To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing

HUMRES-00597; No of Pages 15 Human Resource Management Review xxx (2017) xxx–xxx

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To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing M. Teresa Cardador a,⁎, Brandon C. Grant a, J. Ryan Lamare a, Gregory B. Northcraft b a b

School of Labor and Employment Relations, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 504 E. Armory Avenue, Champaign, IL 61620, USA College of Business Administration, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1206 S. Sixth Street, Champaign, IL 61820, USA

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history: Received 18 May 2015 Received in revised form 13 February 2017 Accepted 6 March 2017 Available online xxxx Keywords: Union organizing Social dilemma perspective Social uncertainty Environmental uncertainty Exposure

a b s t r a c t A worker's decision whether or not to support union organizing remains a critical and timely issue for American workers. We draw on the union organizing, organizational psychology, and social dilemma literatures to offer new insight into a worker's decision whether or not to support union organizing efforts. In particular, we highlight three specific conditions – social uncertainty, environmental uncertainty, and exposure – that make the decision whether or not to support union organizing a social dilemma, and describe how these should be expected to vary by union organizing stage. We also examine the effects of key contingencies: management opposition that exacerbates, and strategic union efforts that counteract, the effects of social dilemmas. Finally, we discuss the theoretical and practical implications of viewing union organizing from a social dilemma perspective. © 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

According to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), close to 1700 union representation elections were held in the United States between 2014 and 2015 (NLRB: Conduct Elections, 2014; NLRB: Election Report for Cases Closed, 2013). In addition, as many as 1500 more certification efforts occur each year via card check procedures (Eaton & Kriesky, 2009). Because the union organizing process provides the foundation for union representation it is important to understand workers' decisions whether to accept or reject union organizing efforts. We apply a social dilemma perspective (Dawes, 1980) to help clarify and explain these decisions. In applying a social dilemma perspective to workers' decisions whether or not to support union organizing, we specifically consider how each of three component pieces of social dilemmas – exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty – relates to worker support of union organizing drives. In doing so, we offer a theoretical framework that organizes and extends the existing literatures on union organizing and social dilemma decision making. Though a social dilemma perspective has a rich history of applicability to the U.S. industrial relations system, such applications have occurred almost exclusively in connection to post-certification labor-management activities, such as collective bargaining negotiations (Kochan & Lipsky, 2003; Walton & McKersie, 1965) and contract administration (Ashenfelter, Bloom, & Dahl, 2013; Ashenfelter & Dahl, 2012). Very rarely, and only in a limited fashion, has a social dilemma perspective been applied to the precertification union organizing process (Posner, Spier, & Vermeule, 2010; Rogers, 2010). Within the industrial relations sphere, Freeman and Kleiner (1988) raise concerns about dilemmas similar to those we present in this paper but do not feature these dilemma concerns in their theory, model, or analysis regarding union organizing. Thus, the social dilemma perspective, while

