social conflict, commodity constraints, and labor market structure in agriculture

Society for Comparative Studies in Society and History

Social Conflict, Commodity Constraints, and Labor Market Structure in AgricultureAuthor(s): Miriam J. WellsSource: Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 23, No. 4 (Oct., 1981), pp. 679-704Published by: Cambridge University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/178398 .

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Social Conflict, Commodity Constraints, and Labor Market Structure in Agriculture MIRIAM J. WELLS University of California, Davis

Although only a minority of harvest workers in California are covered by union contracts, jobs in some nonunionized industries are becoming increasingly stabilized and internally stratified in ways and to extents that are largely unnoted. These conditions result from an augmentation of the labor market structure (Fisher 1953), that is, from policies evolving within agricultural industries that partially insulate their job markets from external market forces. These policies provide some firm-specific protections and selective proce- dures (i.e., a structure) for the hiring, pricing, and allocation of labor.'

This process is of particular interest in that it is occurring in a system historically seen as the paradigm of the unstructured, competitive labor market (Burawoy 1976; Doeringer and Piore 1971; Fisher 1953; Fuller 1939; McWilliams 1976). In this view, a sustained surplus of cheap labor in California fostered large factory-like farms, highly seasonal in labor demand, and unprotected in labor utilization. Not only were unions virtually nonexis- tent, but there was no relationship between employer and employee on which to base claims for recurrent employment. The high rate of turnover, the large scale of farming, and the practice of using labor contractors to recruit, assign tasks, and supervise workers impeded the growth of informal ties of obligation between employer and employee. Since most tasks were accomplished by unskilled hand labor, jobs were undifferentiated and workers easily replace- able.

Recent developments, however, cast doubt on the past and present validity of this view of California agriculture. Not only is there some indication that labor processes were historically more variable than recognized (Thomas 1980), but the advent of harvest mechanization has imposed new constraints

The author wishes to thank Bill Friedland, Gene Havens, Suad Joseph, Phil LeVeen, Arnold Strickon, and John Walton for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article, and David Dupre for his irreplaceable assistance in documentary research.

Structured labor markets are the same phenomenon that Clark Kerr (1950) called "institutional" labor markets and John T. Dunlop (1966), "internal" labor markets. Peter B. Doeringer and Michael J. Piore (1971) use the concepts of "primary" and "secondary" labor markets, terms that are essentially interchangeable with "structured" and "unstructured" markets.

0010-4175/81/4711-0175 $2.00 ? 1981 Society for Comparative Study of Society and History

679



680 MIRIAM J. WELLS

on the organization and nature of work (Barnett et al. 1978; Cargill and Rosmiller 1970; Friedland and Barton 1975; Thompson and Scheuring 1978). The extension of protective legislation and union organizing to agriculture has invalidated notions of a harvest labor market responsive to economic forces alone (Brown 1972; Sosnick 1978). Despite this evidence of dramatic change in the circumstances of agricultural production, few studies have analyzed the

impact of these changes on the structure of the labor market. This article employs a case study of the California strawberry industry2 to

explore the extent and determinants of increasing structure in the regional harvest labor market. In this, it contributes to a growing interest in the com-

parative organization of agricultural production (Friedland and Barton 1975;

Fligstein et al. 1980; Thomas 1980). And it informs recent debate concerning the causes and consequences of labor market segmentation. Contemporary labor market theory tends to emphasize economic and technological factors as causes of market structure (Doeringer 1966-67; Doeringer and Piore 1971; Dunlop 1966). Regional labor surpluses are expected to depress tendencies toward internal structure for all firms because of the ease of replacement. However, firms using technologies involving distinctive skills or production in teams are expected to offer higher wages, better working conditions, job security, and opportunities for advancement to protect their investments in current workers. Similarly, stable demand for a firm's product and control over markets encourage fewer changes in the size and composition of the labor force and motivate the upgrading of jobs. To the extent that this approach deals with social factors as causes of market structure,3 it focuses on the already implemented policies of unions and governments (Dunlop 1966; Kerr et al. 1960).

While concurring as to the importance of economic and technological factors, I argue that an understanding of social conflict is critical to an explana- tion of labor market structure. In particular I hope to demonstrate the reciproc- ity between social and technoeconomic structures: the impact of the rise in social conflict on labor market structure, and the concomitant impact of en-

2 The research for this article began in 1976. The present phase involves the historical sociology of the California strawberry industry, especially the competitive advantages of different types of producers. In ethnographic detail it concentrates on the fertile central coast region, which has a long history of strawberry production and currently dominates the industry. The study draws on extensive interviews with forty-three central coast berry growers and deals with the history, process, and problems of strawberry production. It utilizes written historical and contemporary sources, as well as participant observation over a period of several years and interviews with workers on a large central coast berry farm. Farm advisors, university researchers, government officials, marketing agents, union activists, and representatives of grower and processor organizations were also interviewed. The author has observed the day-to-day operation of most of these aspects of the industry.

3 Adherents of this approach do consider social factors at length in their analyses of why certain persons participate in different sorts of labor markets. Their explanations revolve around the job-related habits acquired by workers (Piore 1970:55-58; Harrison 1974:10).



LABOR MARKET IN AGRICULTURE 68i

hanced structure on the bases for class struggle. In this regard, it is the level of

organization and the tension between social classes, rather than more narrow constraints such as union and government policy, that constitute the underlying social dynamic. This case substantiates recent contentions that labor market structure, like technology (Braverman 1974), can play a major role in

shaping the social relationships between labor and capital (Edwards, Gordon, and Reich 1973, 1975; Jenkins 1978). It reinforces indications that threats to the control of labor may be as important as directly imposed policies in

shaping production policies.4 And it confirms and expands claims that en- vironmental conditions are central to the outcome of social movements (Jen- kins and Perrow 1977; Snyder 1975; Walsh 1978).

The following discussion will first clarify the manner in which technological and economic constraints on the contemporary California strawberry in-

dustry establish a pivotal role for labor in the production process. It will then show how unionization and the diminution of growers' control over public policy in the region have, in the virtual absence of formal union contracts, restricted growers' ability to deploy labor advantageously. These circumstances have encouraged the development of a labor market structure, at the same time altering the objective conditions for social conflict in California

agriculture.

