Abstract
How did the growth of trade unionism affect industrial relations within specific industries? I have selected as my basic case study the workers employed in the Belfast shipyards. This group were certainly highly unionised, containing a high proportion of skilled workers, and are often presented as an ‘aristocracy of labour’. Were all those employed in the shipyards members of the privileged elite or were there divisions within the labour force? What problems faced the unions in ‘organising’ these workers? Were industrial relations within the industry improved or harmed by the unionisation of the labour force? My intention is to use this group as a sample against which, in a later chapter I will compare other groups within the labour force.
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© 1998 John Lynch
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Lynch, J. (1998). Belfast’s Shipyard Workers: a Study in Organised Labour. In: A Tale of Three Cities. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-14599-7_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-14599-7_5
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-14601-7
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-14599-7
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