more than five million" French Commu­ contre le Parti Communiste Rapports sur nists. (51) Still, Détruire le PCF remains l'activité du PCF (décembre 1940-juin a fascinating and highly readable account 1941, Roger Bourderon debunked what of the gradual mutation of the PCF into a he dismissed as "la version indéfiniment leading voice of the French Resistance ressassée" (36) of the events of 1940 and movement. In the PCF, the authors con­ 1941. French Communism, he claimed, tend, the Nazis saw not only a formidable did not have to wait for Hitler's invasion political enemy but also un cancer social of Russia to mobilize its followers against which they felt compelled to extirpate. the Nazis. In fact, Bourderon contends The book is above all a tribute to the that the PCF became la bête noire of courage and resourcefulness displayed by Vichy and the Nazis as early as 1940. the members of the French Communist With Détruire le PCF Archives de l'Etat Resistance throughout the war. The descrip­ français et de l'occupant hitlérien 1940- tion of the various methods of sabotage used 1944 (1988), Bourderon and by PCF members will be of great interest for Avakoumovitch undertake the task of students of the Resistance. substantiating this revisionist thesis. The Yet the authors of Détruire le PCF, book is introduced as the first study of the even within a framework limited to the French Communist Resistance based on PCF, leave several important questions an exhaustive examination of French and unanswered. It would have been interest­ German archives. The authors are thus ing, for example, if they had explained the able to trace a vivid picture of the obses­ historical roots of the anti-communism sive fear of Communism shared by the displayed by the Vichy régime and the 238 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

Nazis. Why were the Nazis so intent on munists were patriotic, selfless, heroes. crushing French Communism? What par­ The reality of 1940 was thus far more allels could be drawn here with their atti­ complex than Bourderon and tude towards German Communism? What Avakoumovitch suggest about Communist Resistance in Nazi Ger­ Yet regardless of their ideological many? Le grand absent from this narra­ feuds, French Communists certainly tive, however, is Charles de Gaulle. Al­ played a crucial role in the Resistance though the main focus of the book is the movement. The saga of the metamorpho­ PCF, it is a distortion of reality to liqui­ sis of the PCF into a leading anti-Vichy date the Gaullist Resistance with a few and anti-Nazi movement deserves to be paragraphs. The authors inform us that fully understood. Détruire le PCF is an 2,000 Communists and 1,865 GauIIists informative and interesting contribution were arrested between May 1942 and to our knowledge of the French Resis­ May 1943 in the South of France. But the tance. But it explores only one aspect of book sheds too little light on the marriage a multi-faceted phenomenon. French of convenience between these two move­ Communism was one of the myriad faces ments. The PCF archives could surely of the Resistance, something which reveal a great deal more about the growth Bourderon and Avakoumovitch seem to of partnerships between Communists, So­ forget at times. They could have been cialists and GauIIists. The authors take it more specific while discussing some for granted that their readers already have major crises and events: for example, the a thorough knowledge of French history tragedy of Oradour-sur-Glane is merely and of life sous la botte. Their lively ac­ alluded to and the authors stop short of count of the Communist Resistance reads examining the "particularly unjust fate" like a thriller, but it falls short of tracing (245) awaiting several members of the an all-embracing picture and ought to be French Communist Resistance after 1944. read along with more global studies deal­ Despite its narrow focus, Détruire le PCF ing with World War II France. has the merit of introducing the reader to In an attempt to demonstrate that PCF rich and fascinating archives. The book is members started to fight Vichy and the not the definitive assessment of French Nazis as early as 1940, Bourderon and Communism during World War U, but the Avakoumovitch appear at times to be­ enthusiasm of the authors for their topic lieve that all French Communists op­ is infectious. posed collaboration. Yet as Rémy Hand- ourtzel and Cyril Buffet have recently Michèle Lalancette shown in La Collaboration ... à gauche Queen's University aussi (Paris, 1989), some French Commu­ nists were not immune to the temptation Henry Milner, Sweden: Social Democ­ of collaboration. Members of the PCF, racy in Practice (Oxford: Oxford Univer­ along with all Frenchmen, were deeply sity Press 1989). shaken by the events of 1940. The author's contention that "Le Parti Com­ IN THIS BOOK, Henry Milner has set out to muniste comme institution, la direction map the nature of social democracy in communiste dans ses hommes, ne se sont Sweden. His major preoccupation is with jamais