TECHNOECONOMIC CONSTRAINTS AND THE IMPORTANCE OF LABOR

Strawberry growers face a distinctive set of technological and economic constraints that contribute to the critical importance of control over the cost and allocation of labor. Since World War II, California strawberry production has moved from a family farm operation with minimal productivity and demand, local distribution, and few hired workers to a capital-intensive industry with international distribution, year-around demand, astronomical crop and dollar

yields per acre, and large amounts of seasonal hired labor. Major changes in methods of cultivation, new high-yield disease-free plants, improvements in

cooling and in truck and air transport, and the extensive adoption of quick- freezing have rendered California the leading strawberry-producing state in the country, marketing a striking 76.7 percent of the national crop in 1978 as opposed to 4.2 percent in 1942. California's strawberry acreage also expanded from 5,300 acres in 1942 to a yearly average of 9,900 acres between 1970 and 1980 (Higuchi 1980:2; Bain and Hoos 1963:29, 128, 132). During

4 For example, see Irving Bernstein's (1960) discussion of the "company unions" initiated by firms in an attempt to ward off worker-controlled unions; Katherine Stone's (1975) analysis of the origin of job structures in the steel industry; Robert Thomas's (1980) discussion of the evolving organization of work in the lettuce industry; Sumner Slichter's (1929) analysis of the institution of wage increases and company welfare plans in nonunionized manufacturing industries in the 1920s; and Lawrence Kahn's (1975) study of the impact of unions on nonunion jobs in metropoli- tan San Francisco and Los Angeles.



682 MIRIAM J. WELLS

the same period the number of strawberry workers employed in the state at

peak harvest grew from approximately 4,150 in 1942 to 16,370 in 1978,5 and

strawberry yields increased from 2.9 tons per acre in 1941 to over 20 tons per acre in 1978-81 (Bain and Hoos 1963:12, 128, 132; California Strawberry Advisory Board 1981:4). Although the state's early lead in production was due in part to expanded acreage, the decisive factor has been this remarkable

productivity. Because of ideal climatic conditions and improved cultural practices and plant strains, some California growers harvest as many as 57 tons per acre, in contrast to the average of 2.7 tons per acre for the nation excluding California (Higuchi 1980:1).

By 1979 there were 11,500 acres of strawberry fields in California, culti- vated by about 900 growers averaging 13 acres each. Ninety-five percent of the state's berries are grown in the coastal valleys in north central and southern California, where sunny, ocean-cooled summers and sandy soils promote the longest and most abundant harvests in the world. Since World War II, the central coast district dominated by the Pajaro and Salinas valleys in Santa Cruz and Monterey counties has emerged as the state and national leader in

strawberry acreage and productivity, employing 44.3 percent of the state's

strawberry workers in 1978 (Annual Crop Report 1978; Farm Labor Report 1978). In the Salinas Valley, an area of unusually large strawberry farms, most of the acreage is farmed by 10 or 11 growers who manage an average of over 140 acres each.6 Some Salinas growers produce various vegetables as well as strawberries on their farms, in contrast to the statewide pattern of

specialization in strawberries. The Pajaro Valley, on the other hand, is more

typical of the statewide pattern of strawberry production in that it is dominated

by small and medium-sized farms which specialize in strawberries and consist of an estimated ten to fifteen acres each. However, almost all strawberry farms fall well below the 1974 California average for all agricultural industries of 493 acres per farm (U.S. Bureau of the Census 1975:xiii).

Despite the relatively small size of most strawberry farms, strawberry production is heavily capital intensive, requiring about $13,350 to produce an acre of berries on the central coast in 1980 (Welch, Greathead, and Beutel 1980:5-6). The cost of prime agricultural land in producing regions is high and rising because of its historical productivity and the pressure from urban

expansion (Cothern 1980). Advances in production technology have increased costs through the introduction of expensive plant varieties and cultivation

5 These figures are derived from the Fairm Labor Report's records in 1942 and 1978 of the number of man-weeks (more appropriately person-weeks) of labor needed during peak harvest in each crop. In a crop which has as little worker turnover as strawberries, person-weeks may be regarded as roughly equivalent to the number of workers.

6 Since there are no official data regarding the microdemography of the strawberry industry, these figures are drawn from estimates of farm advisors, state employment offices, and agricultural commissioners in each county.



LABOR MARKET IN AGRICULTURE 683

practices involving dense plantings and costly pesticides, fertilizers, and bed preparation materials. The cost of finance is increasing steadily and rising energy prices are boosting the expense of production and marketing. It is labor, however, that emerges as the single most costly factor of production. In the central coast district, for example, agricultural extension agents place labor at 29 percent of the planting cost and at 53.5 percent of the total cost of the first harvest year (Welch, Greathead, and Beutel 1980:4-6). When viewed against the nationwide average of labor as 8 percent of agricultural production costs, or even against California's average of 20 percent (Reed 1976:8), the strawberry industry's dependence on hand labor is striking.

It is not only the centrality of labor to production costs but the requirement of a certain sort of labor that renders control over labor so critical to berry growers. The seasonality, the need for constant cultural care, and the fragility of the crop place special restrictions on the timing, amount, and kind of labor employed. Strawberry growth patterns create sharp fluctuations in labor demand and require close attention to timing. Hand labor is needed for planting, cultivation, and harvest, ranging from an estimated 35 person-hours per acre for removing runners and weeding in September, to an estimated 300 person- hours per acre in early and late harvest months, up to 1,200 person-hours per acre for the peak harvest months (Seasonal Labor 1968:B-161-170). Predict- ing optimal timing is difficult because of climatic variability. Planting too early reduces plant vigor with too many fruit buds, while planting too late results in excessive vegetative growth, reduced field yield, and early runners the next spring. According to the local farm advisor, as little as a week's error in planting times can seriously reduce production. Although the timing of pruning is less crucial, it must be completed before the spring growth spurt. To maintain plant vitality, runners and weeds must be removed as they appear. Harvest timing is especially critical. During the harvest season, fresh market berries must be picked every four or five days and freezer berries every seven to ten days, depending on the area and variety grown.

The fragility of the fruit and the need for constant cultural attention also shape strawberry labor demands by placing a special premium on careful and semiskilled workers. Constant manicuring of the beds is necessary to produce maximum yields. This tedious work involves pulling weeds and picking de- formed and overripe berries off the vine. During the harvest season, manicuring is generally accomplished in the course of picking and is work that would not be remunerated under a piece-rate pay system. In addition, the care with which workers select, handle, and pack fruit for both fresh and frozen markets is a major determinant of price. The discrimination of optimum berry condi- tion and the rapid production of attractive boxes of undamaged fruit are acknowledged to be skills that must be learned over time. Careless picking



684 MIRIAM J. WELLS

can nullify all other attempts to maintain fruit quality and can make the difference between substantial profit and major loss.7

The importance of control over the price and quality of labor is reinforced

by the growers' present inability to replace labor with capital in the harvest

process. Although the industry has been financing research into harvest

mechanization, the necessity for gentle handling, the sequential ripening of

prevailing plant strains, and the difficulty of effectively removing the stem and leafy cap from freezer berries have prevented mechanization to date.

Despite national industry forecasts of "Strawberry Harvesters Galore!"