⁎ Corresponding author at: School of Labor and Employment Relations, University of Illinois, 504 E. Armory Avenue, Champaign, IL 61620, USA. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (M.T. Cardador), [email protected] (B.C. Grant), [email protected] (J.R. Lamare), [email protected] (G.B. Northcraft).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003 1053-4822/© 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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common in explaining individual behaviors at post-certification stages of union activity, is underutilized as a mechanism to explain choices workers face during pre-certification union organizing drives. Social dilemmas capture “the conflict between self-interest and collective interest” in which a non-cooperative course of action is tempting for each individual, but if all pursue a non-cooperative course of action, the collective benefit is not realized (Van Lange, Joireman, Parks, & Van Dijk, 2013: 126; see also Kahan, 1974). The social dilemma perspective deals with a dynamic form of cost/benefit analysis in which the costs and benefits an individual contemplates for an action are highly dependent on the cost/benefit calculations and subsequent actions of others (Dawes, 1980; McCarter, Rockmann, & Northcraft, 2010; Van Lange et al., 2013). Goal-expectation theory of cooperation in social dilemmas represents a dominant theory of social dilemma decision-making (Pruitt & Kimmel, 1977; also see Rutte & Wilke, 1992, Van Lange et al., 2013, and Yamagishi, 1986). According to goal-expectation theory cooperation is dependent on two inter-related conditions. First, an individual has to have the goal or motivation to cooperate. Examples of such goals and motives include cooperative or/and prosocial orientations (Van Lange & Kuhlman, 1994; Van Lange & Liebrand, 1991). Research shows that when individuals are high on these orientations, willingness to cooperate is increased (De Dreu & Van Lange, 1995; Van Lange, Agnew, Harinck, & Steemers, 1997). A second condition of goal-expectation theory is that an individual has to expect that others will also cooperate. Research has shown that such expectations are enhanced by factors such as group trust or perceptions of reciprocity within the group (De Cremer & Van Vugt, 1999). These two conditions are inter-related such that when individuals expect others to cooperate, their own motivation to cooperate will be increased (Pruitt & Kimmel, 1977). Applying these conditions to the decision to support union organizing, one would predict that individuals should cooperate to support a union organizing campaign to the extent that they (a) are personally motivated to support the organizing effort (perhaps because they are pro-union or expect the union to benefit them), and (b) expect others to also be favorably inclined to support the union organizing campaign. Though these predictions stemming from goal-expectation theory provide useful insights, we argue that they may be limited in at least three ways with respect to their application to a union organizing context. First, considerations of the “goal side” of the goal-expectation equation largely focus on the personal orientations and motives that drive cooperation in support of collective action. While these personal orientations and motives may certainly be relevant in a union organizing context, other factors may be even more important. For example, particularly when employers are strongly anti-union, individuals may not be motivated to cooperate because the investment of significant personal resources is required, thus increasing the perceived risk associated with union support. This perception of risk is amplified when individuals fear organizational opposition or when they are uncertain about the eventual outcomes of collective action. Accordingly, even if individuals are motivated to support a union, they may fail to cooperate because of perceptions of personal risk. Applying goal-expectation theory to the decision whether or not to support union organizing fails to capture this element of individual motivation. A second way that goal-expectation theory may be limited with respect to a union organizing context is in its temporal focus. Existing research drawing on goal-expectation theory has been largely conducted using lab experiments where cooperation decisions are made without consideration of whether those decision will be beneficial to the individual over the long term. Thus, existing research on goal-expectation theory fails to incorporate temporal considerations – that is, individual assessments of whether or not they will benefit even if cooperation to support the union does occur (McCarter, Mahoney, & Northcraft, 2011; McCarter et al., 2010; Van Lange et al., 2013). This type of temporal consideration is particularly relevant to a union organizing context given strong evidence that 40% of certified unions fail to reach first contract. This means that, even if individuals are motivated to support the union organizing campaign (perhaps because they are pro-union or believe a union can benefit them), they may fail to do so because they have substantial uncertainty about whether the personal benefit will be realized even if the union is certified (Messick, Allison, & Samuelson, 1988; Suleiman & Rapoport, 1988). A third limitation of goal-expectation theory applied to union organizing campaigns relates to the “expectation side” of the equation (i.e., whether others can be expected to also cooperate). Expectation considerations have largely been linked to either psychological dynamics of the group (e.g., those that promote trust and reciprocity) or to structural dynamics (e.g., the existence of rewards and/or punishments associated with cooperation or the failure to cooperate [Wit & Wilke, 1998; also see Van Lange et al., 2013 for a recent review]). While those are undoubtedly important factors associated with expectations that others will cooperate, expectation factors of specific importance to the union organizing context – such as the role of bargaining union characteristics – have received comparatively little attention. Thus, it is worth considering how such factors affect individuals' expectations that others will also cooperate to support the union. With the intent of explaining workers' decisions whether or not to support union certification and filling these gaps in goalexpectation theory literature (i.e., a lack of focus on risk perceptions as motivators, temporal considerations, and characteristics particularly relevant to bargaining units) we present a union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework. Foundational to our framework are three inter-related components of social dilemmas that address risk perceptions, temporal considerations, and bargaining unit characteristics influencing individual assessments that others will be likely to also cooperate. The three components are: exposure, social uncertainty, and environmental uncertainty (McCarter et al., 2010, 2011; Messick et al., 1988; Suleiman & Rapoport, 1988). Exposure refers to whether or not individuals risk investing significant personal resources in uncertain outcomes of collective action. Environmental uncertainty emerges when factors outside the control of the collective might intervene to prevent even successful cooperation from translating into future personal benefit realization (Messick et al., 1988; Suleiman & Rapoport, 1988). Social uncertainty refers to the possibility that other members of the collective (in this case, the bargaining unit) will not cooperate – i.e., invest their personal resources to support the union (Roch & Samuelson, 1997; Suleiman & Rapoport, 1988). Of the three components, social uncertainty is the most closely aligned with existing expectation Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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arguments associated with goal-expectation theory. However, as noted, we extend this focus through consideration of contextspecific factors influencing the expectation that other bargaining unit members will also cooperate to support union organizing. Our theory explains worker decisions to support union organizing and in doing so integrates, and sheds new light on, the literatures on both the goal-expectation theory of social dilemmas and on worker's decisions to support organizing campaign. With respect to goal-expectation theory, as explained above our framework addresses the role of risk perceptions, temporal considerations, and bargaining unit characteristics as critical factors contributing to cooperation – in this case, union organizing success or failure (see Bronfenbrenner, 2000). With respect to the union organizing literature, our theory helps explain workers' decisions to support union organizing. It doing so, it helps to further an understanding of when and why individuals may act (or fail to act) in support of union organizing campaign. Additionally, it helps reconcile discrepant findings in the extant union organizing literature. For example, researchers have debated the importance of bargaining unit size in an organization campaign – some indicating that large size is better (Chandler & Gely, 2007) and some claiming the opposite (Flanagan, 1989; Riddell, 2004). Our framework explains why the effects of bargaining unit size may need to be considered in combination with other bargaining unit characteristics. Additionally, while much of the existing literature focuses on union organizing writ large, the theory presented here highlights the importance of specific stages of union organizing. In particular, the framework explains how and why bargaining unit members' perceptions of risk and uncertainty may be more or less activated at different organizing stages. Practically, the union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework presented here may be particularly valuable in helping to explain the well-known “representation gap” within the U.S. industrial relations system. Although 40% of private sector employees affirm that they would support unionization (Freeman & Rogers, 1999), as of 2015 only 6.6% of U.S. private sector workers were unionized (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2015). Our framework may help to shed light on the representation gap in U.S. industrial relations, and also provide new insights regarding the factors that affect the choices employees make during the organizing stages of union certification. Because of our focus on applying the social dilemma theory to a union organizing context, we begin with a brief review of two dominant perspectives on worker decisions to support union organizing. We then introduce the three components of social dilemmas – exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty – and apply them to the union organizing context. Next, we describe how perceptions of exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty should be more or less relevant depending on the stage of organizing. Finally, we present a key theoretical mechanism through which social dilemmas are exacerbated within the organizing context – macro-level pressures on employees, largely in the form of employer opposition campaigns – and consider what our theory suggests for how unions can alleviate social dilemmas. 1. Why workers want unions: theories of utility and mobilization Two theoretical perspectives govern research into the drivers of individuals' decisions during union organizing efforts. The first surmises that workers initially seek union representation because labor groups provide tangible economic benefits unattainable to workers who are not members of the union – in other words, because of the subjective expected utility of union certification (Cooke, 1983; McClendon, Wheeler, & Weikle, 1998). This perspective views a worker's decision whether or not to support union organizing as a calculative process (Newton & Shore, 1992): union support during organizing drives is a function of a rational comparison of the benefits desired by workers and the perceived ability of the union to deliver those benefits if the union is certified, versus the costs of unionization (Beutell & Biggs, 1981; Farber & Saks, 1980; Florkowski & Schuster, 1987; Hurd & McElwain, 1988; Lawler & West, 1985; McClendon et al., 1998; Montgomery, 1989; Wheeler & McClendon, 1991; Youngblood, DeNisi, Molleston, & Mobley, 1984). In particular, this perspective emphasizes the importance of perceived union instrumentality – the degree to which the establishment of a union to represent the bargaining unit is seen as critical to achieving the benefits and payoffs that the worker desires (Brett, 1980; Fiorito, Gallagher, & Greer, 1986). Perceptions of union instrumentality have been shown to be most consistently related to whether bargaining unit members believe that – post-certification – the union will be effective in benefitting them individually and meeting their needs (Fiorito et al., 1986; Youngblood et al., 1984). The second theoretical perspective – mobilization theory – views worker decisions to support union organizing as a function of beliefs about whether their interests are similar to, different from, or opposed to, those of the employer (Kelly, 1998; Tilly, 1978). This perspective focuses on how and why people develop a sense of injustice (i.e., that they are being treated wrongly or illegitimately), and a sense that their grievance is collective (Gamson, 1995; Klandermans, 1992). Perceptions of injustice can stem from employer violations of established rules, or employer actions that conflict with worker beliefs about justice and fairness (Batstone et al., 1978; Feuille & Blandin, 1974; Getman, Goldberg, & Herman, 1976; Youngblood 1982; Premack & Hunter, 1988; Deshpande & Fiorito, 1989; Wheeler & McClendon, 1991; McClendon et al., 1998). Under this perspective, workers support union organizing because they believe unions can address workers' perceptions of injustice, power imbalances between workers and employers, and feelings of inefficacy (Atzeni, 2009; Badigannavar & Kelly, 2005; Blyton & Jenkins, 2012; Kelly, 1998; Moore & Reed, 2006). An expansion of this viewpoint sees a union's function as being broader than simply acting as a business agent for workers (a typology that can be associated with business unionism), and instead views the union as an agent for wider social change in the face of perceived injustice and inequality (a typology that can be associated with social movement unionism).1 1 Scholarship abounds into the distinctions between business unionism and social movement unionism. Since our focus is on the application of social dilemma theories to union organizing efforts writ large, we cite only a handful of the voluminous studies that distinguish union involvement in workplaces along these two typologies (for more holistic accounts, see Clawson, 2003; Nissen, 2003; Fantasia & Voss, 2004; Frege & Kelly, 2004; McAdam & Scott, 2005; Milkman, 2006; Turner, 2009; Tattersall, 2010).

Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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Fig. 1. The union organizing as social dilemma framework.

