ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on downsizing and how it may affect employees' attitudes toward their union. It begins with a brief review of the downsizing literature and highlight the characteristics that typically make this type of organisational change burdensome for the employee. The chapter focuses on factors that tend to reduce the negative consequences by providing employees more control over the process of change. It discusses how and why union attitudes may be affected. The chapter presents a study conducted in a Swedish emergency hospital undergoing downsizing, and reports results on how the unionised employees' perceived their union. This study shows that downsizing related variables (role overload and job insecurity) are negatively associated with union attitudes (union justice and union satisfaction). The chapter employs multiple regression analysis to examine the extent to which downsizing characteristics and indicators of global process control contributed to the variance in union attitudes. It places findings in relation to the literature and discusses implications for unions.
