Organizing to Win: Introduction

[Excerpt] The American labor movement is at a watershed. For the first time since the early years of industrial unionism sixty years ago, there is near-universal agreement among union leaders that the future of the movement depends on massive new organizing. In October 1995, John Sweeney, Richard Trumka, and Linda Chavez-Thompson were swept into the top offices of the AFL-CIO, following a campaign that promised organizing at an unprecedented pace and scale. Since taking office, the new AFL-CIO leadership team has created a separate organizing department and has committed $20 million to support coordinated large-scale industry-based organizing drives. In addition, in the summer of 1996, the AFL-CIO launched the Union Summer program, which placed more than a thousand college students and young workers in organizing campaigns across the country

SiGe/Si THz laser based on transitions between inverted mass light-hole and heavy-hole subbands

We have investigated a SiGe/Si quantum-well laser based on transitions between the light-hole and heavy-hole subbands. The lasing occurs in the region of k space where the dispersion of ground-state light-hole subband is so nonparabolic that its effective mass is inverted. This kind of lasing mechanism makes total population inversion between the two subbands unnecessary. The laser structure can be electrically pumped through tunneling in a quantum cascade scheme. Optical gain as high as 172/cm at the wavelength of 50 μm can be achieved at the temperature of liquid nitrogen, even when the population of the upper laser subband is 15% less than that of the lower subband

Intersubband lasing lifetimes of SiGe/Si and GaAs/AlGaAs multiple quantum well structures

The feasibility of population inversion is studied for the SiGe/Si system and compared with that of GaAs/AlGaAs. Because of the absence of strong polar optical phonon scattering in SiGe/Si, the lifetime difference of the upper and lower lasing levels, to which the population inversion and laser gain are proportional, is consistently an order of magnitude larger than that of GaAs/AlGaAs; nor does it show the sudden drop to zero or negative values when the lasing energy exceeds the optical phonon energy. Both systems studied are superlattices, each period of which consists of three coupled quantum wells and barriers

Iteration Stability for Simple Newtonian Stellar Systems

For an equation of state in which pressure is a function only of density, the analysis of Newtonian stellar structure is simple in principle if the system is axisymmetric, or consists of a corotating binary. It is then required only to solve two equations: one stating that the "injection energy", $\kappa$, a potential, is constant throughout the stellar fluid, and the other being the integral over the stellar fluid to give the gravitational potential. An iterative solution of these equations generally diverges if $\kappa$ is held fixed, but converges with other choices. We investigate the mathematical reason for this convergence/divergence by starting the iteration from an approximation that is perturbatively different from the actual solution. A cycle of iteration is then treated as a linear "updating" operator, and the properties of the linear operator, especially its spectrum, determine the convergence properties. For simplicity, we confine ourselves to spherically symmetric models in which we analyze updating operators both in the finite dimensional space corresponding to a finite difference representation of the problem, and in the continuum, and we find that the fixed-$\kappa$ operator is self-adjoint and generally has an eigenvalue greater than unity; in the particularly important case of a polytropic equation of state with index greater than unity, we prove that there must be such an eigenvalue. For fixed central density, on the other hand, we find that the updating operator has only a single eigenvector, with zero eigenvalue, and is nilpotent in finite dimension, thereby giving a convergent solution.Comment: 16 pages, 3 figure

Introduction: The Context for the Reform of Labor Law

[Excerpt] It has become increasingly clear that the U.S. system of collective bargaining is no longer a realistic option for a large and growing proportion of American workers, and the situation will continue to worsen absent a major redirection of public policy. The decline in union density rates in this country is alarming to those who value and promote unionization. The extent to which this decline is due to management resistance and the failure of the law to promote collective bargaining is an important question that requires continued study and debate. Opinion polls reveal that for millions of nonunion American workers, workplace representation is an unfulfilled goal. These and other concerns about the inadequacy of U.S. labor law motivated the Clinton Administration to create the Commission on the Future of Worker-Management Relations, chaired by John Dunlop and charged with examining the laws that govern and shape relations in America\u27s workplaces. In the same spirit, the Department of Economic Research of the AFL-CIO and the School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University convened a conference on labor law reform in October 1993. Nearly forty papers and speeches advanced a variety of ways to correct the inadequacies in our system of union-management regulation. This volume contains a selection of the papers from that conference, chosen to reflect the diversity of opinion and thought represented. While all of the views and policy recommendations expressed in the papers are not necessarily fully shared by the, editors, the AFL-CIO, or Cornell, they are stimulating and provocative and deserve the widest possible discussion and debate. Our aim in producing this book is to stimulate public awareness about the need for fundamental reform of the legal and institutional underpinnings of the U.S. system of workplace representation and to offer proposals for the content of that reform