(1971) and "At Last! Strawberry Mechanization Is On Its Way" (Morris 1978), no reliable and cost-efficient harvesters have been developed for the California region. Even the yields of usable fruit achieved by the most promis- ing experimental harvesters, employed in conjunction with new simultane-

ously ripening plant strains, have approached only 25 percent of California's

average of 20 tons per acre ("Berry Mechanization" 1977:12). In addition, the quality of machine-harvested fruit has been inadequate for the lucrative fresh market on which the bulk of the California crop is sold. In short, while some progress in labor saving has been made by using plastic bed mulching and simple tractor-pulled attachments for pruning, runner removal, and culti-

vation, researchers at the University of California and industry leaders do not

anticipate harvest mechanization in the foreseeable future. The vulnerability of growers to high labor costs is enhanced by their in-

ability to leverage higher market prices to offset the increased cost of production. As noted earlier, California's strawberry industry changed radically after World War II; new freezing and transportation technology transformed a

single seasonal outlet with widely fluctuating prices and localized demand into a dual market with year-around demand, relatively stable prices, and an international distribution.8 Fresh and processed markets are differentiated by quality and market price. The best fruit is directed to the fresh market, which returned an average of 12.7 cents per pound more to growers between 1969 and 1978 than the processed market (Marketing Calijfrnia Strawberries

1979:18, 23). The lower quality fruit is directed to the processed market; the

7 See Mitchell, Maxie, and Greathead (1964) for detailed discussion of the requirements and consequences of strawberry handling. These University of California researchers found that even berries selected by a careful picker resulted in 14.4 percent unmarketable fruit, while a careless picker caused 33.7 percent of the berries to be unsaleable.

8 The evolution of the product market has not been without its setbacks. After World War II, California strawberry acreage ballooned because of the profitability of the crop and the opening of a major new utilization and new geographical regions of demand. By 1957 acreage had increased to 20,700, following an extremely heavy crop in the previous year, and in the face of a large carry-over in the frozen strawberry pack. As a result, prices fell disastrously that year, driving many producers out of business and forcing a reduction in acreage. Since that date, supply has been adequately balanced with demand and there have been no severe fluctuations in market prices.




best (approximately 90 percent) of it is used for freezing, and the culls and damaged fruit go for juice. Growers assess the quality of their fruit and the prices being offered in the fresh and processed markets in their decisions as to where to market their crops. Most growers enter the season without a fixed contract specifying a price and the amount of fruit that must be delivered to either market. Because of high fresh market prices and superior fruit quality, an average of 72.3 percent of the California crop was sold on the fresh market between 1970 and 1980 (Higuchi 1980:2).

Strawberry growers have little control over the prices they receive for their products. While an estimated 80-85 percent of the state's crop is sold through aggregated marketing mechanisms, and while two such agencies-Naturipe Berry Growers and Driscoll Associates-account for the bulk of that crop, neither of these organizations can exert monopolistic power to achieve consis- tently higher prices. In addition, some important determinants of prices come from outside the industry, both from the supermarket chains to which the crop is preferentially sold and from competition with other producing areas. Al- though California dominates fresh sales, low-priced imports of frozen strawberries from Mexico have seriously depressed processed sales on and off since the late 1950s (Dennis and Sammet 1961; Feder 1977). Since the strawberry product is, with the exception of the fresh/frozen dichotomy, basically homogeneous, growers are limited in their ability to increase market prices through product differentiation. The state body for industry self-governance, the Strawberry Advisory Board, is not allowed to restrict supply to raise prices, and thus another potential means of market control is eliminated. Although the Strawberry Advisory Board has invested heavily in sales promotion, prices and consumer demands have not risen as sharply as costs. The

TABLE 1 Profits per Gross Dollar Yield per Acre,

Central Coast California Strawlberry Industtr, 1969-80

Profit Production and Harvest Gross $ Net Profit/

Costs/Acre Yield/Acre Acre Gross $ Yield

1969 $6,064 ((t 3,350 crates/ac.) $9,631 $3,568 0.37 1979 $13,202 ((t 3,500 crates/ac.) $16,030 $2,828 0.18 1980 $13,335 ((O 3,500 crates/ac.) $18,585 $5,250 0.28"

" The 1980 profit margin was especially high because of unusually strong market deliveries at the beginning and end of the season. The 1979 figure is more representative of what growers can expect in the absence of exceptional climatic conditions. SOURCES: Burlingame, Farnham, and Greathead 1969: 2-3; Marketing California Strawberries 1973: 18; California Strawberry Advisory Board 1981: 4; Welch, Greathead, and Beutel 1980: 5-6.



686 MIRIAM J. WELLS

result, as shown in Table 1, is that strawberry farmers, like other farmers around the country ("The Farm Dollar" 1980), are keeping less of every sales dollar despite increases in total production.

The economic and technological constraints on production, then, have rendered the cost and supply of labor of particular concern to strawberry growers. Not only are their labor demands distinctive, but the alternative means of

enhancing their economic positions are few. Thus it is not surprising that

strategies to control labor have been central to strawberry production from the outset. The following section will touch briefly on the impact of these

strategies on labor market structure prior to World War II, and then concen- trate on the period from 1945 to 1964 when the technoeconomic conditions

previously described had attained their present contours and large amounts of hired labor had become essential to production.

LABOR SUPPLY AND POLICY CONTROL: THE BRACERO PERIOD

Even prior to World War II, the strawberry labor market had an internal structure that set it apart from the less structured statewide agricultural stan- dard. This structure was encouraged by the need for a semiskilled, conscientious labor force. It was facilitated by sociopolitical constraints on the workers of choice in the industry. At that time, most strawberry growers were

Japanese; they either tended small family farms of from three to five acres or worked in larger sharecropping operations that were subdivided into family- farmed parcels. Restrictive land laws passed in 1913, 1920, and 1923 prevented foreign-born Japanese from owning or leasing agricultural land. Al-

though many circumvented these laws by obtaining land in the names of their American-born children (Bunje 1971), the Alien Land Laws did limit the

options of Japanese growers and workers. Strawberry yields in those years were such as to require little hired labor. The need for quality labor, however, did encourage growers to preferentially select workers from their own families and their broader ethnic community. Personal bonds of reciprocal obligation between growers and their hired and family workers were reinforced by lack of facility in the English language and by laws against Japanese land owner-

ship that kept workers from seeking alternative employment. As a conse-

quence, the hired work force in strawberries tended to be very stable and

enjoyed numerous informal personal prerogatives in the work context. This system was disrupted by the internment of the Japanese from 1942 to

1945, during which time strawberry production in the central coast and in the state generally shrank dramatically (Bain and Hoos 1963:128-29; Sievertson 1969:99-100). Although many Japanese growers reentered the industry after their release in 1945, the postwar period also saw the entry of new growers drawn by the promise of profits from improved productivity, demand, and

transport. While small family farms continued to dominate the industry, some of the newcomers operated larger farms on which planting, cultivation, and




harvest were performed by crews of hired labor. On all farms the increased

yield and duration of harvests forced the hiring of a substantial number of seasonal workers, raising the issue of control over labor price and process to a central position in the industry.