compromis avec l'occupant, même analyzing the policies of what he calls a quand celui-ci chercha à les piéger" solidaristic market economy, character­ (244) is not fully substantiated by the ized by a simultaneous commitment to book and by the facts. A human institu­ economic efficiency and competitiveness tion, the PCF always suffered from inter­ in the international arena and full employ­ nal tensions, even before 1940. It was ment and universal social programs at never totally unified, either before June home. He pays close attention to the role 1940 or thereafter. Not all French Com­ of institutional actors like LO (the blue- REVIEWS 239 collar trade union federation), SAP (the Milner underlines the high levels of Swedish employers' organization) and educational achievement amongst the SAP (the Swedish Social Democratic Swedish population, a common commit­ Party) in the development of the postwar ment to economic growth and competi­ Swedish model; he highlights the contri­ tiveness that comes from inhabiting a butions made by economists like Ohlin, small state, and a work ethic that has done Myrdal, Rehn and Meidner; and he pro­ much to make possible high levels of wel­ vides detailed information on pension fare expenditure. He also tries hard, and I funds and labour mobility programs, re­ think convincingly, to correct some of the search and development and educational distortions about Sweden that have crept policy, social services and quality of work into political debate: for example, a sup­ circles in his book. posedly high level of anomie reflected in Overall, Milner has acquitted himself suicide rates, a lack of individuality, or an to his task rather well. He makes no bones excessive concern with welfare at the ex­ about the fact that for him, social democ­ pense of productivity. racy represents a mixture of idealism and Yet Milner's constant defence of pragmatism, and that it is the very prag­ Swedish social democracy against critics, matism of Swedish policy that has made both from the right and left, may also social democracy there so much of a suc­ point to the major shortcoming in this cess. The key social democratic values for analysis. At times, the book reads too him are economic well-being, work, so­ much like a brief for the defence, like the cial solidarity, democracy, participation, work written by some political scientists and access to information. By compari­ or anthropologist returning from a distant son, he has much less patience and inter­ land or tribe with the blueprint of a para­ est in such classically marxist objectives dise that works. Now, to be sure, I person­ as "ownership of the means of produc­ ally find Swedish social democracy a tion." Yet compared to the state socialist good deal more appealing as a model than regimes of post-war Eastern Europe or to the Stalinist one which the Webbs cele­ more ruggedly market economies in the brated with such gusto in the 1930s or the west, Sweden has been notably successful Maoist variant which China visitors of the at delivering the goods. late 1960s or early 1970s embraced with By this, Milner means that Sweden little restraint Arid when I think of Can­ has managed to combine high rates of ada (or the Quebec mat Milner implicitly labour productivity and income levels has in mind) there is much in the Swedish per-capita towards the top of the OECD model that appears attractive. scale with significantly lower levels of But not everything. "Practical moder­ inequality in income distribution than ation, public-spiritedness, equity, indi­ elsewhere. Swedish labour, unlike its viduality and the work-ethic" (S3) may counterparts in other countries, has been appear as very commendable values in the swift to adjust to change and even to en­ economic and social arenas. One won­ courage change in the market sector, ders, however, whether there is any room helped greatly by governmental policies left for the politics of passion and com­ which foster labour training and mobility. mitment, whether pragmatism may not, in And Swedish management (Volvo, for the Swedish context, have undercut the example), by and large, has been prepared more romantic or Utopian elements in the to countenance a degree of trade union socialist vision and in politics at large. participation in shop-floor and related For good or ill, there is something about areas, even while firmly rejecting moves politics in France, Germany, Russia or to any greater control by unions over even Poland that makes the heart run managerial decision-making through faster than is the case with politics in share ownership via the wage-earner Sweden. Why? funds. The one attempt to go beyond the 240 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL mixed economy the wage-earner fund Greg M. Olsen, éd., Industrial Change scheme came to naught by the middle of and Labour Adjustment in Sweden and the 1980s. At the same time, some of the Canada (Toronto: Grammond Press verities of the Swedish experience that 1988). Milner extols (for example, an openness to international