Atrial Flutter in Infants

ObjectivesWe sought to characterize the clinical nature of atrial flutter (AFL) in a large cohort of infants.BackgroundThere are no large studies describing the natural history of AFL in infants. Previous studies vary in the therapy used and expected prognosis.MethodsWe reviewed the records of all children younger than 1 year of age who were diagnosed with AFL at our hospital during the past 25 years, excluding those with previous cardiac surgery.ResultsWe identified 50 infants with AFL. Most, 36 (72%), presented within the first 48 h of life. Congestive heart failure was evident in 10 infants, with 6 presenting at 1 day of age, and 4 presenting beyond 1 month of age. The remainder were asymptomatic. A large atrial septal defect was the only structural heart disease. Spontaneous conversion to sinus rhythm occurred in 13 (26%) infants. Sinus rhythm was restored in 20 of 23 (87%) attempts at direct current cardioversion and 7 of 22 (32%) attempts at transesophegeal pacing; 7 required antiarrhythmic therapy. An additional arrhythmia, all supraventricular, appeared in 11 (22%) infants. The recurrence of AFL developed in 6 infants; 5 of 6 of these incidents occurred within 24 h of the first episode. All patients with recurrence had an additional arrhythmia.ConclusionsInfants with AFL usually present within the first 2 days of life. No association was found with structural heart disease. Direct current cardioversion appears to be most effective at establishing sinus rhythm. Chronic AFL has the potential to cause cardiovascular compromise. Atrial flutter in the absence of other arrhythmias has a low risk of recurrence. Once in sinus rhythm, infants with AFL have an excellent prognosis and may not require chronic antiarrhythmic therapy

Inter-group alliance dynamics in Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus)

The social intelligence hypothesis holds that complex social relationships are the major selective force underlying the evolution of large brain size and intelligence. Complex social relationships are exemplified by coalitions and alliances that are mediated by affiliative behavior, resulting in differentiated but shifting relationships. Male Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins in Shark Bay, Australia, form three alliance levels or ‘orders’, primarily among non-relatives. Strategic alliance formation has been documented within both first- and second-order alliances and between second-order alliances (‘third-order alliances’), revealing that the formation of strategic inter-group alliances is not limited to humans. Here we conducted a fine-scale study on 22 adult males over a 6-year period to determine if third-order alliance relationships are differentiated, and mediated by affiliative interactions. We found third-order alliance relationships were strongly differentiated, with key individuals playing a disproportionate role in maintaining alliances. Nonetheless, affiliative interactions occurred broadly between third-order allies, indicating males maintain bonds with third-order allies of varying strength. We also documented a shift in relationships and formation of a new third-order alliance. These findings further our understanding of dolphin alliance dynamics and provide evidence that strategic alliance formation is found in all three alliance levels, a phenomenon with no peer among non-human animals

Posttraumatic Stress among Young Urban Children Exposed to Family Violence and Other Potentially Traumatic Events

This study examines the relationship between the number of types of traumatic events experienced by children 3 to 6 years old, parenting stress, and children\u27s posttraumatic stress (PTS). Parents and caregivers provided data for 154 urban children admitted into community-based mental health or developmental services. By parent and caregiver report, children experienced an average of 4.9 different types of potentially traumatic events. Nearly one quarter of the children evidenced clinically significant PTS. Posttraumatic stress was positively and significantly related to family violence and other family-related trauma exposure, nonfamily violence and trauma exposure, and parenting stress. Additionally, parenting stress partially mediated the relationship between family violence and trauma exposure and PTS. This study highlights the need for early violence and trauma exposure screening in help-seeking populations so that appropriate interventions are initiated