Power struggles off the field To most Americans, baseball is just a sport; but to those who own baseball teams - and to those who play on them - our national pastime is much more than a game. In this book, Robert Burk traces the turbulent labor history of American baseball since 1921. His comprehensive, readable account details the many battles between owners and players that irrevocably altered the business of baseball. During what Burk calls the ""paternalistic era,"" from 1921 to the early 1960s, baseball's management rigidly maintained racial segregation, established a network of southern-based farm teams to serve as a captive source of cheap replacement labor, and crushed attempts by players to create collective bargaining institutions. In the 1960s, however, the paternal order crumbled, eroded in part by the civil rights movement and the arrival of television. As a consequence, in the ""inflationary era"" that followed, both players and umpires established effective unions that successfully pressed for higher pay, pensions, and greater occupational mobility - and then fought increasingly bitter struggles to hold on to these hard-won gains.

About the Author
Winner of the 1994 Macmillan-SABR Baseball Research Award, Society for American Baseball Research A 1995 Choice Outstanding Academic Book Robert F. Burk is professor and chair of the history department at Muskingum College in New Concord, Ohio.

Reviews
"A penetrating and savvy history of baseball's turbulent labor relations. Those seeking insight into the upcoming 2000-2001 round of collective bargaining would do well to start with Much More Than a Game." - Andrew Zimbalist, author of Baseball and Billions: A Probing Look Inside the Big Business of Our National Pastime"



Book Information
ISBN 9780807849088
Author Robert F. Burk
Format Paperback
Page Count 384
Imprint The University of North Carolina Press
Publisher The University of North Carolina Press
Weight(grams) 456g