currents) have also THIS BOOK IS A COLLECTION of 25 short brought elements threatening to the social papers delivered at a conference of the democratic compromise. (As in the sig­ same name at York University, Toronto, nificant tax reform introduced by K-O in Qecember 1986, by Canadian and Swe­ Feldt, the Minister of Finance, in 1989, dish participants, most of them trade scaling down tax levels at the top to levels union or government officials. Part I deals closer to those in Western Europe or the with Swedish and Canadian approaches United States.) Environmental factors are to unemployment and labour market pol­ alluded to en passant, yet one wonders icy generally; Part IL not reviewed here, whether Sweden has been more success­ focuses more narrowly on the two ful at taming nuclear energy or balancing countries' automobile industry. off economic with environmental con­ It is an odd experience to be review­ cerns than have other western states. Fi­ ing these papers at a time when the news­ nally, where political culture is con­ papers inform one that Sweden's Social cerned, I cannot help feeling that Milner Democratic government, which wanted to overstates the "saintliness" of the Swedes impose price and wage controls (thus sus­ when he asserts: "Swedish mass culture is pending an important part of the "Swe­ not a consumer culture... Ideas and things dish Model"), has fallen and the future of are not located within two separate cul­ the Model itself remains much in doubt: tures, one for the intellectual elite, one for many of the papers are little more than the mass." (155) In a society where the expressions of commitment to and admi­ children of the university-educated have ration for the Swedish Model. six times the likelihood of going to uni­ One does indeed get some glimpses of versity than do children of unskilled the Model's principal objectives and in­ workers, it is hard to believe that all class stitutions — some of them many times barriers to knowledge have vanished. over. Its foundations are said to be a And do wealthy Swedes, much like their 'solidaristic' wage policy (meaning both counterparts in Paris, Zurich, or New a narrow range of wage differentials and York, not indulge in some of the rarer uniform wage increases, independent of a commodities of consumer capitalism un­ particular firm's or industry's prosperity) available to the masses? Give the reader and a profound commitment to jobs for all a break. who want them. Many do, the participa­ Still, I do not want to end on a cavil­ tion rate being around 83 per cent of the ling note. Milner's is a useful, and at population 16-64 years of age (85 per cent points incisive, account of the workings for men and 80 per cent for women), said of Swedish social democracy. He has a to be the highest in the world. Only 2.8 fine sense of both the ideals and limits of per cent were unemployed in 1985, and the Swedish experience over recent de­ the rate had not exceeded 3.5 per cent. cades. And he provides insights into the The mechanisms for achieving these strategic thinking of Swedish trade union­ objectives are centralized private bargain­ ists, social democratic politicians and in­ ing between employers and labour feder­ tellectuals not without implications for ations and extensive (and expensive) our own predicament in the northern part 'active' labour market policies. These last of the North American continent consisted of an extended public employ­ ment service with compulsory notifica­ Philip Resnick tion of vacancies (but not the exclusive University of British Columbia right to fill them), a variety of training, REVIEWS 241 and, where needed, sheltered workshops assess and also, perhaps, more uncertain." and temporary public or subsidised em­ (147) One gathers that it is indeed these ployment To avoid inflation and high last effects that might lead to the policy's profits these were combined with a tight ultimate collapse. fiscal policy and strong unions with vir­ Those three of the four short papers tually complete coverage of the labour on The Canadian Approach" that take force. their task seriously (the remaining is a One is given some of the organiza­ mere harangue against all aspects of the tional and quantitative detail of this sys­ present government's economic policy) tem and much praise for its 'active' ap­ argue that we have much to learn from the proach to labour market policies. This last Swedes about training, preparation for the is contrasted favorably to "'passive' lab­ work world and, perhaps, employment our market policies, such as unemploy­ services. One paper (Noah Meltz's) cau­ ment insurance and public assistance." tions about the difficulties of a divided (29) In the one short paper on "Evalua­ jurisdiction in Canada in this respect. tion" (Bjom Jonzon's) we are told that, on Meltz also worries about the lack of lab­ average in 1985, some 1.5 per cent of the our-management bilateral organization to labour force were "employed through the cooperate on this issue, commends the various measures for