ABSTRACT
Many people in the labor movement see coalitions as an important tool for social change and union revitalization. Labor geographers appropriated the term “community unionism” to bring an understanding of labor geography to the literature on alliances. They presented a place-based approach that argued alliances at a local scale can rebuild union power. In the late 1990s, the term “community unionism” was again used to describe community-based organizing strategies focused on common ethnic and gender identities located in specific neighborhoods. Coalitions, like other forms of trade union action, embody possibilities and limits. Coalitions can fail to achieve policy victories but can still be successful because they increase the strength of the coalition’s participating organizations. Coalitions are frequently forced to prioritize different types of organizational strength. Ideally coalitions would concurrently sustain their relationships and build the capacity of the participating organizations while winning campaigns. This chapter also presents an overview on the key concepts discussed in this book.
