History of the Labor Movement in the United States, Vol. 8: Postwar Struggles 1918-1920

History of the Labor Movement in the United States #8

by Philip S. Foner

Traces the history of labor unions and the labor movement from America's colonial era, through the Industrial Revolution, to the present

Genres: Labor, History, Nonfiction

480 pages, Hardcover

First published October 1, 1987

About the author

Philip Sheldon Foner was an American labor historian and teacher. Foner was a prolific author and editor of more than 100 books.

Reviews

[Brett · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the eighth volume of Philip Foner's inexhaustible series on labor history in the U.S. I think I've used all the synonyms for "magisterial" in my reviews of the previous entries, so forgive me if I'm repeating myself.

This volume covers only two years, in the immediate aftermath of World War I. Foner's point of view comes through as in his other volumes. He routinely criticizes the AFL for lack of militancy and for commitment to craft unionism instead of industrial unionism. He discusses at length labor's relationship to the emergence of the Soviet Union in this time period and spends more time dissecting political activity of the socialist party and less on describing strike activity. He continues to hate Samuel Gompers.

If you gathered all the people in the country for whom this series holds great interest, we'd probably fit in a large hotel ballroom. Still, if you're in that group, this series continues to be an interesting left criticism of the history of labor in the U.S.