From early in World War II until 1964, this control was exerted through supportive federal policies that enabled growers to obtain an inexpensive, flexible, and diligent labor supply without themselves adopting inducements to retain proven workers. It was the politically administered character of this labor supply that made it particularly advantageous to growers. Wartime mobilization had increased the opportunities for lucrative employment in the cities, which constricted the traditional labor supply to agriculture.9 California

growers therefore took this occasion to press the United States government to enter directly into the regulation and management of labor for agriculture. In

large part because of the lobbying of California growers (Jones 1970; Haw-

ley 1966), the government secured a wartime emergency agreement with Mexico in 1942 authorizing the importation of Mexican contract workers.

During the war in Korea, the growers pressed for a more permanent arrangement. These demands were met in 1951 through the enactment of Public Law 78, popularly known as the Bracero Program.

While there is some contention as to whether the Bracero Program resulted in an actual labor surplus in strawberry-producing regions, and while detailed consideration of this issue is beyond the scope of the present paper, there is no doubt as to the program's impact on the control of labor. Not only did the

program insulate the harvest labor market from the necessity to compete with the better wages and working conditions in urban areas (Galarza 1964:94- 106, 115, 209-18), but it enabled growers to externalize the cost and headaches of labor recruitment. Bracero contracts imposed minimum restrictions as to the treatment of workers in terms of standards for housing, pay, and the guarantee of work. Although local employment offices administered the

program, growers had considerable control over its actual functioning through grower organizations authorized by the Department of Labor. In most cases these organizations were able unilaterally to determine the number of braceros to be recruited for the upcoming harvest and the exact wage to be incorporated into bracero contracts. This wage rate then became the effective maximum rate for farm workers in the county, displacing the domestic workers who resisted these terms of employment (Jenkins 1978:526). Since braceros were contracted from Mexico for a particular job in the United States, and were

required to return immediately upon its completion, their ability to seek more lucrative employment was highly restricted.

9For most regions and periods of time it was not a labor shortage, but a relative diminution of the labor surplus in agriculture that spurred growers to advocate federal guarantees of the Mexican labor supply (Jenkins 1978).



688 MIRIAM J. WELLS

California proved to be the major employer of contract workers. For example, 90 percent of the emergency workers imported in 1945 were employed in California. By the late 1950s, braceros were contributing one third of the peak harvest labor force in California; they averaged 90,000 workers a year (Sosnick 1978:388). Within California, strawberry production joined that of lettuce, tomatoes, and several other specialty crops in becoming especially dependent on bracero labor. In 1962, for example, Mexican contract workers provided over 70 percent of peak harvest employment in strawberries (Sea- sonal Labor 1963). A survey of seventeen large growers found that braceros accounted for 95 percent of total picking hours in 1963, and for 91 percent in 1964 (California Strawberry Advisory Board 1965).

In the central coast, growers report that strawberry workers were almost 100 percent bracero from the early 1950s until 1964. Peak harvest labor was augmented by undocumented Mexican workers. At the start of the period, central coast berry growers formed several organizations to transmit their needs to the local employment agencies. The organizations put in special requests for braceros with prior experience in strawberry work and exerted close scrutiny over their performance. Some braceros would ask to be sent to the central coast year after year, identifying their experience in berry picking and sometimes reporting a verbal job promise from a particular grower. While it is not clear how many braceros in strawberries returned repeatedly, and while the program did not purport to guarantee growers continuity in their work forces, almost all the growers interviewed reported that a significant minority of their braceros were returnees.

Although these recruitment practices structured the strawberry labor market to a limited extent through job stabilization, turnover was still frequent and replacement easy. Care in picking was ensured by the hourly pay method and by strict field supervision of workers. For every bracero whose work was found, after a three-day training period, to be inadequate in quality or quantity, there were many others to take his place. In general, braceros tended to be conscientious and undemanding employees since poor performance or complaint was cause for immediate dismissal and deportation to even lower wages or unemployment in Mexico. The central coast growers interviewed were unanimous in their positive estimation of the Bracero Program, of its efficiency, its low cost, and of the untroubled relations they had with their contract workers.

Despite its accolades from California growers, the Bracero Program came under increasing fire in the late 1950s as some of its traditional supporters fell away and as new opposition arose. Because of the mechanization of the cotton harvest in the late 1950s and early 1960s, a major bloc of Southern growers no longer joined California in urging the program's continuation (Hawley 1966; Craig 1972). In addition, the 1960s saw the rise of an alliance between urban liberals, organized labor, and the emerging farm labor movement (Bach




1978). This alliance attacked the program for its detrimental impact on domestic wages, working conditions, and labor organizing. It also brought to public attention the fact that the program used public funds to boost the profits of

private agribusiness. This opposition led to the termination of the program in 1964, marking the end of an era in which growers could expect unequivocal support and direct recruitment service from the federal government. While

subsequent border policy has been attentive to agribusiness interests, it has had to take account of competing constituencies.

The imminent and actual demise of the Bracero Program struck panic in the

strawberry industry. Given the concomitant impossibility of mechanizing and the increasing competition from Mexican frozen fruit, some observers concluded that without bracero labor, large growers would be driven out of business and production would be reduced to a small number of family and

tenant-type operations (Seasonal Labor 1963). In fact, however, the importation of Mexican workers did not cease. Rather it was driven underground, as witnessed by the dramatic increase in illegal immigration since the 1960s (Bach 1978). In Califoria, conservative estimates currently place illegal aliens at 43 percent of the harvest labor force (Department of Housing and Community Development 1977:17).10 Legal importation of labor is of relatively small proportions and is accomplished through Public Law 414, which permits a limited number of declared immigrants, called "green-carders," to work in labor-needy United States industries. These new border policies, while permitting a continued supply of cheap, tractable labor, have not been as advantageous for strawberry growers as the Bracero Program. Before con- sidering the response of the growers to the changed policy environment, it is necessary to examine another threat to labor control that has emerged since the mid- 1960s.

UNIONIZATION AND LABOR SUPPLY

Assisted in its organizing by the termination of the administered labor supply, but still hampered by the presence of illegal Mexican workers, the United Farm Workers (UFW) has dramatically changed the balance of power between growers and workers in California. Although only a minority of the harvest labor force is as yet unionized,"' the UFW has increased the political leverage of labor and has altered supply and price conditions in producing

'1 In some regions and in particular crops, the proportion is undoubtedly higher. In 1969 the U.S. Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare estimated that illegal aliens and green- carders constituted about 85 percent of all hired farm workers in the Imperial Valley and main- tained the regional unemployment rate at 10 percent (U.S. Senate 1969:65).

" An accurate count of farmworkers covered by union contract is unavailable because of the unions' interest in overestimating members, the growers' interest in underestimating members, and the barriers imposed by the mobility of farmworkers. Refugio Rochin of the Department of Agricultural Economics, University of Californa, Davis, estimates that 10 percent of the seasonal hired farm labor force is unionized. Personal communication, 17 February 1981.



