A QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF WAGE STRIKES IN FOUR U.K. INDUSTRIES, 1962–1970

Abstract

A strike is not the only available collective sanction open to a dissatisfied workforce, which may have recourse to alternative forms of militant action such as the go‐slow or overtime ban. Nevertheless, despite their well known limitations, strike statistics constitute the only available quantitative barometer of overt and organised industrial conflict. In order to explain the incidence of strike action at an aggregative level a number of studies have been carried out in recent years which test quantitative relationships via the use of multiple regression techniques and which postulate an economic interpretation of strike activity. The advantage of the quantitative approach as a method of analysis and insight into the relationships involved is that it “replaces improvised ad hoc explanations of strike activity with a behavioural model which….does yield refutable implications”. That is, in terms of providing more solid and systematic empirical knowledge, its performance is testable and, by amendments and refinements, capable of improvement.