Investigating the causal association between unionism and organizational effectiveness

Abstract

In an earlier study, a negative relationship was found between faculty unionism and organizational effectiveness in colleges and universities. No research, however, has ever investigated potential causality in this relationship, that is, whether ineffectiveness leads to unionism or whether unionism leads to ineffectiveness. This study relies on assessments of organizational effectiveness in a sample of 4-year institutions in 1976, 1980, and 1983 to investigate the potential causal directionality of these two factors. The results of the analyses suggest that ineffectiveness leads to unionism, but that once unionized, organizational effectiveness does not seem to improve.