the handicapped and Canadian Labour Market and Productiv­ hard-to place people....About 1% was in­ ity Centre for initiating such cooperation volved in labour market training and and urges provincial counterparts. (It is roughly 1.5% participated in demand-ori­ pleasant to report that the Centre is con­ ented programs." But, "[i]t would be to­ tinuing its efforts.) One might worry, in tally misleading to add these figures to the this context, about the absence at both the number of unemployed [2.8%] to obtain national and provincial levels of central a 'real' unemployment figure. The core of business and labour bodies that can bind Swedish labour market programmes in­ their constituents and the much smaller volves training, rehabilitation, and pro­ degree of unionization of Canada. If one ductive work which should by no means were inclined to consider adapting other by placed on equal footing with unpro­ aspects of the Swedish Model, one might ductive idleness." (139) Unfortunately, wonder, too, if our polity is in any mood without more detail than the chapter pro­ for the Swedish levels of taxation and vides, someone with the opposite ideolog­ public expenditure on labour market and ical commitment might equally validly social programs, or for that matter, com­ (or arbitrarily) have said that wasteful mitted to solidarity. The newspapers sug­ make-work projects are by no means to be gest no. placed on an equal footing with income The well-known gap between school­ support for productive job search. One ing and work in Canada is mentioned, as wishes to know the subsequent work ex­ is the minuscule provision of training of perience of these trained and "rehabili­ any length and intensity by the private tated." Are these true stepping stones to sector. (The reports on public sector en­ "productive work" or merely (repeated) deavors, too, are both scarce and discour­ temporary expedients? Many of the few aging.) The Province of Ontario is said to publicly available evaluations of such be committed to do better in the future. projects in Canada are not encouraging. One anxiously awaits further reports on While the paper's assessment of the both these endeavors and more evaluation impact of the Swedish policy on the lab­ of Canadian efforts, public and private, our market is unreservedly enthusiastic, is generally. does express some worry about the trend towards higher levels of inflation and S.F. Kaliski concludes that: "The effects on inflation Queen's University and growth are....much more difficult to 242 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

Donna Rae Gabaccia, Militants and Mi­ "Red Town" occurred against a backdrop grants: Rural Sicilians Become American of increasing mobility. Workers (New Brunswick: Rutgers Uni­ Having discussed the interplay be­ versity Press 1988). tween rural protest and emigration in Sambuca, the bulk of the work examines As DONNA OABACCIA points out in her the complex interrelationship of migra­ introduction. Militants and Migrants tion and militance in the trans-Atlantic "does not easily fit the mold of most connections between the Western Sicilian monographs in either immigration or town and its major settlements in the labor history." (2) The book is an impor­ United States. This approach is in keeping tant (though not entirely innovative) work with Samuel Baily's call for more "vil­ interlinking labour, ethnic and social his­ lage-outward" studies, transcending the tory with an interdisciplinary foray into narrow boundaries of the nation state and anthropology. The primary thesis, as the the contextual limitations of single settle­ title suggests, is a reassessment of J.S. ment study. This approach is crucial to Macdonald's contention that labour milit­ her understanding of the immigrant expe­ ance and emigration in the Old World rience as she finds tremendous variety in were geographically and demographi- the different chain migration links to cally distinct strategies in response to the North America. While radicalized arti­ 19th-century challenges to commercial sans and peasants may have cooperated in agriculture. While labour militance ac­ Sambuca — a cooperation helped along companied economic development, Mac- by return migration — the various New donald has argued, mass emigration World settlements of immigrant derived primarily from areas of economic Sambucesi did not evolve along uniform stagnation. Gabaccia finds this model lines reflective of Old World develop­ wanting in her study of the town and ments. The Sambucesi artisans who pion­ environs of Sambuca in Western Sicily. eered the way to Louisiana, for example, Migration and labour unrest in this re­ emerge as padrone middlemen channel­ gion, she contends, developed simulta­ ling the poorest Sambucesi peasants to the neously in the latter 19th century, and, Louisiana sugar plantations. In this sce­ indeed, as the history of Sambuca shows, nario — as a consequence of the chain "the same people sometimes could both migration structure, seasonal mobility, fight and flee." (66) The