One Step at a Time; Union Organizing in the Public Sector South

In October of 2000, a coalition of students and workers started a public sector labor union for higher education employees known as United Campus Workers at the University of Tennessee - Knoxville. As a public sector union in Tennessee, United Campus Workers lacks the right to collectively bargain. By conducting interviews with union-related personnel and reflecting on my own time as a member, this paper explains the way the labor union has still won campaigns for higher pay and policy changes at UT-Knoxville within its legal context, and what union members and staff organizers make of their experiences. I conclude that by using social movement strategies of pressure escalation and worker identification, union members organize issue campaigns that culminate into interactions that partly mimic negotiations with management, sometimes resulting in campaign victories.