The successful union organizing drive and first contract campaign of the tenure track faculty at Illinois State University (ISU) came after a string of unsuccessful organizing campaigns which took place circa 1998 to 2018. After the tenure track faculty of four Illinois public universities unionized during the 2010s, the United Faculty Illinois State University's (UFISU) successful organizing campaign initially emerged out of discussions regarding COVID-19 virus health and safety concerns prior to the delivery of classes during the 2020 fall semester. After more than two years of one-on-one and small group discussions among union rank and file organizers, union staff and faculty members, UFISU filed for and obtained union certification on January 8, 2024, with a first contract negotiated on April 4, 2025. The purpose of this article is to present and discuss the lessons that have been learned from the UFISU union organizing drive and the first contract campaign to help college/university faculty obtain union certification and negotiate a strong first contract. The paper also includes a discussion of the importance of utilizing Jane McAlevey's whole worker organizing during union organizing drives and contract campaigns.

The auto industry is a central force in the US economy and is in the midst of a profound global transition from gas-powered to electric vehicles. While public investment is necessary for such a complex and urgent transformation of a major sector of the economy, the government's engagement with the auto sector runs into a major challenge: the shareholder primacy orientation in US corporate governance, which allows companies to use the public funding to increase its payments to shareholders rather than invest in its workforce and production innovations. This article considers how past public policy toward the auto industry has held up the industry without shifting corporate practices, and how industrial policy should include corporate guardrails to maximize its success in the future.

Pension funds for unionized workers increasingly invest with private equity asset managers. In this paper, we provide an overview of the private equity business model and the ways it can both negatively impact workers and their communities and create risks for pension funds' investment returns. Drawing on a case study of the 2023-2024 hotel workers' strike in Southern California, we also show how pension fund leaders can and increasingly are taking steps to mitigate the risks posed by private equity managers. We argue that such measures are not only permitted but mandated by trustees' fiduciary duty to safeguard beneficiaries' interests when making investment decisions.

Despite achieving substantial contract gains, including significant wage increases, the 2023 pattern agreement reached between Unifor—Canada’s largest private sector union—and Detroit Three automakers was met with mixed reactions from union members, with particularly low support from skilled trades and more senior members. This study reveals how intra-union dynamics were shaped by shifting socioeconomic conditions, comparisons with the United Auto Workers, differences between production and skilled trades members, generational tensions, and leadership conflicts intertwined with strike dynamics. These factors influenced bargaining expectations and union strategy. The findings suggest that intra-union tensions weakened member solidarity and support for the historically strong pattern agreement, highlighting the complex interplay between external pressures and internal union dynamics in collective bargaining.

Teacher compensation is often deferred until late in teachers’ careers. Concerns about teacher shortages have raised concerns that backloading compensation in this way is inefficient. However, existing theoretical and empirical work does not clearly explain why these compensation structures often persist. Using detailed longitudinal teacher compensation data and spatial autoregressive models, I test two of the most common explanations for deferred teacher compensation. I find little evidence that school districts strategically frontload compensation to compete for teachers. However, I find evidence consistent with deferred compensation resulting at least in part from the influence of teachers’ unions.

In this roundtable, labor studies scholars examine the viability of the Clean Slate for Worker Power project. Engaging themes such as labor law, immigrant workers, and organizing strategies, the contributors debate the limits of U.S. labor law, the tendency of scholars to silo our work and our research without engaging an intersectional approach, and the practical realities that impact the U.S.' low rates of unionization.

This essay makes a case for integrating an international political economy (IPE) perspective into the field of labor studies to improve current theories of labor politics. I argue that viewing labor studies through an IPE lens means taking real structural barriers to collective action into account while also analyzing how labor is empowered, not just despite macroeconomic constraints, but also sometimes, paradoxically, by such constraints. I further argue that a combined IPE/labor studies approach offers insight into labor's potential for collective action, especially when one considers the politics of international trade and finance from a historical perspective.