Overview
The miners' strike against Pittston Coal in 1989-1990, which spread throughout southwestern Virginia, southern West Virginia, and eastern Kentucky, was one of the most important strikes in the history of American labour, and, as Richard Brisbin observes, ""one of the longest and largest incidents of civil disorder and civil disobedience in the United States in the second half of the 20th century"". The company aggressively sought to break the strike, and workers and their families used a variety of tactics - lawful and unlawful - to resist Pittston's efforts as the situation quickly turned ugly. In this book, Richard Brisbin offers a study of the exercise of political power. In considering the legal significance of the strike, Brisbin asks the larger question of whether even extreme transgression or resistance can fracture the ""imagined coherence of the law"". He shows how each party in the strike invoked the law to justify its actions while attacking those of the other side as unlawful. In the end, both sides lost; although the US Supreme Court ultimately ruled in favour of the union, most of the strikers faced elimination of their jobs and an ongoing struggle for pensions and health benefits.
Full Product Details
Author: Richard A. Brisbin, Jr. (West Virginia University)
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Imprint: Johns Hopkins University Press
Dimensions:
Width: 15.20cm
, Height: 2.60cm
, Length: 22.90cm
Weight: 0.635kg
ISBN: 9780801869013
ISBN 10: 0801869013
Pages: 368
Publication Date: 01 November 2002
Recommended Age: From 17
Audience:
College/higher education
,
Professional and scholarly
,
Undergraduate
,
Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: To order
Stock availability from the supplier is unknown. We will order it for you and ship this item to you once it is received by us.
Reviews
<p> This excellent study describes the 1989--1990 Pittston coal strike... Brisbin avoids offering a traditional narrative in favor of a deeper analysis of the dispute that explores the strike's significance as an exercise in civil disobedience and oppositional culture... Brisbin is to be commended for dissecting what happened here with an eye toward its wider implications. -- Richard P. Mulcahy, Journal of American History
<p>Gives fascinating insights for those involved in directing collective bargaining activities, both as managers and union activists.--Michael Wald Monthly Labor Review (01/01/2004)
Author Information
Richard A. Brisbin, Jr., is an associate professor of political science at West Virginia University. He is the author of Justice Antonin Scalia and the Conservative Revival, also available from Johns Hopkins.
