The State, the Unions, and the critical synthesis in labor law history: a 25-year retrospect

2013/03/05 by Christopher Tomlins · 1 citation
Social Sciences · Arts and Humanities · #International Labor and Employment Law #Historical and Contemporary Political Dynamics #Labor Movements and Unions #Labor history #State (computer science) #Labour law #Labor relations #Political science #Law #Economics #Computer science

paper · doi:10.1080/0023656x.2013.773148

openalex publication_date 2013/03/05 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29

Abstract

This article responds to Jean-Christian Vinel's assessment of the ‘critical synthesis’ whose proponents created labor law history as a new and flourishing field of scholarship in the decade after 1978. Vinel accords my book, The State and the Unions (1985) a key role in the development of this new field. Here, I situate my book in relation to the critical synthesis, and assess the capacity of critical legal scholarship to address the current parlous state of the U.S. labor movement. I look to current labor historians to engage with and build on the work that the labor law historians undertook.

Cited by

• Labor history of the United States [wikipedia]

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