690 MIRIAM J. WELLS

areas. It is these indirect influences, along with the threat of further unionization, that have had the most decisive impact on the strawberry labor market. The nature and dimensions of this threat can best be clarified by examining the

history of industry-union encounters. The strawberry industry has never been a primary target of the UFW,

mainly because larger farms in other segments of agriculture have promised greater returns for organizers' efforts. In the lettuce industry, for example, mobilization is facilitated by the concentration of workers on large farms and

by enduring teams of workers within the work force (Friedland, Barton, and Thomas 1978). On the central coast, most of the union's direct confrontations with berry growers took place in 1970 as an offshoot of the more visible conflict surrounding lettuce unionization.'2 In the summer of 1970, with contracts covering over 20,000 table-grape workers in California's interior

valleys, the UFW directed its attention toward the large fruit and vegetable growers of the central coast. On July 24, the UFW demanded recognition as the collective bargaining agent for all field workers in the area. Three days later, in an effort to head off contracts with the UFW, some thirty growers in the Salinas, Pajaro, and Santa Maria valleys signed what they hoped were less

demanding contracts with the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. The UFW announced it would fight these sweetheart contracts, and named as its

major targets the three Salinas-based produce firms owned by publicly held

corporations. Among these firms was Pic 'n Pac, a subsidiary of the S. S. Pierce Company of Boston which farmed over a thousand acres of strawberries in the Salinas Valley. Pic 'n Pac had long had a tense relationship with its

workers, who only reluctantly acceded to a strike moratorium between August 13 and 22 while the growers and the Teamsters discussed voiding the sweetheart contracts.

With the announcement on August 22 that the growers intended to honor the Teamster contracts, the UFW declared a general strike of central coast field workers to begin on August 24. That night the Salinas Californian reported that agriculture in the area was "virtually shut down" ("Salinas Valley" 1970:1). The strike was initially peaceful, but confrontations between growers, field workers, and union representatives grew increasingly hostile. Within a few days, picketing and walkouts spread from Pic 'n Pac's Salinas operations to strawberry farms in the neighboring Pajaro Valley. Caravans of banner-waving farm workers and union organizers drove from farm to farm, calling to workers to leave the fields. On the larger berry farms, harvest was virtually halted because strike committees of UFW members had

12 There are no secondary sources which describe the impact of union activity on the strawberry industry. The following picture has been reconstructed from interviews with growers, marketing agents, and union organizers. An invaluable supplement has been provided by review of union contracts and of the Salinas Calijfrnian and the Watsonville Register-Pajaronian for the periods of intense union activity on the central coast.




prepared their coworkers for the strike. The impact of the strike on the straw-

berry industry was indicated by a report from the Strawberry Advisory Board that berry shipments from the central coast had shrunk from some 13,000 crates a day before the stike to around 2,000 crates four days later ("Strike Tightens" 1970:2). Pic 'n Pac's directors acknowledged that they had "scarcely shipped a berry" since the onset of the strike and had been forced to "give up" on their $2 million crop for the year ("Inter Harvest" 1970:1).

With an expensive crop to harvest and the experience of Pic 'n Pac vividly in mind, some thirty Pajaro Valley members of the Naturipe marketing cooperative announced their desire to discuss relief from picketing with the union. Negotiations on behalf of the entire cooperative began on September 2, with the understanding that strike activity against negotiating growers would cease for thirty days. Naturipe was soon joined by members of the Watson- ville Berry Cooperative and by ten large independent growers in the area.

Together, these growers comprised most of the berry producers in northern California. By September 11, all three groups had recognized the UFW as their workers' collective bargaining agent.

An actual contract, however, was not so easily concluded. As the harvest drew to a close, the growers' inclination to compromise subsided. The contract signed by Pic 'n Pac on October 9 was more stringent than the other growers were willing to accept. On October 15, the group of growers "tem-

porarily suspended" negotiations with the union, on the grounds that the two parties were not progressing toward a compromise. The chief spokesperson for the growers declared that group's willingness to continue talks at some future date, but insisted that this group of small and medium-sized growers was "a different animal than Pic 'n Pac" and could not possibly agree to the wage level established by the Pic 'n Pac contract ("Berry Growers" 1970:1). Although the union tried to bring the growers back to the bargaining table by accusations of bad faith and scattered picketing during that fall and the next summer, the "temporary" stand-off ended formal communication between the UFW and northern Californian berry growers outside of Pic 'n Pac. When Pic 'n Pac went out of business two years later, its successor, Pic 'd Rite, also negotiated a contract with the UFW. Despite these formal legacies of the period, the UFW did not regain its momentum in the strawberry industry. The slowdown was a consequence both of the general subsiding of UFW activity in the central coast area and of the efficacy of the growers' defensive strategies in the strawberry and the wider fruit and vegetable industries.

Only two UFW contracts emerged from these confrontations, but their provisions had widespread consequences for the strawberry industry. The Pic 'n Pac and Pik'd Rite contracts structured labor relations within these com- panies, and they provided a living example to other growers of the consequences of unionization. One of the most important contract stipulations was an hourly wage guarantee, specified in the Pic 'n Pac contract as $2.20 an



692 MIRIAM J. WELLS

hour for the first year and $2.30 the second year. Guaranteed minimum hourly wages were unheard-of in the industry at that time, with the exception of the

extremely low rate that had been set for the braceros. In addition to the hourly minimum, the Pic 'n Pac contract guaranteed workers a graduated scale of

piece rates with two step-increases over the season as the crop dwindled and the difficulty of picking a crate of berries increased. Wage levels for other

categories of employees on the farm were also raised and a set weight for a crate of freezer berries was established. These stipulations set a wage level that averaged $.50 an hour higher than the prevailing wage for strawberry workers in the central coast that year (Farm Labor Report 1970). It also shifted the cost of worker inexperience and varying field yield from the worker to the grower, a consequence that was particularly burdensome to smaller growers. In addition to these direct wage stipulations, the contracts also introduced restrictions regarding hiring and firing, seniority, health and

safety standards, overtime pay, paid holidays and vacations, record-keeping, and an employee-financed medical plan. While these provisions improved worker well-being, they also increased labor costs and decreased the latitude of growers in obtaining and deploying workers.

The impact of union activity went beyond these contract-related matters to

shape the manner in which government regulations affected the industry. Protective legislation had increased the cost of labor and regulated employer-employee relations throughout California agriculture since the mid-1960s (Sosnick 1978). The strawberry industry, however, was especially affected by the enforcement of restrictions on the Mexican labor supply. Because most growers relied on undocumented workers to augment their work forces at peak harvest, the industry was particularly vulnerable to constraints on the supply of illegal workers. In normal times, the simple existence of

immigration laws has not restricted growers' use of undocumented workers; in

fact, immigration agencies have been systematically understaffed and patterns of enforcement have sustained substantial movements of workers to agriculture. However, in 1974, and again in 1979, the UFW launched a heated

campaign against illegal farm workers who, it claimed, were being used as strikebreakers. Both campaigns resulted in dramatic roundups of illegal workers to the decided detriment of growers employing undocumented workers. In the spring of 1979, this campaign reached the central coast in conjunction with the renewed union activity. Following a public hearing instigated by the UFW at which the border patrol acknowledged a "hands off" policy toward illegal workers, border patrol staffing and apprehensions of illegal aliens increased significantly. In the month of May, for example, after the

augmented staffing, the patrol announced 9,652 arrests on the central coast, almost double the 5,503 arrests made in the previous month and many times more than the customary handful ("Amplia" 1979:1). In short, this union




tactic had the effect of enforcing the sanctions against hiring undocumented workers and forcing growers to discriminate between legal and illegal workers in the harvest labor market.

