the crisis of unions in the 1980’s. Extremely con-
cise yet comprehensive.
Brisbin, Richard A.A Strike Like No Other Strike: Law
and Resistance During the Pittston Coal Strike of 1989-
1990. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University
Press, 2003. Brisbin recounts one of the decade’s
few successful union victories. Theoretical, for
more advanced students.
Dubofsky, Melvyn, and Foster Rhea Dulles.Labor in
America: A Histor y.7th ed. Wheeling, Ill.: Harlan
Davidson Press, 2004. Written by two of the lead-
ing scholars of U.S. labor history, this classic, viv-
idly written overview has an excellent chapter on
the 1980’s, aptly titled “Hard Times.”
Goldfield, Michael.The Decline of Organized Labor in
the United States. Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1989. An incisive analysis of the causes of
union decline in the 1980’s. Uses statistical and
historical data to puncture many popular myths.
Moody, Kim.U.S. Labor in Trouble and Transition: The
Failure of Reform from Above, the Promise of Revival
from Below. New York: Verso Press, 2007. A leading
labor scholar and activist, Moody offers a pene-
trating analysis of the failure of unions in the
1980’s. Concludes with a survey of the new leader-
ship, strategies, and initiatives that have emerged
since then.
Murolo, Priscilla, and A. B. Chitty.From the Folks Who
Brought You the Weekend: A Short, Illustrated Histor y
of Labor in the United States. New York: The New
Press, 2001. Easily accessible and written for a
popular audience, this comprehensive survey de-
votes a lengthy chapter to the 1980’s, titled “Hard
Times.” The section “Fighting Back” chronicles a
number of innovative union campaigns.
Perusek, Glenn, and Kent Worcester, eds.Trade
Union Politics: American Unions and Economic
Change, 1960’s-1990’s.Atlantic Highlands, N.J.:
Humanities Press, 1995. A sophisticated analysis
for advanced students, this provocative volume
offers competing theories and perspectives on
unions’ responses to globalization and corporate
offenses.
Rachleff, Peter.Hard-Pressed in the Heartland: The
Hormel Strike and the Future of the Labor Movement.
Boston: South End Press, 1992. A brief and engag-
ing account of one of the most important strikes
of the decade. The conflict pitted local union ac-
tivists against their national affiliate and AFL-CIO
leadership.
Rosenblum, Jonathan D.Copper Crucible: How the Ari-
zona Miners Strike of 1983 Recast Labor-Management
Relations in America. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Univer-
sity Press, 1995. Sympathetic but not uncritical ex-
amination of the 1983-1986 strike against the
Phelps Dodge copper company. The use of the
National Guard and permanent replacement
workers made this a pivotal event in 1980’s labor
history.
L. Mara DodgeSee also Air traffic controllers’ strike; Business
and the economy in the United States; Chrysler Cor-
poration federal rescue; De Lorean, John; Globaliza-
tion; Iacocca, Lee; Income and wages in the United
States; Reagan Revolution; Reaganomics; Recessions;
Unemployment in Canada; Unemployment in the
United States; Women in the workforce.United Nations
Identification International organization
Date Established in 1945
Place Headquartered in New York City
During the 1980’s, the United Nations faced a wide array
of global problems but managed to maintain global peace
and continue its work addressing the worldwide problems of
hunger, poverty, and disease.
The 1980’s proved to be a tenuous decade, as the So-
viet Union and the United States intensified efforts
to undermine each other during the Cold War.
Many violent conflicts that drew the support of one
superpower immediately attracted the opposing sup-
port of the other, escalating the level of death and
destruction. As the leading members of the United
Nations, including the superpowers, often limited
the organization’s decision-making abilities, it had
to assume a rather awkward position—or one of am-
bivalence—in many of the decade’s conflicts, de-
spite its best efforts to bring about peace.
Some of the most controversial conflicts of the de-
cade included the Soviet invasion and occupation of
Afghanistan, the Iran-Iraq War, and the impasse over
apartheid in South Africa. The Islamic revolution in
Iran that was attended by 444 days of a U.S. hostage
standoff, the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, the
escalating tensions between Pakistan and India, and
the intensification of terrorist acts in the Middle EastThe Eighties in America United Nations 1005