town's artisans, and the organization of work in the sugar in particular — "politically frustrated and plantations — the Louisiana settlements economically disappointed after a period failed to develop a labour movement of rising expectations" (54) — emigrated drawing on European traditions. Yet, the in considerable numbers quite early on Sambucesi artisans and petty merchants (the early 1880s). At the same time, the who emigrated to, and settled in, Brooklyn region, as elsewhere, saw the organiza­ and Tampa "struggled to apply their Sicilian tion and development of artisanal mutual experiences and build an immigrant labor aids and cooperative and political socie­ movement in the United States. In bom cit­ ties, all in response to the political and ies, skilled immigrants became intimately economic "ferment" affecting their ex­ involved in the problems of wage earning in pectations and livelihood. The local pro­ industrial workplaces." (122) These immi­ tests of the 1880s erupted into the more grants, however, — largely wage-earners, complex and widespread fasci revolts of lower-middle class small businessmen and the 1890s (in which artisans and poor independent craftsmen (147) — did not wheat cultivators cooperated). Through­ simply transplant their Sicilian experiences out this time and well into the 20th cen­ but developed a regionally distinct "mili­ tury, immigration did not hinder tant" consciousness in tension with very militance. As Gabaccia demonstrates, specific New World conditions and circum­ Sambuca's political transformation into a stances. REVIEWS 243

In examining these developments, rior ends becomes evident when, as Gabaccia makes a number of important Gabaccia herself points out, Brooklyn's observations. First of all, in contrast to the pronunenti (however "radicalized" in still current tendency to see emigration in Sambuca) "sometimes protested that fairly uniform terms. Gabaccia points to they, not Carlo Tresca or Joe Ettor, were the astonishing diversity of the mobility the 'real Socialists'...." (147) from one town alone. "Sambucesi ap­ These and other queries, however, are peared in various locations as peasant minor in comparison to Gabaccia's erudi­ leftists, migrant harvesters, padrone tion and her accomplishment in hopefully slaves, immigrant familists, militant fac­ (once and for all) eradicating the still cur­ tory workers, and factionalized small rent overview of Sicilian migrants (by no businessmen. Who would guess that all means homogeneously "peasant") as ei­ were also fellow villagers?" (171) This ther docile labourers or premodern mili­ diversity, she contends, needs to be con­ tants. sidered in the international context and continuum of Old World rural conditions, E. Carlson-Cumbo the specific transatlantic immigrant links University of Toronto connecting Old to New, and the multivar­ iate New World work places and social Vladimir Andrle, Workers in Stalin's structures into which the Sambucesi en­ Russia. Industrialization and Social tered (and helped shape). In the all-impor­ Change in a Planned Economy (Hemel tant intermediary link, furthermore, Hempstead and New York: Harvester- Gabaccia argues that occupational con­ Wheatsheaf and St Martin's Press 1988). nections in the migration chain "shaped the histories of Sambuca's settlements in JUST AS THE STALINIST industrial system the United States as much as did the more is being radically transformed (if not dis­ extensively studied ties of family and mantled) under Gorbachev, western un­ community." (170) derstanding of its making is deepening. For all of the book's complexity — Where once Solomon Schware's Labor in and it is a subtle, multilayered study of the the Soviet Union (1951) was practically immigrant experience — there are prob­ the sole text on Soviet labour history, the lems. Gabaccia's too-narrow conception last several years have seen the publica­ of the padrone, for example, does not tion of half a dozen studies, and more are allow her to apply the term and the accor­ in the works. These studies differ in dant hierarchies, connections and obliga­ scope, interpretative framework and sev­ tions onto kin relations; the padrone and eral other respects as well. But common kin networks, as R.F. Hamey has shown, to them all is the argument that the forces were not uniquely different systems nor unleashed by the industrialization drive were they necessarily distinct temporal were only partially controlled by the cen­ stages in the migration process. Paesani tral political authorities, and that the kin, like padrone bosses, could very well emerging industrial order was character­ act as intermediaries for social and pecu­ ized not only by periodic campaigning, niary gain (not only in the trans-Atlantic threats and draconian measures (the em­ "chain", but also in the day-to-day activ­ phasis of Schware's book), but also much ities of settlement life). Gabaccia's lack maneuvering, circumvention and "fid­ of precise definition, furthermore, is on dling" by workers and managers alike. occasion