In sum, the 1970 strike and the two resulting UFW contracts supplied ample proof to strawberry growers that they were not insulated from the union struggle that was transforming the agricultural scene. The strike showed that field workers in various crops were more similar than dissimilar, and that they were more sympathetic to the union and had stronger lines of communication among themselves than growers had realized. Small and medium-sized growers were forced to acknowledge that the relative isolation of their employees on separate farms would not prevent them from making collective demands. Although larger farms were more vulnerable to union organizing, the momentum of a regional union campaign enabled farm workers in the 1970s to exert substantial pressure regardless of their places of work.

The technological and economic constraints on strawberry production rendered the industry particularly vulnerable to the threats posed by the union. Because of the need for care and skill in picking, striking workers could not easily be replaced. Because of the critical timing and the great value per acre of the crop, interruption of field activities for even a short period could be financially disastrous. Because of some growers' reliance on illegal aliens, production schedules could be seriously jarred by enforcement of immigration laws. Since hand labor costs comprised such a high proportion of production expenses, since growers were prevented by a competitive product market from raising sales prices to offset increases in labor costs, and since most farms were small and specialized, demands for higher wages severely strained grower resources. Finally, because of the nature of the fruit, berry growers could not substitute labor for capital in the harvest process, as had growers in other industries (Friedland and Barton 1975).

GROWER STRATEGIES AND LABOR MARKET STRUCTURE

In the presence of strawberry commodity constraints, no longer able to rely on a politically administered labor supply, and threatened by unionization, the growers adopted policies that in effect structured the industry's labor market. Although these policies have increased labor costs and decreased flexibility to some extent, they provide a buffer against the more severe constraints that would be imposed by union contracts. At the collective level, growers have increased collaboration among themselves through organizations that lobby for their interests and help defuse pressure for unionization. At the individual level, strategies have differed according to farm size. Larger growers have adopted the sharecropping system to increase control over their work forces and reduce vulnerability to rising labor costs. Smaller growers have infor- mally enhanced the reciprocal bonds of personal obligation with their workers



694 MIRIAM J. WELLS

to achieve the same ends. While detailed discussion of these strategies is beyond the scope of the present article, their general contours can be indicated here.

Collective Strategies. Grower Organizations

Since 1970, temporary special-purpose organizations and permanent integra- tive organizations have become increasingly active in growers' attempts to control labor. On the central coast, two associations focusing on farm labor issues emerged from the 1970 crisis: the Salinas Valley Independent Growers' Association, founded in the summer of 1970 and dominated by large-scale vegetable growers; and the Pajaro Valley Strawberry Growers' Association, organized in the spring of 1971 and comprised solely of berry growers. Both organizations represent growers' pursuit of what the California Farm Bureau approvingly called the "third way" during the 1970 confrontations. That is, to help their members avoid signing with either the Teamsters or the UFW, these associations offer member growers fringe benefits for their workers equivalent to those won by the union. Both organizations have insurance plans that offer health, accident, and life insurance coverage for the employees of their members. They also provide labor relations advice for members and intervene with state legislators and the courts to promote a public policy beneficial to growers. In its early years, the Pajaro Valley Strawberry Grow- ers' Association employed a Spanish-speaking "labor relations expert" to detect worker unrest on members' farms and to convince the workers that they could resolve their grievances without a union.

The major permanent organizations of central coast berry growers are the regional Western Growers and Shippers Association (WGA), the California Strawberry Advisory Board, and the three cooperatives mentioned earlier, whose operations center in the central coast district: Naturipe Berry Growers, Driscoll Associates, and Watsonville Berry Cooperative. The WGA, although dominated by large growers of vegetables, is viewed by the strawberry producers as their most powerful representative on union issues. It not only has a

history of opposition to unionization that stretches back into the 1930s, but it has continued to play a pivotal role in advising members on contract negotiations and industrial labor practices (Friedland, Barton, and Thomas 1978:57-64). Its substantial legislative budget and the numerous reports in its journal, the Western Grower and Shipper, bespeak the organization's powerful continuing role as lobbyist and strategist for grower interests. At present, the WGA continues to oppose the external imposition of a labor market structure through legislation or union contract, while advising growers to provide worker benefits privately to defuse union pressure.

The Strawberry Advisory Board (SAB) and the three marketing cooperatives have focused industry-specific responses to emerging labor problems. The SAB was established by growers in 1955 under the California Strawberry




Marketing Order. Although board representation is drawn from the entire state, central coast growers have played a major role in the organization because of their prominence in the industry and because the board's only office is located in Santa Cruz County. In the late 1950s, when the future of the Bracero Program began to look bleak, the SAB began to invest heavily in research on increased productivity and mechanization, as well as in sales promotion. As mentioned, however, hopes for mechanization have not come to fruition and SAB officials describe current increases in productivity and consumer demand as largely a holding pattern against increases in production costs. Because labor is central to production costs, the SAB has attempted to enhance its members' control over labor. Both the SAB and the cooperatives served as spokespersons for grower interests during the 1970 strawberry walkout. Since that time, they have contributed to labor market structure by setting wage levels in the industry. Each year they review the prevailing wage rates for field labor and suggest an "appropriate" pay scale for the upcoming year. This scale is closely geared to rates established by UFW contracts in lettuce and other vegetable industries, so closely, in fact, that berry growers say they can anticipate their future wage scale from the annual provisions of union lettuce contracts.

While the grower associations have no way of enforcing their suggested wage levels, peer pressure to observe these standards is strong since they are regarded as a means of preventing unionization. The growers do make allowances for differences in the resources of various farmers, although they speak disapprovingly of those who lag more than a few months behind in accepting the suggested wage rates. A farm labor expert at a central coast employment office estimated that most berry growers in the area adhere to the wage level guidelines. Representatives at the Naturipe and Watsonville cooperatives noted that, while at the beginning of the 1979 season some members were still paying the previous year's suggested rate, by the end they were all paying the recommended wage for the current year. By the start of the next season they anticipated a $1 per hour increase in strawberry wage rates as a result of the August 31, 1979, contract between the UFW and the large Salinas-based lettuce company, Sun Harvest.

Strawberry growers acknowledge that the stimulus to keep wage increases competitive with those in the unionized vegetable industry comes not only from their memories of the seige of 1970 but also from their employees' continued pressure and from the persisting, though not so intense, union activity on the central coast. Growers report that their workers keep abreast of UFW negotiations and contracts. A grower who does not initiate a raise is likely to be approached by his workers to increase wages. The grower then either has to convince his workers that the increase is financially impossible or risks unionization or the loss of workers to higher-paying crops or growers.