The two aforementioned theoretical perspectives on unions suggest that workers will support labor groups during organizing campaigns as a function of the union acting as (a) an economic instrument for the workers, and/or (b) an agent of broad social justice and change.2 Our work focuses instead on a critical but heretofore underemphasized piece of this puzzle: the response of individual workers to the exposure, environmental uncertainty and social uncertainty they face during organizing drives. In articulating our union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework, we first define and characterize the social dilemma perspective before examining the interaction between this perspective and specific stages of the union organizing process.

2. Components of social dilemmas As noted earlier, social dilemmas deal with a dynamic form of cost/benefit analysis in which the costs and benefits an individual contemplates for an action are highly dependent on the cost/benefit calculations and subsequent actions of others (McCarter et al., 2010). Defined broadly, social dilemmas represent “situations in which individual rationality leads to collective irrationality” (Kollock, 1998: 183). Groups of individuals form organizations (such as labor unions) in order to access benefits beyond the reach of any single individual, such as increased efficiency or increased effectiveness. Some have argued that any collective action represents a social dilemma (e.g., Olson, 1965). In any collective action, if too many group members choose to pursue individual interest rather than behaving in the collective's long-term interests, the group risks not producing the collective good and its associated benefits (e.g., Hardin, 1968). As noted, social dilemmas are defined by three inter-related components: exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty (McCarter et al., 2010; McCarter et al., 2011; Messick et al., 1988; Suleiman & Rapoport, 1988). Exposure means that individuals risk significant personal resources by investing those resources in collective action. After all, if there is no cost required to cooperate, there is no risk to cooperating. Investing personal resources (i.e., time, talent, money) in collective action is risky because individuals face uncertainty about whether others will similarly invest, and the outcomes of those investments (McCarter et al., 2010; Rapoport & Chammah, 1965). No one wants to invest personal resources if those resources will be lost because others fail to similarly invest in cooperating, or because successful cooperation will yield no personal benefits. Increasing exposure will diminish an individual's motive to cooperate. Environmental uncertainty emerges when factors outside the control of the collective might intervene to prevent even successful cooperation – the production of the public good –from translating into future personal benefit realization (Messick et al., 1988; Suleiman & Rapoport, 1988). Increasing environmental uncertainty also will diminish an individual's motive to cooperate (Budescu, Rapoport, & Suleiman, 1990; Gustafsson, Biel & Garling, 1999) out of fear that the produced public good will not yield personal benefits. Social uncertainty results from the possibility that other members of the collective will not cooperate – i.e., invest their personal resources in working together – to create the opportunity for shared value (Roch & Samuelson, 1997; Suleiman & Rapoport, 1988). Increasing social uncertainty will diminish an individual's motive to cooperate out of fear that the public good will not be produced. Exposure, environmental uncertainty and social uncertainty represent the defining components of social dilemmas because social and environmental uncertainty should make an individual less willing to risk the exposure of investing personal resources in collective action (McCarter et al., 2010). 2 These two union functions are not mutually exclusive. For instance, labor groups more closely aligned with social movement unionism can also directly act as instruments of economic utility for workers.

Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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When all members of a group face these forms of uncertainty and risk, each individual is incentivized toward non-investment of personal resources in cooperation, even though non-investment strategies generate inefficiencies and produce worse collective outcomes (Rapoport & Chammah, 1965). Thus, organizing may fail because not enough members of the collective personally invest in collective action. It is in this way that the social dilemma perspective departs from traditional cost/benefit analysis: The cost/benefit analysis that determines a particular individual's actions must incorporate calculation of what others are thinking – their cost/benefit analyses – and how others' subsequent actions (cooperation or defection) might create costs and benefits for an individual (McCarter et al., 2010). 3. Applying the components of social dilemmas to union organizing The logic of risk and uncertainty captured by social dilemmas provides a framework that helps to explain worker decisions to support union organizing. In applying the components of social dilemmas to union organizing, we specifically consider how each of the three defining components of social dilemmas (exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty) relates to individual decisions and behaviors during union organizing drives. (See Fig. 1.) 3.1. Exposure and union organizing Although a simple majority of voting-eligible members of a bargaining unit must sign cards or vote in favor of certification for a union to be formed (Ahlburg, 1984), certification elections are the final stage in a complex and often arduous process of organizing a union. During this process, members of the bargaining unit may need to invest many personal resources (e.g., collecting union authorization cards, knocking on doors, or passing out pamphlets) in order for the bargaining unit to achieve union certification (Devinatz, 2003). As Bronfenbrenner and Juravich (1998: 24) have noted, union campaigns have been “more successful when they encouraged active rank-and-file participation in and responsibility for the organizing campaign.” They have also noted (Bronfenbrenner & Juravich, 1998: 34) that, “To win takes nothing short of a truly exceptional effort.” Thus, there is a broad consensus that union certification success requires that workers risk exposure of their personal resources during organizing drives. The union, once certified to represent the bargaining unit, can create value by providing important benefits to bargaining unit members – what Haberfeld (1995) calls the “union premium” – such as increased wages and job security (Premack & Hunter, 1988; Youngblood et al., 1984). However, before value can be created by the union, someone (typically many someones) must risk those personal resource expenditures necessary for certification to be successful. Exposure risk is a particularly prominent feature of union organizing because the outcome (whether the union will be certified or not and what value will be realized from the union) is uncertain. In this sense, establishing a union is not at all like joining an already-established union. Haberfeld (1995) contends that workers “buy” union representation just as workers buy others goods and services. But what exactly are workers buying? In the case of joining an existing union, the benefits and costs can be explicit and well understood if the union has been representing the bargaining unit for some years and has a track record of representation. However, in the case of certifying a new union, the pre-election investment of personal resources represents a real risk as long as the probability of certification success – dependent on the actions of others – remains unknown. When uncertainty is too high, a worker may feel that the likelihood of any hoped-for (but uncertain) future benefits of union certification will not outweigh the personal exposure risked – particularly if the union might get certified without that worker's exposure. Perceived pre-certification exposure should be influenced by factors that affect the net present value to a worker of investing personal resources in the union certification campaign. Drawing from the finance literature, this net present value is derived by comparing the present value of union organizing today to the value of the union in the future, taking risks and future returns into account (Sunde & Lichtenberg, 1995). This is a time-bound cost-benefit analysis whereby bargaining unit members have to decide whether the net future value of any potential benefit obtained from the union (which may or may not be returned) is worth the net present value of resources required to invest in union organizing. However, as noted earlier, this is also a dynamic cost/benefit calculation in that any individual's cost/benefit calculations must take into account what other members of the bargaining unit are thinking, and how their subsequent actions would impact the probability of successful union certification. The exposure risk to workers should be influenced by time. The influence of time may be seen in two forms. The first is the length of the organizing process, which is a structural derivation of the labor laws governing the U.S. industrial relations system. Until very recently, there was little temporal governance to the union organizing process – the time between employees filing NLRB election petitions and the holding of the election itself, for instance, could last weeks, months, or even years (Bronfenbrenner & Warren, 2011; Logan, Johansson, & Lamare, 2011).3 The longer the campaign, the more time there is between a bargaining unit member's at-risk present investments and the eventual net future benefits of collective action (Eaton & Kriesky, 2001). Benefits that cannot be enjoyed right away are seen as less certain, and thus are perceived as less valuable and less worthy of risking personal resources (Parks, Henager, & Scamahorn, 1996). Additionally, when campaigns are long and drawn out,

3 The NLRB updated its procedures to streamline and standardize the union organizing process effective April 15, 2015. These updates included a variety of policies designed to quicken the time between the filing of a petition for a union election and the election itself, thus ostensibly shortening both union and management campaigns and lowering the possibility of long delays. The NLRB rules continue to be challenged in courts as well as by legislation, and at this stage it is unclear what effect these changes will have on individual decisions to support union organizing.

Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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workers are likely to perceive that support of organizing will require additional, continuous – even increasing – risk of personal resources. By contrast, when the length of the certification campaign is likely to be relatively short, individuals will feel that the time to payoff is quicker and that the overall personal investment required to support the campaign will be smaller. The second temporal element of exposure is the worker's length of time within the organization. The value of longer tenure at an organization, specifically within certified bargaining units, has a well-documented history in unionized contexts. Seniority provisions are one of the first non-wage concerns that unions take to the collective bargaining table, and represent a cornerstone of the bargaining relationship, because these provisions reduce the opportunity for subjectivity and limit the potential for bias to affect key workplace decisions like promotions and pay raises (Abraham & Farber, 1987; Slichter, 1940). However, a natural artifact of labor groups emphasizing seniority is that more senior members of unions receive considerably greater benefits from union representation than do less senior union members (Carrell & Heavrin, 2010; Cohen-Vogel, Feng, & Osborne-Lampkin, 2013). Therefore, though the power of union representation may seem more attractive to less senior employees who have greater job insecurity (Wilson & Mossakowski, 2012), less senior workers may feel they have comparatively little to gain, yet much to risk, in exposing themselves as a consequence of supporting a union (Devinatz, 2003). On the other hand, for very senior employees, their shorter time horizon to retirement may also make them less likely to support organizing. Their advanced tenure may mean that they will have less opportunity to capitalize on any potential value created from unionizing. Thus, they may be less likely to want to risk exposure for a comparatively minimal (short-term) payoff. Support for this argument is found in studies of organizational commitment which show that commitment declines with advanced tenure, because as individuals near retirement the benefits of organizational membership are lower (Meyer & Allen, 1984; Wright & Bonett, 2002). Overall, this suggests that with respect to organizational tenure, there may be something of an organizing support “sweet spot” for middle-tenured bargaining unit members who still have plenty of time left and enough seniority to realize fully the benefits of having a union. Thus: Proposition 1. Worker support during union certification drives will be weaker as (a) campaign length increases, and (b) tenure of workers is very low or very high. Proposition 2. The effect of (a) campaign length and (b) worker tenure on worker support during union certification drives will be mediated by perceptions of exposure risk. 3.2. Environmental uncertainty and union organizing The most obvious sources of environmental uncertainty in union certification campaigns are those that researchers have previously identified as key determinants of union support decisions: perceived union instrumentality (Godard, 2008; Wheeler & McClendon, 1991) and perceived collective action efficacy (Kelly, 1998). Both are about the apparent ability of the union to deliver on its promise to create value if bargaining unit members cooperate – invest the critical mass of personal resources needed – to support union organizing. If bargaining unit members are uncertain that the union is willing or able to pursue the bargaining unit's interests, that uncertainty quickly could translate into fear that value creation will be jeopardized and that personal resources committed in support of union certification will be wasted, thereby eroding any individual's appetite for supporting the union's efforts. An important factor influencing environmental uncertainty in union certification campaigns stems from the principal-agent relationship between members of the bargaining unit (principals) and the union leaders (agents) who represent them in negotiations with the employer (Ramamohan Rao, 1992). The influence of environmental uncertainty – via the principal-agent relationship – on workers' decisions to support union organizing should be a function of two union features – (1) perceived union leader skill, and (2) perceived union motives. First, with respect to leader skill, the union leaders representing the bargaining unit may not have (or be perceived to not have) the skill required to successfully negotiate a promise-fulfilling contract. As Cooke (1985: 165) has noted, the skill of union leaders is important to their role because it influences perception of subjective costs and benefits, especially since workers are “unsure whether the potential benefits of union representation will outweigh the costs.” Skill of the agents representing the bargaining unit might be particularly concerning if the bargaining unit forms an independent local union – i.e., does not join an existing and established union such as the Teamsters (Devinatz & Rich, 1993). An independent local union would require more members of the bargaining unit to assume agent representation roles – and such individuals might have little or no contract negotiation experience. In contrast, joining an existing union would allow the newly-unionized bargaining unit to be represented by the established union's experienced and skilled negotiators. Second, the union leaders representing the bargaining unit may not be perceived as having the right motivation to successfully negotiate a promise-fulfilling contract. Agent motivation is a particularly thorny issue in many principal-agent relationships because it is rarely (if ever) the case that the interests of principals and their agents are perfectly aligned (Schatzki, 1975; Walton & McKersie, 1965). Misalignment of union and bargaining unit objectives could lead a union negotiator to bargain in a way that the negotiator believes faithfully represents and pursues the interests of the bargaining unit membership when, in fact, it may not. A related – and very realistic – concern is that the union will position itself at the center of the bargaining unit's needs and be less likely to meet the concerns of those at the margins of the bargaining unit. Union campaigns often understandably tailor their goals to the preferences of the “the median voter” (Kaufman & Martinez-Vazquez, 1987; White, 1982). While tailoring Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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negotiations to the median bargaining unit member may maximize satisfaction with the contract in the bargaining unit, bargaining unit members on the margins may feel uncertain that the union will benefit them even if the union's negotiations succeed (see Downs, 1957). These representational concerns should fuel environmental uncertainty. Thus: Proposition 3. Worker support during union certification drives will be weaker as individuals (a) question union leader skill and motives, and (b) experience representational concerns. Proposition 4. The effect of perceptions of (a) union skill and motives, and (b) representational concerns on worker support during union certification drives will be mediated by perceptions of environmental uncertainty. 3.3. Social uncertainty and union organizing The union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework suggests that social uncertainty concerns should be paramount in union organizing (Delton, Nemirow, Robertson, Cimino, & Cosmides, 2013; Olson, 1965, 1980; Reynolds, 1980). Each member of the bargaining unit must decide whether to avoid the risk of exposure by withholding personal support for union organizing – to sit on the sidelines and free-ride on others' investments in creation of the union. The risk here is that if enough bargaining unit members attempt to free ride – to leave it to other members of the bargaining unit to invest the critical mass of resources required for successful certification (i.e., “Why not let Harry do it and enjoy the benefits at no cost” [Freeman & Medoff, 1984: 9]) – organizing fails. Any worker's (or group of workers') withheld effort could turn out to be the proverbial “straw that broke the camel's back” of the certification campaign. This is significant given evidence that when certification elections occur, they are often decided by narrow margins. For example, a study of the hospitality industry found that nearly half of the certification elections held over a 2-year period were decided by fewer than 10 votes (Deshpande & Stamper, 2004). The possibility of free-riding creates social uncertainty for bargaining unit members. Ideally, a worker will risk contributing personal resources to the organizing campaign believing that other members of the bargaining unit will similarly contribute. However, the fear that other members of the bargaining unit will not similarly contribute could mean that the critical mass of personal resources necessary to insure union certification will not be achieved – or even if achieved would be spread over a smaller number of supporters, perhaps making the greater exposure required of each contributor not worth the anticipated benefits. Given the risk of contributing personal resources during union organizing, workers may be extremely reluctant to make up for the non-contributions of free riders (Jackson & Harkins, 1985: 1205). One factor with implications for social uncertainty associated with free-riding has been debated in the union organizing literature: bargaining unit size. Olson's (1965) seminal work regarding collective action suggests an inverse link between bargaining unit size and successful collective action (Weber, Camerer, Rottenstreich, & Knez, 2001). The larger the bargaining unit, the greater the social uncertainty that other members of the bargaining unit might free-ride partly because they feel that someone else will invest effort so they don't have to, and partly because their non-investment will be less visible to the group (Darley & Latane, 1968; Haber, 2005; Olson, 1965). However, others have suggested a positive relationship between bargaining unit size and collective action, arguing that as group size increases, the exposure required of any one individual is lessened and more bearable (Kelly, 1998). These opposing points – and what they suggest about the trade-off between social uncertainty and exposure risk – can be reconciled by the union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework. Larger bargaining unit size should be beneficial to the extent that the greater risk of social uncertainty associated with increased size can be mitigated, thus leaving individual decision makers with both decreased exposure risk and decreased social uncertainty. We identify two factors – related to bargaining unit characteristics and social dynamics – that should decrease social uncertainty independent of group size: bargaining unit heterogeneity and social cohesion. We also suggest a third factor - the presence of individuals actively opposed to unionization – that should also be expected to increase social uncertainty. First, bargaining unit heterogeneity should increase social uncertainty. Heterogeneity refers to the diversity of people and their (implied) agendas and interests in the group (Cooke, 1983; Williams & O'Reilly, 1998). Diversity can arise from differences in unit member tenure, disciplinary expertise, bargaining unit turnover, and/or demographics, such as gender and race. The more heterogeneous a bargaining unit, the greater the tendency for the bargaining unit to appear to be a collection of subgroups reflective of distinct characteristics – and interests (Lau & Murnighan, 1998). The salience of clear subgroups can lead bargaining unit members to feel that individuals in other subgroups may not share similar interests, including a similar perspective about the role of the union and the value the union should create. Bargaining unit heterogeneity should therefore influence bargaining unit member perceptions of whether members of other subgroups in the bargaining unit can be trusted to invest personal resources to support the union. Second, group cohesion should reduce social uncertainty in bargaining units. Group cohesion refers to the tendency for a group to “stick together and remain united in the pursuit of its goals and objectives” (Carron, 1982: 124). When unit cohesion is high, individuals should be feel more assured that others in the unit share their perceptions of injustice, desire for, and support of, unionization, and should thus be more confident in others to take action to support the union. In short, unit cohesion should reduce social uncertainty that other group members will behave similarly to support the union. This prediction is based on evidence that people's beliefs about others' attitudes are a critical element of interdependent decision-making (Epley, Morewedge, & Keysar, 2004). Specifically, research on projection – the tendency for people who hold a particular stand to perceive others as likely to be similarly inclined – demonstrates that, particularly when group cohesion is high, a person's estimates of others' evaluations of an option are directly influenced by that person's own evaluation of that same option (Krueger, 1998; Marks & Miller, Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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1987; Ross, Greene, & House, 1977). For example, individuals whose emotions are strongly aroused by partisan politics may assume that the emotions of similar others are similarly aroused (Van Boven & Loewenstein, 2005). This prior research suggests a strong tendency for people to perceive that those who share their goals and objectives will engage in similar attitudinal processes as themselves. Connecting this with the mobilization perspective, when unit cohesion is high individuals should be more likely to believe that their perceptions of injustice and inequality are shared by others. When this is the case, individuals should be more likely to trust other group members to support the union, so social uncertainty will be reduced. Third, we predict that the presence of individuals who actively oppose the union will increase social uncertainty, both directly and via reduced social cohesion. When individuals perceive that other members of the unit are strongly opposed to unionization, it should directly affect their ability to trust that others will also support unionization (Epley et al., 2004). Moreover, when fellow bargaining unit members express strong opposition it will also make it clear that the bargaining unit is not united in the pursuit of its goals and objective (i.e., not socially cohesive). As noted, such perceptions of low cohesion should increase social uncertainty among union supporters. Significantly, in the absence of voiced opposition, “false consensus” that others are similarly inclined to support the union should be encouraged by unit homogeneity and cohesion. Thus: Proposition 5. Worker support during union certification drives will be weaker as units (a) increase in heterogeneity, (b) decrease in group cohesion, and (c) increase in number of members expressing opposition. Proposition 6. The effect of unit (a) heterogeneity, (b) cohesion, and (c) expression of opposition on worker support during union certification drives will be mediated by perceptions of social uncertainty.

