Information Communication Technology (ICT) offers unions a greater capacity to build cohesion and expand membership. An important issue in assessing the potential benefits of ICT is the nature and... Show More

Information Communication Technology (ICT) offers unions a greater capacity to build cohesion and expand membership. An important issue in assessing the potential benefits of ICT is the nature and scope of union members’ use of this technology. Unions must have an Internet presence. Using data from a 2010 Current Population Survey (CPS), the authors examine the extent to which union members have and use computers and the Internet. In addition, the authors review Facebook pages and Twitter accounts established by or for national labor organizations. The authors find that labor union usage of these social networks has not produced anticipated usage by members.

This study examines relations between indicators of knowledge work and worker attitudes toward employers, collective action, and union efficacy. Previous writing on these relations are used to... Show More

This study examines relations between indicators of knowledge work and worker attitudes toward employers, collective action, and union efficacy. Previous writing on these relations are used to develop hypotheses. Data are drawn from the 2009 Young Workers Survey. Results fail to show any statistically significant main effect relations between knowledge work indicators and the worker attitudes examined, despite a sample size sufficient to detect at least medium effect sizes. Further, there is very limited support for moderator effects. A discussion section discusses limitations, implications, and issues for future research.

This paper discusses how political parties and candidates try to enhance the public visibility of their websites during electoral campaigns, through a process that the author proposes calling the... Show More

This paper discusses how political parties and candidates try to enhance the public visibility of their websites during electoral campaigns, through a process that the author proposes calling the “meta-campaign.” This process significantly depends on the actions of journalists and the way in which they cover electoral campaigns. The discussion is based on an exploratory and qualitative study of the Portuguese campaign for the 2009 European Parliament election. The main reason the authors chose this election was that European themes, being less familiar to Portuguese citizens than national ones, would highlight the need for information about the salient issues as well as the tools for attaining this information, with the websites of political parties and candidates clearly being one of the latter.

This paper explores the use of interactive communication and dialogic relationship building strategies on political campaign Web sites. In contrast to presidential races that often feature... Show More

This paper explores the use of interactive communication and dialogic relationship building strategies on political campaign Web sites. In contrast to presidential races that often feature substantially more sophisticated campaign Web sites, congressional candidates’ ability and willingness to use the Web as an electioneering tool has varied greatly. The present research sought to address two broad research questions: 1) how candidates from the same electoral districts used their Web sites during the 2006 and 2010 congressional elections; and 2) to what extent could several candidate and district level variables explain the differences in Web utilization. A typology was proposed to examine the first question, while content analysis was performed to collect empirical data that addressed the second question. Results indicate that while the use of interactive Web strategies may be concentrated among candidates with certain characteristics in 2006, the adoption of social media in political campaigns has trickled down from the presidential level, and that interactive tools have become a norm in the 2010 congressional election, with virtually no observable differences emerging among candidates. Theoretical and practical implication for online political public relations is discussed.