The size of a grower's strawberry operation seems to play some role in the



696 MIRIAM J. WELLS

speed with which he responds to increases in the prevailing wage rates. For example, in the fall of 1979 the largest producers, who were the most able to absorb the increased costs, adjusted their pay scale almost immediately to the Sun Harvest lettuce contract. Many smaller growers continued to pay at the lower rates and depended on their workers' acceptance of the argument that low end-of-season yields did not permit a wage increase at that time. The voluntary nature of the wage levels set by the grower associations thus permits individual producers to assess their financial resources and crop conditions, as well as the nature of their relations with their workers, in deciding on the timing of increases. In short, although berry growers voice their resentment at being "puppets of the union," without union contracts they maintain a degree of individual flexibility and, to the extent they can delay pay increases, a certain amount of financial advantage. Individual Strategies: Personalized Labor Processes and Sharecropping In addition to the collective responses outlined above, berry growers in the central coast have adopted two major individual strategies to control labor. These courses of action themselves have altered the organization of particular firms and shaped the labor markets associated with them.

The first strategy is pursued by small and medium-sized growers-those farming from three to twenty acres each'3-and emphasizes job stabilization and upgrading through informal bonds of reciprocal obligation. This approach was begun during the early 1960s when the demise of the Bracero Program seemed imminent. At that time, smaller growers, who had established trusting relationships with some braceros through repeated employment and the personal contact possible on small farms, began to sponsor braceros for green- card status and American citizenship. In those years sponsorship was rela-

tively easy and quick, involving primarily a written guarantee of future em-

ployment. The spouse and children of a citizen automatically became citizens. While green cards have been more difficult to obtain in recent years, green- carders have been the workers of choice for small berry growers because of their comfort with the seasonality of strawberry employment and their invul-

nerability to immigration restrictions. Although technically the green-carders are immigrants, most of them appreciate and take advantage of the production lull between November and February as a chance to visit their families and friends in Mexico. Their employers' expenses for unemployment insurance are minimized during that time since workers cannot legally collect while abroad. In addition, many green-carders are less actively involved with the UFW because their primary orientation is toward relatives in Mexico. And since green-carders are legal immigrants, their work cannot be disrupted by border patrol raids.14

13 The sources of these estimates are cited in note 6. Sharecropping farms, like other farms, are smaller in the Pajaro Valley and tend to encompass from twenty to fifty acres each. In the Salinas Valley, six or seven sharecropping farms dominate in acreage, ranging from one to two hundred acres each.




This preferential recruitment of a particular category of worker has been accompanied by a stabilization of the work force. Most small and medium- sized growers continue to use their own family members as workers but have also established a relationship with a set group of hired workers who provide all but a small amount of peak harvest labor. These growers not only hire the same core of workers year after year, but they also try to maximize the annual incomes of these workers to increase their job commitment. Some growers do this by devoting a small proportion of their acreage to crops that mature during the slack berry season and can employ those who want work at that time. Others systematically employ as many of their core workers as possible for as long as possible, even though the growers' own profit margins may shrink to almost nothing toward the end of the season. Workers' incomes are also augmented by employer-financed unemployment insurance, a benefit that has been required for farm workers since 1975 but that many berry growers claim to have provided voluntarily before that time.

The conditions of labor under this system are enhanced by personal bonds of mutual obligation that increase workers' benefits and also their diligence. This relationship begins with recruitment, which is done almost exclusively through personal networks rather than through a labor contractor or employment office. Core workers on small and medium-sized farms are typically drawn from one or more family groupings from the same village or region in Mexico. Even illegal workers tend to be friends or relatives of established employees. The family network hiring arrangement enables growers to meet fluctuating daily labor demands with precision. On days of heavy yield, growers ask their core workers to bring their sisters, aunts, and sons to work. When the harvest push subsides, the relatives are sent home, generally thank- ful for the work and prepared to be available when needed again. The personal nature of worker-grower relationships is enhanced by the grower's frequent reference to the workers as his "family," to those on the farm as a "team," and to the benefits accruing to all as a result of hard labor and sacrifice. Workers are expected to maintain high standards and to be loyal to their employers against union pressure. For his part, the grower provides his workers with a number of intangible and material benefits which, because voluntarily given, reinforce his image as a generous patron: on-the-job flexibility (breaks, time off); unrequired improvements in working conditions and benefits (knee pads, overshoes, gloves, health insurance, overtime pay, permis- sion to take home odd boxes of berries); and access to supplemental resources (housing, legal assistance, translation), either directly from the grower or through his intercession. All in all, these policies have had a decidedly positive impact on production. Growers pursuing this course of action report the best quality and quantity of yields in the business.

14 Southern California growers appear to hire more undocumented workers, probably because of recruitment and replacement ease in the border region and the historically lower level of union activity.



698 MIRIAM J. WELLS

The scale of operation on larger berry farms, however, is not so conducive to this pattern of labor control. As a consequence, larger growers-those farming an average of forty-five to fifty acres of land-have adopted a second course of action, one that formally subdivides the internal labor market through the sharecropping system. During the 1950s, the practice of sharecropping had dwindled as Japanese sharecroppers gained the financial resources and were granted the legal right to buy their own lands. During the labor crises of the late 1960s and early 1970s, however, many larger growers switched to sharecropping. The new sharecroppers were Mexican immigrants, a population prevented by its lack of fluency in English and its paucity of financial resources from becoming owner-operators. Currently an estimated 40 to 50 percent of the strawberry acreage on the central coast is farmed by sharecroppers.

As an administrative system, sharecropping divides a large farm into a series of smaller units of from three to five acres each, and each unit is headed by a sharecropper with a more or less formal annual contract. The labor force is internally differentiated into permanent employees (supervisory personnel and sharecroppers) and temporary employees (hired laborers). Sharecropping constitutes a distinctive employment relationship that reserves fundamental control over all inputs and basic decisions to the owner and leaves small-scale decision making to the share farmer. In a typical contract, the owner provides the land, plants, fertilizer, pesticides, equipment, and marketing facilities for the crop. The sharecropping family provides the core of field labor and is

charged with hiring additional workers during the harvest season. The share-

cropper generally receives 50 percent of the proceeds after sale, sometimes supplemented by free or cheap housing.

As an incentive system, sharecropping is well suited to achieving quality labor while buffering the farm owner from rising labor costs and union pressure. Since it is the sharecroppers who pay all the labor costs, they bear the brunt of rising wage rates and try to pay the lowest wage possible. And since they are rewarded in proportion to the market price of their crop, their motivation for careful harvesting and plant maintenance is strong. The solidarity of sharecropping families and the personal relations they develop with their hired workers provide additional assurances of quality. Share farmers usually hire relatives and friends from Mexico or the migrant stream, workers who are influenced by friendship and favors, and in many cases by their illegal status, to accept lower wages and dismiss attempts at unionization. Since sharecroppers are considered by the UFW to be growers, they themselves have not generally been targets for union organizers. In addition, the making of collective demands by the entire work force on large farms is discouraged by the stratification of workers into the two classes with different prerogatives and somewhat conflicting interests.




