CharlieWhitham, Corporate conservatives go to war: How the National Association of Manufacturers planned to restore free enterprise, 1939–1948 (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020. Pp. xi+400. ISBN 978‐3‐030‐43907‐1 Hbk. €103.99; ISBN 978‐3‐030‐43910‐1 Pbk. €72.79)

2021 ◽  
Vol 74 (4) ◽  
pp. 1119-1120
Author(s):  
Taylor Jaworski
Keyword(s):  
National Association ◽  
Free Enterprise ◽  
National Association Of Manufacturers

Back on Track?

2020 ◽  
pp. 291-313
Author(s):  
Jennifer A. Delton
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
National Association ◽  
Free Enterprise ◽  
American Industry ◽  
Global Competitiveness ◽  
Hundredth Anniversary ◽  
National Association Of Manufacturers

This chapter considers the National Association of Manufacturers' (NAM) revival in the 1990s. Indeed, NAM celebrated its one-hundredth anniversary in 1995 amid vastly improved conditions. Blasting premature claims about manufacturing's death, NAM president Jerry Jasinowski declared that American industry was back on track. Manufacturing had transformed itself to meet the global future. Granted, it did so through downsizing, automating, and relocating production abroad. But, Jasinowski insisted, it was still a generator of jobs—better jobs, smarter jobs, and jobs in which workers' input and empowerment were crucial to success. Like past NAM leaders, Jasinowski placed enormous importance on “getting out the story,” but the story was no longer about “free enterprise.” It was about the manufacturing sector's contribution to economic growth and global competitiveness.

A Changing Workforce

2020 ◽  
pp. 210-236
Author(s):  
Jennifer A. Delton
Keyword(s):  
African Americans ◽  
Affirmative Action ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
Equal Opportunity ◽  
National Association ◽  
Historically White ◽  
Right To Work ◽  
Workplace Rights ◽  
National Association Of Manufacturers

This chapter examines the overlap between African Americans' demands for jobs and conservatives' push for “right to work” laws. While compulsory union dues were very different from unions' exclusion of blacks, both movements targeted historically white unions and shared a language of workplace “rights.” Conservative “right to work” activists adopted the tactics of the civil rights movement and aligned themselves with blacks against exclusionary unions. Although this strategy failed to attract African Americans, it called attention to unions' historic and ongoing racism in a way that eventually divided the labor–liberal coalition. This dynamic is key to understanding the National Association of Manufacturers' complicated support for civil rights, equal opportunity, and affirmative action.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Jennifer A. Delton
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
National Association ◽  
Trade Association ◽  
National Association Of Manufacturers ◽  
Insight Into

This introductory chapter presents new understandings of manufacturing's main lobbyist and trade association, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). To understand how a conservative, anti-union organization can also be seen as progressive, the chapter first takes a look at its background as it considers how disorganized and chaotic US capitalism was at the end of the nineteenth century, when NAM was founded. In addition to examining NAM's role in organizing and globalizing capitalism, the chapter explores how it worked, who it represented, and how effective it was as a lobbyist. It also identifies NAM's many internal tensions. Furthermore, the chapter identifies the economic, ideological, and institutional concerns that drove NAM actors, as these offer insight into the evolving political taxonomies of our own day.

Who Tells Your Story: Contested History at the NAM

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 110-133
Author(s):  
JENNIFER DELTON
Keyword(s):  
Professional Staff ◽  
National Association ◽  
Executive Secretary ◽  
History Of ◽  
National Association Of Manufacturers ◽  
The 1950S

From 1948 to 1960, an executive secretary at the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) attempted to persuade NAM leaders to commission an “objective” history of the organization. The project never came to fruition, but the story reveals a fundamental split within the NAM between its professional staff and its conservative leadership over the organization’s mission. It thus offers a unique perspective on the NAM not as a powerful lobby, but as a contested workplace with its own fraught dynamics, which, in turn, reveals a more progressive image of the 1950s-era NAM than historians have typically recognized.

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