3.4. The role of union organizing stage Thus far, we have defined exposure risk, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty, and explained how and why these defining components of social dilemmas should affect a bargaining unit member's support during union organizing. In this section, we suggest that these forms of uncertainty and risk should be more or less salient at different stages of a union organizing campaign. We begin this analysis with a brief description of the U.S. union organizing process. In the United States, the process by which labor unions are organized has in large part remained unchanged since the passage of the National Labor Relations Act in 1935 and its 1947 amendment, the Labor-Management Relations Act, commonly known as the Taft-Hartley Act. Employees seeking union representation must traverse several procedural stages prior to full union certification (see Bronfenbrenner & Warren, 2011; Budd, 2013; Katz, Kochan, & Colvin, 2008). First, workers must express an interest in unionization either by reaching out to a union or after being contacted by one. Second, the union begins an initial stage of organizing where it seeks to build support and solicits interested employees to sign union authorization cards. Third, if 30% or more of the targeted employees sign cards, the union can petition the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to hold an election where workers in the bargaining unit will vote on whether to authorize the union as their exclusive representative. (If over 50% of the bargaining unit have signed cards, the union can ask the employer for voluntary recognition and no election is needed.) Fourth, if an election petition is received, the NLRB will determine the appropriate bargaining unit and assess various other conditions before scheduling an election date.4 Fifth, if an election is granted, prior to the election date, both sides can engage in campaigns either supportive of, or in opposition to, the union. As part of the campaign, labor groups are given lists of bargaining unit members and can contact these individuals at their homes, while employers can campaign against the union at the worksite. Finally, on the election date, employees vote in secret on whether to accept or reject the union – a union-positive vote by over 50% of the bargaining unit results in the union being certified as the exclusive representative of the workers. Although it is known that, at workplaces where employees express interest in unionization, there are steep odds of actually achieving unionization, researchers have less thoroughly examined how and why the choices individuals make to support or reject the union's efforts during organizing drives may be tied to specific union organizing stages. We posit that a social dilemma framework might best explain individual behaviors in the stages where worker uncertainty and risk should be greatest. In particular, we suggest that the first, second, and fifth stages described above should be most relevant to the union-organizing-as-socialdilemma framework. That is, when workers must express an initial interest in unionization, when the union begins an initial stage of organizing where it seeks to build support, and, if an election is scheduled, post-election date when both sides can engage in campaigns either supportive of or in opposition to the union. These stages all represent critical decision periods where bargaining unit members must evaluate the potential risk of supporting a union and assess the uncertainty surrounding others' support of the union, and the unions' ultimate ability to satisfy their interests.

