Why David Sometimes Wins tells the story of Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers' groundbreaking victory, drawing important lessons from this d...
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reviews
Mar 27, 2011
sdw
rated it: 
This book is ultimately less about the UFW and more about the types of strategy that organizations and movements may find most successful.
"I this book, I will argue that the UFW succeeded, while the rival AFL-CIO and teamsters failed because the UFW's leadership devised more effective strategy, in a fact a stream of effective strategy. The UFW was able to do this because the motivation of its leaders was greater than that of their rivals; they had better access to salient kno More...
"I this book, I will argue that the UFW succeeded, while the rival AFL-CIO and teamsters failed because the UFW's leadership devised more effective strategy, in a fact a stream of effective strategy. The UFW was able to do this because the motivation of its leaders was greater than that of their rivals; they had better access to salient kno More...
Feb 27, 2011
Nick
rated it:
This was an assigned text for my grad school class, Strategic Management. The author, Ganz, is an Anglo guy who got involved with Cesar Chavez and the organization of California farm workers in the 1960s. Although nominally an academic study, the book is really mostly a narrative of the rise of Chavez and the UFW, with occasional asides about organizational strategy and learning.
Before reading this book I only had a cultural familiarity, in the vaguest sense, with the events that it d More...
Before reading this book I only had a cultural familiarity, in the vaguest sense, with the events that it d More...
Sep 07, 2009
Elaine
rated it: 
Great job, Marshall! Many of us who worked for the UFW could not wait to get our hands on this book. Ganz worked for the UFW for several decades, starting as a college volunteer, moving on to become a full-time organizer of some of the major strikes in grapes and lettuce, and eventually being elected to the executive board. Quite a trajectory. The inside stories he tells are really worthwhile both for movement veterans, and young people who want to learn the day-to-day nitty gritty work of bui
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Oct 20, 2009
Dan
rated it:
Ganz's thoughtful book is not so much a history of the UFW and the farmworker movement as an interpretation of its early success in the mid-1960s as an example of the efficacy of what he calls "strategic capacity": the ability to turn the various resources organizers have at their disposal into the power they need to achieve their objectives.
Given his high profile role in advising Barack Obama's campaign, not to mention his current position at Harvard, Ganz has a good platf More...
Given his high profile role in advising Barack Obama's campaign, not to mention his current position at Harvard, Ganz has a good platf More...
Feb 13, 2010
Dan
rated it:
Outstanding conceptual framework for understanding strategic capacity (his model in five words: motivation, information and learning organizations), coupled with a great California history lesson, and with a meditation on organizational development, effectiveness and decline on top of it all. Movement required reading.
Sep 18, 2010
Austin
rated it:
One of the most engagingly written and relevant labor histories that I have read. A must read for anyone interested in movement building, California history, or understanding the process and culture of building the strategic capacity of an organization.
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