troubling. What exactly did Vladimir Andrle's book is no excep­ Rockford's Rosario M., the "padrone mil­ tion. A work of historical sociology, its itant," understand by "socialism" (114), aim is to elucidate "a pattern of interac­ or, for that matter, Sambuca's resident tion between politically instigated cam­ fraternal artisans? The malleability of paigns for industrial efficiency on the one such terms and their exploitation for ulte­ hand, and a structure of labour-manage- 244 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL ment relations on the other." (ix) The is organized around two major contradic­ book consists of five chapters of which tions that were by no means unique to the the first is an overview of the "Revolution period under investigation or even to the from Above" and the last is an examina­ Soviet Union, but manifested themselves tion of the Stakhanovite movement which with particular force under Stalin. One the author sees as a "test case for the was between "Bolshevik speeds" and "in­ industrial order that had been estab­ dustrial culture." The former, promoted lished." (x) The three thematically-con- by higher party officials, took the form of structed chapters in between focus on Utopian production targets, or as Andrle workers, management, and their interac­ terms it, the "taut-plans system." This in­ tion on the shopfloor. Throughout the volved nearly constant pressure on indus­ book, but especially in these core chap­ trial management and lower-ranking ters, Andrle relies heavily on four or five party and trade union personnel to step up economic newspapers and journals and production schedules, and the instigation the testimonies of American engineers of mass mobilization campaigns to un­ and Soviet emigres found in the Hoover cover hidden reserves of production and Archive. He also refers to some of the resistance to central directives. The latter classics of industrial sociology and what found its primary advocates in industrial he calls "ethnographic" studies of shop- managers and engineers, who, as converts floor behaviour among managers and to scientific management, plugged no less workers in capitalist enterprises. zealously for regularity and precision. Such a limited range of sources and The other contradiction pitted both taut the laconic manner in which they are cited planning and industrial culture against a does create problems. Local and regional shop-floor culture of "making out" that peculiarities, the differences between Andrle argues was genetically similar to newly constructed enterprises and cities that exhibited in industrial-capitalist so­ such as Magnitogorsk and older industrial cieties. areas, the fact that certain policies such as The combined effect of these contra­ the Taylorist-inspired functional system dictions was a system better characterized of management were applied to a much by "anarchic competition for scarce re­ greater extent in some branches of indus­ sources" (71) than anything approximat­ try (especially textiles) than in others, and ing rational planning. It produced no little the impact of regional party bosses on frustration among central authorities, policy implementation are elided in the kept industrial management more or less elaboration of synthetic patterns. Andrle permanently off balance, and had workers makes good use of the memoirs of Ivan scrambling for survival. Although not the Gudov, a milling machine operator who first to do so, Andrle's book is particu­ gained fame as an outstanding larly good at demonstrating that living by Stakhanovite, but ignores others. Indeed, one's wits was as important, perhaps with the exception of a single reference to more important, than working hard. This Stakhanov, Gudov is the only Stakhanov­ was an important theme in Donald ite whose name is mentioned. He thus is Filtzer's Soviet Workers and Stalinist In­ made to stand in for hundreds of thou­ dustrialization (1986), but whereas sands of workers whose backgrounds, Filtzer stressed the "breakdown of resis­ levels of skill, accomplishments, re­ tance," demoralization and atomization wards, and subsequent fates varied. among workers, Andrle underscores their These, though, are quibbles which do adaptability, relative autonomy from not seriously detract from the value of the "outside" interference and participation book. The great strength of Andrle's in shifting alliances. Some of the most study is its skillful penetration of the com­ interesting passages in the book, for ex­ plex web of issues associated with the ample, those on blot (the pursuit of goods industrialization drive. Much of the book and services through personal connec- REVIEWS 245 tions) and the solidarity of foremen and ular role of labour history in a South Af­ rank-and-file workers vu à vis norm-set­ rican context This survey is impressive ters, quality inspectors, and the advocates in scope, reflecting the breadth of one of of functionalism illustrate this orienta­ the few scholars in the field who has both tion. There are also some intriguing ideas taught