4 As noted in Footnote 3, new rules have drastically accelerated the unionization process (discussed earlier in this paper). Additionally, questions regarding the appropriateness of bargaining units and their sizes have been shaped by recent NLRB decisions to certify “micro-units” (357 NLRB No. 83 [2011]). As an alternative to “wall-to-wall” bargaining units, micro-units are more homogeneous units within larger organizations that unions can organize. The logic underlying this particular recent NLRB action lends credence to the theory we posit in this paper, showing evidentiary support for why unions and workers can reduce social uncertainty by seeking more homogeneous certification units (see Husband & Williams, 2015).

Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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3.5. Exposure and organizing stage Our analysis suggests that campaign length and worker tenure should be more or less relevant at different stages of organizing. To begin, campaign length should influence exposure risk the most at stage two – during pre-election or pre-card check organizing. Until an election is scheduled and time to vote is fixed, the length of the pre-election, or pre-card check organizing campaign is uncertain (Bronfenbrenner & Warren, 2011). Thus, exposure risk should be greatest for workers during this stage. Undeniably, explicit management support of unionizing – via pre-election assurances such as neutrality agreements and card check recognition (Guzick, 1984) – would dramatically reduce any risk of exposure from campaign length. In contrast, worker tenure affects individual decision making at all three stages. A noted above, worker tenure should be a critical factor in individuals' decisions about whether supporting a union is “worth the risk.” Because worker tenure will not change significantly during the organizing campaign, and because it relates to how valuable the union may be perceived to be, this exposure factor should remain constant throughout the organizing stages. 3.6. Environmental uncertainty and organizing stage Environmental uncertainty concerns stemming from perceptions of union leader skill and motives should be prevalent during all three stages of union organizing identified above. Such perceptions should influence employee willingness to contact a union, or responsiveness to union contact, during stage one. Similarly, perceptions of union leaders' ability to deliver on bargaining unit interests should be relevant during the pre-election or pre-card check organization campaign, and to employees' decisions to ultimately support the union if an election is scheduled. Because union leaders' skills and motives signal to workers whether unionization can ultimately satisfy their interests and needs (Badigannavar & Kelly, 2005), unit perceptions of the union should be critical at all stages. In contrast, representational concerns should be most relevant during stages two and five – when organizers are building support for a union, and if and when the election is certified. Because representational concerns are about worker's perceptions that a union may ignore their needs by giving preference to the “the median voter” (Kaufman & Martinez-Vazquez, 1987; White, 1982), these concerns should be most prevalent when workers are weighing the decision to lend their support to the union. Since bargaining unit members may have less information about what the union will do at initial stages of contact, and more information as the campaign lengthens, representational concerns should increase as the campaign goes on. Thus, these concerns should be more significant in the latter two stages. 3.7. Social uncertainty and organizing stage All forms of social uncertainty – unit heterogeneity, unit cohesion, and unit member opposition –should be greatest in stages one and two. Because all three signal to workers whether other members of the unit can be trusted to support the unionization effort – because they share one's interests (heterogeneity), are united in pursuit of goals and objectives (cohesion) and/or are likely to actively counter the union (opposition) – they should be most important when the union is building support and collecting authorization cards. Once the election is scheduled, or a sufficient number of cards collected, social uncertainty concerns should be minimized. To summarize, the union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework suggests that while exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty should influence bargaining unit members' decisions to support unionization, the contributors to each of these forms of uncertainty and consequent risk likely vary by stage of organizing. Next we turn our attention to two key contingency factors that can shape the extent to which the components of social dilemmas during organizing drives are heightened or weakened. 4. Employer opposition to unions as a contingency factor In this section, we argue that management's opposition to the union is one of two key contingency factors influencing exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty (see Fig. 1). Our arguments help explain the role of strategic management opposition to unions when considering organizing successes and failures (Freeman and Kleiner 1990; Riddell, 2004; Ferguson, 2008). We view managerial opposition to unionization as affecting perceptions of all three components – exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty – within the union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework (Kochan, 1980; Bronfenbrenner, 1993). When management is thought to harbor anti-union sentiments, workers who show a willingness to organize may fear they are risking more than they would otherwise – e.g., their reputations with their superiors (Rusbult & Van Lange, 1996), as well as the possibility of harassment or diminished opportunities at work for supporting the union (Devinatz, 2005). Logan (2002: 204) maintains that employers sometimes hire anti-union consultants in response to organizing threats, with consultants encouraging supervisors to, among an array of other anti-union tactics, “convince employees that, instead of voting for the union or no union, the real choice they are facing is between the union and their jobs” (a similar claim is made by Hurd & Uehlein, 1994). Such actions would serve to enhance perceptions of exposure risk for employees. Although, as noted, U.S. labor law provides unions and employers with an opportunity to engage in campaigns once employees express interest in unionization and before an election is held, employers may articulate their opposition to labor groups well Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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before this point, with some employers advocating against unionization as early as an employee's orientation onto the job (Bronfenbrenner & Warren, 2011; Logan et al., 2011). Fear of management's opposition to unions – even if inaccurate – creates lasting perceptions of exposure risk that cannot be overcome simply by proceeding to the next stage in the organizing process. When employers oppose unionization, this action also creates environmental uncertainty. During organizing campaigns, employers sometimes attempt to persuade employees that the union places its own interests (e.g., dues collection) above those of the workers it represents, and therefore will not effectively serve the workers' needs (Logan, 2002: 203). This fuels environmental uncertainty that the concessions achieved by the union may benefit the union more than the bargaining unit members. Additional environmental uncertainty also occurs when management delays first-contract bargaining after a union election has been held. This practice is more common than might be expected, with approximately 40% of newly certified unions failing to obtain first contracts (Craver, 2009; Ferguson, 2008). These forms of opposition dampen worker perceptions that the union will be able to deliver on its intended benefits – thus creating environmental uncertainty – and increase both the need for more investment on the part of workers in order for organizing to succeed, and the probability of losing that investment – thereby increasing exposure risk. Thus, from the social dilemma perspective, perceptions that management is likely to resist the union's efforts to create value post-certification should significantly dampen the extent to which workers view the exposure required to insure union organizing success as worthwhile. Finally, management opposition to unions can shape – both directly and indirectly – the level of social uncertainty an employee faces during an organizing campaign. Management opposition can have a direct effect when management influences the composition of the bargaining unit. As noted, social uncertainty rises as bargaining units become more heterogeneous (Olson, 1965). It is important to note that U.S. labor law includes provisions that limit bargaining units to only those considered to represent a “community of interest” among employees (i.e., workers sharing an array of commonalities as determined by the NLRB4). This aspect of the U.S. industrial relations system has yielded a highly decentralized structure that, it can be argued, is far less prone to heterogeneity-related problems than are more centralized systems like those in the United Kingdom or Germany. However, successful anti-union employers have been known not only to challenge the appropriateness of the identified bargaining unit in order to create delay, but also to introduce heterogeneity into these groups. Logan (2002: 200–201) notes that employers are sometimes advised to “pack units with anti-union employees, exclude pro-union employees, and reduce the number of employees eligible for collective bargaining.” Where employers are successful in influencing the composition of bargaining units to their benefit, the probability of social uncertainty grows substantially.5 Management opposition to unions can also shape levels of social uncertainty indirectly. Employer resistance may influence employees to oppose the union (Bronfenbrenner, 2009; Logan, 2006) and/or reduce the social cohesiveness of bargaining unit (Riddell, 2001). Based on the arguments presented above, both would reduce unit member perceptions that others can be trusted to support the union. When employers signal to workers that investment in organizing is risky and unpopular, the probability of social uncertainty concerns increase accordingly. Proposition 7. The negative effect of exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty on worker support during union certification drives will be heightened by employer opposition to unions.

