Gary Chaison

Gary N. Chaison (born October 21, 1943) is an industrial relations scholar and labor historian at Clark University.
Early life and education.
Chaison was born in 1943 to Alfred and Ada Chaison, a Jewish family living in Brooklyn.
He obtained his bachelor's degree in 1965 and his Master of Business Administration in 1966, both from the City College of New York. He received his Ph.D. in 1972 from SUNY-Buffalo.
He is married to historian Joanne Danaher Chaison, a former American Antiquarian Society research librarian.
While still working on his doctorate, Chaison was appointed a lecturer at Baruch College in 1968 and in 1970 an assistant professor at SUNY-Buffalo.
In 1973, Chaison was named an assistant professor at the University of New Brunswick. He was promoted to associate professor in 1977.
In 1979, Chaison became a visiting professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
Chaison was appointed professor of management studies at Clark University in 1981.
Research focus.
Chaison's research focus has been on union mergers and the impact these have on union viability, union democracy, and perceptions of legitimacy. His first book, "When Unions Merge" (1986), examined the motivations for merger, barriers to merger, negotiations leading to merger, the nature of merger agreements, various mechanisms by which agreements are approved or disapproved by union officers and union members, the governing structures of merged unions, and the outcomes of mergers. Chaison distinguished between two categories of merger: Amalgamation (the joining two or more unions of roughly equal size into a new union) and absorption (in which a small union merges into a large union and loses its identity). The book generated a cottage industry of labor scholars scrutinizing union mergers, and led Chaison to be called the "major scholar of union mergers..."
In 1996, Chaison followed up this groundbreaking work with a transnational study of union mergers, "Union Mergers in Hard Times: The View from Five Countries." In this work, Chaison turned his attention to the effectiveness of union mergers. He concluded that mergers do not solve the fundamental problems facing labor unions (such as organizing large numbers of new members or combating the negative effects of globalization), but they do enable unions to rationalize jurisdictions, and to devote more resources to organizing and building political power.
In 2002, Chaison and co-author Barbara Bigelow examined the role legitimacy plays in the life of a union. The question of legitimacy flowed from Chaison's prior examination of union mergers. Did mergers negatively affect a labor organization's legitimacy in the eyes of its members, or in the eyes of the public? And if merger did so, what was the impact on the union's effectiveness in the various fields (such as organizing, servicing and collective bargaining) in which the union was active? In "Unions and Legitimacy," Chaison and Bigelow argued that the concept of legitimacy provided a framework for understanding the sources of union strengths and weaknesses, and why some union survival strategies have failed. Chaison and Bigelow concluded that there were three ways in which legitimacy could be obtained: legal recognition, employer recognition, and public approval. Chaison and Bigelow, however, distinguished these three types further by arguing that there are two kinds of legitimacy: Pragmatic legitimacy, which is essentially an assessment of a union's effectiveness, and moral legitimacy, which conferred when people or organization outside the union treats the union as a socially valuable actor. Reviewers called the work "...a fresh and lucid discussion of legitimacy as it applies to labor unions and their role in society."
Chaison recently published his first textbook, "Unions in America." Rather than a historic survey, the 2005 work discusses labor unions in the here-and-now by examining what unions do and why they do it. The textbook covers governance structures, how unions organize, the basic strategies of collective bargaining, and how unions attempt to exercise political influence. The book also assesses emerging and continuing trends in organizing, collective bargaining, and union political action.
Media influence.
Despite his relatively low level of academic output, Chaison is widely cited in the mass media. He has been interviewed by such major American newspapers as "The New York Times," "Los Angeles Times," "Chicago Tribune," "The Christian Science Monitor," and "USA Today," as well as mass-market international media sources such as the Associated Press and MSNBC. His popularity with the mainstream press led a consortium of central Massachusetts universities and colleges to cite his output specifically as an asset to the community. The reach of Chaison's media voice was particularly noted: "An article on the janitors' strike in Los Angeles had a combined circulation of over 9.2 million, and his quotes about the Verizon strike were picked up by over 90 newspapers across the country."
In part, Chaison is utilized as a resource by the mainstream press because he is noticeably pessimistic about the future of the American labor movement. Among his more recent strong statements are:
Honors and memberships.
Chaison won a research grant from the Canadian Department of Labour in 1977, 1979 and 1983, and a three-year research grant from the Canada Council from 1975 to 1977. He was also named a scholar with the Canadian Department of Labour in 1975.
Chaison is a member of the Industrial Relations Research Association, Canadian Industrial Relations Association, International Industrial Relations Association and the Academy of Management.
He is a reviewer for the journal "Industrial and Labor Relations Review," and is a member of the editorial board of the "Journal of Labor Research."