Counter-movement within the labor movement: Workers' education and the American federation of labor, 1900–1937

Abstract

This article examines the historical development and sudden collapse of the workers' education movement from 1900 to 1937. Workers' education was a vital component of early dissident strategies to overturn the AFL's dominant philosophy of business unionism with a broader and more politicized philosophy of social unionism. The article concludes that the pattern of events leading to the demise of workers' education as an opposition movement provides strong support for Piven and Cloward's theory of how social movements fail.

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