5. Union strategies as a contingency factor The consideration of uncertainty and exposure as significant factors has several implications for union organizers and bargaining unit members. Namely, we argue that social dilemmas can be alleviated by unions in instances where labor groups strategically manage social influence strategies, bargaining unit composition, and requests for bargaining unit member commitment and involvement (see Fig. 1). 5.1. Social influence Unions have several strategies available to mitigate the impact of the social dilemma on supporting a union organizing campaign. It is critical to remember that the uncertainty governing social dilemmas is a perception, and such perceptions are highly susceptible to social influence (Asch, 1958). If bargaining unit members are uncertain that other unit members will support the organizing campaign (i.e., social uncertainty), union supporters and organizers may increase their success in garnering support for unionization by focusing attention on communicating to bargaining unit members that others are convinced. Zimbardo and Ebbesen (1970: 119) describe a process in which the individual most certain (convinced) of the benefits is identified and enlisted to help convince the next most certain, who is used to convince the next most certain, etc., creating a “rolling consensus” of (perceived) support that should help diminish social uncertainty effects on the union support decision, and increase the collective efficacy (Mischel & Northcraft, 1997) of bargaining unit members. Union leaders might also enlist those workers whose ideology favors unionization, irrespective of any rational cost-benefit analysis, to help decrease social uncertainty via their voicing public support for the union. In the end, workers who are uncertain are most likely to be swayed by similar others (Bleda & Castore, 5 Conversely, when employers fail to manipulate the bargaining unit composition to their benefit, they run the risk of diminishing social uncertainty. In the recent case of the University of Illinois at Chicago faculty union organizing drive, the administration argued that “tenured and tenure-track faculty should not be in a bargaining unit with non-tenure-track faculty, challenging the idea that there is a community of interest between them” (Rhoades, 2011: 25). This produced two more homogeneous faculty unions.

Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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1973) whose visible enthusiasm for union organizing might not only reduce social uncertainty concerns, but also suggest to a worker that she or he should be similarly more enthusiastic about, and supportive of, union organizing. Another social influence strategy – presenting evidence of the union's demonstrated skill and expertise in delivering benefits – can count toward the resolution of environmental uncertainty. For example, if bargaining unit members fear the environmental uncertainty of the union negotiators' abilities to bring home a favorable contract, hard evidence that shows they have done so in the past – for example, enlisting internal organizing committees or social media to communicate a demonstrable “track record” for success in past negotiations, particularly in similar organizations or related industries (Bobo, Max, Bobo, & Kendal, 2001) – could help allay environmental uncertainty concerns. Similarly, social influence strategies can be used to reduce environmental uncertainty about whether management will resist union efforts to achieve a first contract post-certification. If unions communicate to workers that management understands the value and power of workers on whom the company is highly dependent, this is likely to reduce uncertainty on the part of unit members that management will resist the union upon certification. In this case, reminding workers of their power in the employee-management relationship may improve their confidence that the union will be able to produce benefits for them in the longterm. 5.2. Bargaining unit composition Another implication of the social dilemma perspective on union organizing support is that uncertainty – particularly social uncertainty – can be influenced by affecting bargaining unit characteristics. As noted, research suggests that individuals are more likely to trust others to cooperate and contribute to collective action when group members are like them (Weber et al., 2001; Williams & O'Reilly, 1998). Thus, members of more homogeneous and more cohesive bargaining units should be more likely to believe that other members of the bargaining unit can be trusted to pursue the same interests (Deshpande & Stamper, 2004). This suggestion – focusing an organizing campaign on more homogeneous bargaining units – seems to run counter to traditional wisdom that more heterogeneous bargaining units are better because they should have more power (Mischel, 1986). Our unionorganizing-as-social-dilemma framework also implies that there may be value in the union contesting employer attempts to influence the compositional makeup of bargaining units, even if this might delay the organizing process. 5.3. Bargaining unit member commitment and involvement The fact that union certification campaigns require personal exposure suggests implications for how, and from whom, requests are made for bargaining unit member commitment. It is critical to keep in mind that, because increasing personal exposure reduces the perceived value of union organizing, it should be important for union organizers to give serious consideration to the amount of exposure (personal resource investment) requested of any single bargaining unit member. This suggests that union organizers must walk a very fine line in soliciting the investment of personal resources to support union organizing by members of the bargaining unit. Asking for too much may lead members of the bargaining unit to conclude that their exposure would be too great given the uncertain return on their personal resource investments. On the other hand, asking for too little pre-certification investment might not foster the level of commitment (perhaps based on a sense of “sunk costs” – Staw, 1976) desired to ensure follow-through at voting or in a protracted campaign. Instead, union organizers perhaps should be oriented toward identifying the minimal sufficient justification suggested by cognitive dissonance theory (Festinger & Carlsmith, 1959), whereby the requested investment is small enough to not threaten the limits imposed by any post-certification cost/benefit analysis, but large enough to insure an unwillingness to abandon those personal resource expenditures at the 11th hour of an organizing effort. Similarly, if bargaining unit members who are more junior, or very senior, perceive greater exposure risk, union organizers may want to target the “sweet spot” middle-tenured employees for involvement in support of union organizing. As we have argued, this group of employees may perceive the lowest risk exposure relative to the perceived benefit of unionization. Thus, such targeted bargaining unit involvement may be important for organizers. What this suggests is that if union organizers are able to get enough of these “middle” (moderately tenured) employees to support the organizing drive, they may have to worry less about the tenure margins – i.e., those employees with very low or very high tenure who are likely to perceive either low valuation and/ or large exposure risk. Another common resolution to the issue of how much commitment should be demanded from the bargaining unit – commitment which helps to mitigate some social dilemma concerns – is for the union to rely on a small group of heavily invested activists to put in much of the legwork needed to organize other members of the bargaining unit. Thus: Proposition 8. The negative effect of exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty on worker support during union certification drives will be mitigated by union strategies regarding (a) social influence, (b) bargaining unit composition, and (c) bargaining unit member commitment and involvement.

