Departmental organization,legitimacy, and faculty militancy: Structural sources of pro union sentiment in a public university

This paper examines the influence of departmental organization on faculty sentiments for social change via unionization. Two structural sources (inequalities of resources between departments; goal-rewarded discontinuities within departments) and one individual source (discontent with departmental governance) of attitudinal militancy are specified in path models and empirically examined using a sample of 338 faculty in 38 departments in a large, public university. Results lend limited support for inequalities of resources between departments as a source of militancy. Departmental discontinuities have important effects on the legitimacy of rewards, but only a weak indirect effect on militancy. Governance discontent has a strong impact on the legitimacy of rewards and an interesting indirect effect on militancy.