and researched in East West and about such characteristically Soviet phe­ Southern Africa and who has a command nomena as "storming" (making up for not only of the relevant European lan­ previous slackness by bursts of produc­ guages but of Swahili, Afrikaans and tive effort) and socialist competition, Hausa as well. which beg for more research. By contrast, My quarrels with this work are few the brief excursion at the end of the book but of some importance. First, given the into the Terror does not add anything to issues engaged by Freund, the book is all the already-existing literature on this still too brief. One suspects that brevity was murky subject imposed as a condition of the work ap­ With the increased availability of ar­ pearing in the Cambridge University chival sources and new opportunities for Press African Society Today series. If so, serious dialogue among Soviet historians, (he series editors should be put on notice and between them and their western coun­ that they have done their audience a dis­ terparts, hitherto unimaginable possibili­ service. The pace of the work is breathless ties for investigating issues in Soviet lab­ — a mere 17 pages to discuss the thorny our history have become real. Andrle is to issue of class and culture, less than 20 to be credited for putting many of these is­ examine the role of the state in the labour sues on the agenda and handling them in movement The result is problematic. No an imaginative way. All in all, then, a sooner is an issue engaged than the focus satisfying book. shifts. In the hands of a lesser scholar this would be disastrous; with Freund it leaves Lewis H. Siegelbaum the reader wanting ideas and suggestions Michigan State University to be developed. Cambridge should con­ sider commissioning Freund to produce a Bill Freund, The African Workers (Cam­ much larger work — say along the lines bridge: Cambridge University Press of John Iliffe's recent study. The African 1988). Poor. A second quarrel with this work is its IF THERE WERE STILL those who remained atheoretical stance. (Again one half sus­ unsure as to whether labour history had in pects that this may be due to the con­ fact arrived as a major area of concentra­ straints of size, but again the result is tion among students of African society, unsatisfactory.) The demise of the "de­ Bill Freund's The African Workers should pendency" consensus has created a theo­ dispel any lingering doubt Perhaps the retical vacuum in African studies. Per­ most immediately useful sections of this haps the most useful response to this void work, which began life as a survey of the has been a return to history and it is clear literature on African labour commis­ that the growth of labour history is a part sioned by the American Social Science of this movement Yet as the South Afri­ Research Council, are its first and last can historian Mike Morris has observed, chapters. Taken together these comprise the need of theory cannot be displaced by a brief historiographie essay in and an empiricism. It remains for authors such as extensive bibliography of African labour Freund to point the way forward toward a studies. In the 12S tightly written pages new synthesis. which remain, Freund surveys such var­ My final quarrel with The African ied issues as culture, community and Worker concerns the treatment of labour class; waged and unwaged labour; trade in South Africa. Although there can be unions and the state; as well as the partic­ little doubt that it is convenient to treat 246 LABOUR/LE TRAVAIL

South Africa as a distinctive region of sity become increasingly clear and I study apart from the rest of the continent somewhat gingerly predict that and although there is ample precedent for historians' treatments of the Republic's so doing, it makes less and less sense to history will necessarily follow suit. do so. Admittedly, Freund, who teaches The above quarrels are and should be in South Africa, is much closer to one taken by those who read this review as aspect of the issue than am I. However, minor. As with his Making ofConlempo- even from the distance from which I write rary Africa, Freund has once again done it, seems clear that the "house next door all of those who study and teach about to Africa" is increasingly being reinte- African society a great service. grated into the continent. As white minor­ ity rule is undone, the reality of South Bob Shenton Africa as an African society will of neces- Queen's University OUR TIMES N ITS EIGHTH YEAR OF PUBLICATION, OUR TIMES, Ipublished by a unionized co-operative, is a magazine that provi­ des an interesting and informative view of the progressive trade union movement in Canada and abroad. Read what union and community activists think and do — feminism, democracy, la­ bour, culture . . . just some of the issues found in Our Times. Make it your times. . . SUBSCRIBE TODAY! ÔURTÏMÈS 390 Dufferin St., Toronto Ontario, Canada M6K 2A3 Name • $18 individual (8 issues) Address D $30 institution

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