6. Theoretical and practical implications This paper applies a relatively underutilized perspective – social dilemmas – to generate new insights concerning factors influencing the success of union organizing efforts. The union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework offered here captures the dynamic cost/benefit analysis characteristic of an individual's decision whether to support union organizing – an individual's Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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cost/benefit calculations must contemplate the cost/benefit calculations and subsequent actions of other members of the bargaining unit – and in doing so makes several theoretical contributions. First, a broad theoretical implication of the social dilemma perspective for union organizing is that it clarifies how and why the decision to support union organizing is not simply a matter of post-certification value creation for workers (i.e., utility) or a response to perceived personal and collective injustice and inequality (i.e., mobilization). Our union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework clarifies how, why and when workers' decisions to support union organizing campaigns are also influenced by exposure and uncertainty associated with the perceived attitudes and anticipated actions of others involved. Second, the framework offers explanations for findings associated with extant research. For example, it is well established that the length of campaign is negatively correlated with campaign success (Bronfenbrenner & Warren, 2011; Farber, 2001), and the framework presented here explains why that might be the case – because exposure risk expands with campaign length. Similarly, while scholars have recognized management opposition as a factor in worker decision-making about union support (Eaton & Kriesky, 2009; Holley, Jennings, & Wolters, 2001), the union-organizingas-social-dilemma framework explains how and why these concerns constitute hallmarks of exposure, environmental and social uncertainty inherent in social dilemmas. A third theoretical contribution applying the social dilemma perspective to union organizing is that it helps to reconcile inconsistent findings in the union organizing literature. While the role of bargaining unit size has been debated (Chandler & Gely, 2007; Flanagan, 1989; Riddell, 2004), the union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework explains how and why it might not be unit size that matters most, but factors associated with the heterogeneity and cohesiveness of the unit. Our framework explains why, to the extent that units are homogeneous and cohesive, size may not be as critical a factor. Fourth, while much of the existing literature focuses on union organizing writ large, the social dilemma framework highlights the importance of specific stages of union organizing to worker perceptions of risk and uncertainty. Our framework explains how and why these perceptions may be more or less activated at certain stages of an organizing campaign, thus providing a more nuanced perspective on both the factors that contribute to risk and uncertainty in union organizing campaigns, and when those factors are likely to be most impactful. Fifth, the social dilemma perspective extends existing union organizing literature by adding new insight into the pre-certification support decision. Historically, worker support of union organizing has been understood largely as a function of an implicit calculative analysis of the probable post-certification benefits and costs (Farber & Saks, 1980; Wheeler & McClendon, 1991). Our analysis highlights pre-certification factors that make the decision to support organizing uncertain and therefore personally risky. Moreover, in articulating the union- organizing-as-social-dilemma framework, we have identified new factors relevant to union organizing support, such as the “sweet spot” of worker tenure, and the notion that organizers should pay attention to unit characteristics and social dynamics rather than size to minimize social uncertainty concerns. The union-organizing-as-social-dilemma framework presented here also may inform research on social dilemmas. The goal-expectation theory of cooperation in social dilemmas has largely focused on the role of personal orientations and motives (see Van Lange et al., 2013 for a recent review), with considerably less attention paid to the role of other factors that may influence motives to cooperate such as whether cooperation is worth the risk (exposure), or perceptions of whether the benefit of cooperation will be realized over time even if cooperation is successful (environmental uncertainty [Darley & Latane, 1968; Haber, 2005; Weber et al., 2001]). Our framework adds to research on the goal-expectation theory of cooperation in social dilemmas by highlighting the influence on cooperation of requiring the investment of personal resources (i.e., exposure risk). Moreover, our framework incorporates temporal considerations into previous theorizing by exploring the role of environmental uncertainty in social dilemma decision-making. In particular, we highlight the importance to cooperation of individual assessments about whether the benefit of cooperation will be realized over the long term. Additionally, in applying social dilemma findings to union organizing, we further an understanding of context-specific factors (e.g., bargaining unit size and heterogeneity) that are likely to influence expectations for cooperation. By integrating the literatures on social dilemmas and union organizing we extend both. Where overlap between the disciplines has occurred, the focus has been almost exclusively on dilemmas facing negotiators during collective bargaining or arbitrators during grievance cases (Ashenfelter et al., 2013; Walton & McKersie, 1965). While studies in the labor organizing literature often emphasize field research or archival data analysis, studies of social dilemmas have been largely experimental. This difference in methodological focus has meant that a strength of the labor organizing literature has been its richness, while a strength of the social dilemma literature has been its precision with respect to social and interpersonal dynamics. Bringing the social dilemma literature to the study of union organizing may help to broaden the theoretical understanding of both literatures by combining the real world richness of union organizing research with the interpersonal and social focus of social dilemma research. The social dilemma framework also raises additional considerations. The framework suggests that the exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty concerns outlined here will give a bargaining unit member pause about supporting a union certification campaign. Implicit in this calculus is that a bargaining unit member must consider whether his/her own exposure and environmental uncertainty concerns are shared by other members of the bargaining unit. Thus, if a bargaining unit member has concerns about (for example) how long it will take to recoup personal investments in the union organizing effort (an exposure concern), or whether the union's negotiators have the skill to negotiate a beneficial contract (an environmental uncertainty concern), the bargaining unit member must consider whether other members of the bargaining unit share these concerns. If these concerns do give the bargaining unit member pause about investing personal resources to support organizing, s/he might also then assume that these concerns will give others pause – which should influence the bargaining unit member's social uncertainty about whether others can be trusted to support the union organizing effort (hence the dynamic nature of cost/benefit calculations in social dilemmas). In this sense, while exposure, environmental uncertainty, and social uncertainty all should be expected to Please cite this article as: Cardador, M.T., et al., To be or not to be unionized? A social dilemma perspective on worker decisions to support union organizing, Human Resource Management Review (2017), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hrmr.2017.03.003

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directly influence a bargaining unit member's willingness to invest personal resources in an organizing campaign, exposure and environmental uncertainty concerns additionally should be expected to indirectly influence a bargaining unit member's willingness to invest personal resources in an organizing campaign via their influence on the perception of social uncertainty (i.e., how those considerations will impact other bargaining unit members' support of union organizing, and thereby impact the individual's costs and benefits). Implicit in our presentation of a social dilemma perspective on union organizing is the idea that both value creation and exposure have a natural absolute zero point – i.e., that in the worst case, successful union certification will promise no (net) benefits to a particular bargaining unit member, so that that person's contributions to the union certification effort (exposure) will trend to zero. However, our discussion of the effect of representational concerns on environmental uncertainty and unit member opposition on social uncertainty also suggests that valuation could be negative for a bargaining unit member – i.e., the value of unionization might appear to some members of the bargaining unit to constitute more of a burden than benefit (Northcraft, Neale, Tenbrunsel, & Thomas, 1996). Based on our approach to the union support decision, negative value creation – as a hard limit on exposure – could easily lead to activism against organizing, including contributing personal resources to making sure union organizing is unsuccessful. This reasoning may help to explain why “vote no” committees emerge during some organizing campaigns, where groups of employees who view unions unfavorably are created to pressure undecided bargaining unit members into voting against unionization (Logan, 2002).6 Significantly, the specter of negative value creation could “flip the script” of the union support decision for a bargaining unit member. Facing the prospect of negative valuation, a member of the bargaining unit must decide, “Is it worth it for me to invest personal resources to fight unionization?” This is a question which begs the same social dilemma risk concerns – e.g., Will other members of the bargaining unit free-ride on my risking personal resources to fight the union? Will I lose those resources if union organizing is successful? But investing to avoid a burden (such as having representation you may not want) in fact represents a very different decision than investing to gain a benefit (such as better job security or wages), because “individuals react more strongly to [the prospect of] losses in status quo than to gains” (Northcraft et al., 1996: 27). This suggests that bargaining unit members opposing unionization to avoid burdens may have a greater appetite to invest personal resources than those members of the bargaining unit supporting unionization to gain benefits. This would appear to steepen the hill that must be climbed for successful union certification. Moreover, it might suggest that union advocates would do well to frame the status quo for bargaining unit members as an undeserved burden, and the failure of organizing as a loss of entitled and deserved benefits, thereby igniting more enthusiasm for making the risky personal resource investments needed for successful certification. 7. 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