CONCLUSION

This case has demonstrated the interplay between social, economic, and

technological factors in the generation of a labor market structure. Technolog- ical and economic constraints peculiar to an industry were shown to define the

range of possibilities for the organization of work. However, these constraints took meaning from, and were in turn shaped by, the changing leverage of labor in the region. Elicited by social conflict, these policies have in turn altered the objective conditions underlying that struggle.

Technological and economic constraints on strawberry production have rendered the industry particularly susceptible to decreased employer control over the cost and allocation of labor. The character of the strawberry crop has

generated a distinctive demand for a flexible, semiskilled, and dedicated labor force. Moreover, commodity characteristics have prevented harvest mechanization, so that labor continues to be the largest single production cost. And control over the cost of labor is growers' major means of improving profit levels in the current economic climate.

The impact of these constraints on labor market organization has varied with the sociopolitical context of production, which in turn has affected the character of the regional labor supply. As anticipated by labor market theory, although unrecognized by studies of agricultural production (Fisher 1953; Doeringer 1966-67; Doeringer and Piore 1971; Fuller 1939), the commitment and skill required of strawberry workers encouraged grower investment in a stable and protected work force. However, the economic constraints noted above and the short duration of harvests before World War II have limited the amount growers were willing and able to pay for such labor.

Before World War II, berry growers were able to stabilize a conscientious work force at little cost to themselves because of their preexisting social bonds with the Japanese workers they hired and the sociopolitical restrictions on these workers' economic alternatives. As the need for hired labor burgeoned after the war and as the Japanese gained access to other positions, berry growers turned to the government-administered bracero labor supply to obtain

appropriate workers at minimal cost. The Bracero Program mitigated the need for internal structure because it enabled growers to pay low wages and to externalize the cost of recruitment and replacement. The socioeconomic de- pendency of braceros provided a powerful stimulus to diligence and a ready remedy for incompetence. The termination of the Bracero Program in 1964, due to the falling away of California growers' traditional allies and the con- solidation of new opposition in policy circles, altered the costs and conditions of labor supply in the region. At this time growers were faced with hiring illegal workers whose political vulnerability made them unreliable, or legal workers whose increasing level of regional organization enabled them to



700 MIRIAM J. WELLS

demand greater benefits in return for care and skill in labor. Although few

berry workers are covered by union contracts, the United Farm Workers has been responsible for increased wage levels and worker leverage in the area and threatens dramatic curtailment of growers' discretion over the allocation of labor.

Faced with this new and disadvantageous political climate, and prevented from resorting to harvest mechanization, strawberry growers have adopted policies that set their labor market apart from the regional system. These

strategies enhance growers' control over the price and allocation of labor, while promoting a labor market structure within the industry. At the collective level, growers have attempted to avoid the greater costs and rigidity of a

union-imposed structure through organizations advocating 'voluntary" adoption of wages and benefits comparable to those offered in unionized industries. At the individual level, producers have stabilized ard upgraded jobs for a core set of workers whom they recruit from a circumscribed pool of appli- cants. Smaller growers select workers they consider most resistant to unionization and immigration policies, and they reinforce loyalty and flexibil-

ity through bonds of interpersonal obligation. Larger growers have secured the advantages of stabilizing personal ties through the sharecropping system, which subdivides large farms into smaller nuclei of personal acquaintance and differential reward. Share farming contracts provide motivation for quality labor and reduce employer vulnerability to rising wages and unionization.

This case demonstrates a little-recognized interdependence among com-

modity labor markets in agriculture. In this respect it underscores the importance of focusing on the broader sociopolitical climate of production rather than on the outcome of that climate as realized in government and union

policy. Social pressures have been exerted through the industry's participation in a regional system of commodity labor markets that are linked by a common

political climate, by the flow of workers among them, and by the personal ties of workers. The increased level of organization among workers in adjacent systems of production has increased the leverage of workers in the strawberry labor market. This evidence suggests that, in the short run, unionization can have a salutory effect on the conditions of work in nonunionized sectors of a

regional economy, although extensive unionization might be expected to de-

press conditions in adjacent labor markets in the long run (Kahn 1975). Under such circumstances, the job benefits provided by labor market structure can be expected to reflect conditions in the regional system, since they are a

response to social conflict within that system. Although this study has concentrated on a single case, it has important

implications for the comparative study of agricultural systems. It contributes to emerging evidence of the past and present variability in the social or-

ganization of agriculture (Friedland and Barton 1975; Fligstein et al. 1980; Thomas 1980). Agricultural labor processes are clearly more differentiated




than is commonly acknowledged, despite conditions of apparent sustained

regional labor surpluses (Fisher 1953). As demonstrated here, differences in the organization of work, both across industries and over time, have social as well as economic causes and consequences. Moreover, the responses of agricultural industries to economic and social challenges are themselves differential, arising from their particular developmental histories. Further comparative study of the technological and economic constraints on production within industries can help account for their differing responses to common social challenges. In this connection there is evidence that the strawberry industry's transformation is not unique. Preliminary evidence from another labor-intensive industry with a highly perishable and fragile product ("Per- sonnel Practices" 1969; Rosedale and Mamer 1976) indicates that labor policies which engender structure may be as important as the mechanization of production as a means of maintaining the rate of profit in an increasingly politicized agricultural economy.

Enhanced labor market structure within the strawberry industry has important consequences for the future course of conflict between agricultural workers and management in the region. The foregoing analysis informs recent debate concerning the circumstances and consequences of labor mobilization. It reinforces the contention of some scholars of social movements (Jenkins and Perrow 1977; Snyder 1975; Walsh 1978) that the character of the broader social environment may be as important as the intensity of social unrest in determining the outcome of attempts at social change. The encounters between the UFW and California strawberry growers demonstrate that, in the case of labor-management conflicts, the concept of social environment should be expanded to include not only the usually considered variable of the presence or absence of allies in the larger society, but also the variable of the social organization of production in targeted firms. As demonstrated here, labor market structure can stratify and fragment the pool of potential union members, erecting organizational and psychological barriers to collective action. However, preexisting ties of friendship, kinship, and ethnic identity among workers in a region can help counteract this fragmentation. And structured labor markets can have a positive effect on the level of labor organization as well, in that they stabilize a previously transient work force.

In the present case, although grower strategies of labor deployment and the small, scattered nature of most berry farms militate against unionization, the increasing regional solidarity of workers should not be disregarded. The outcome of the 1970 general strike suggests that, however ingenious the growers' defensive strategies might be, they may not be proof against eventual resurgence of union pressure.

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social conflict, commodity constraints, and labor market structure in agriculture

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