Reconsidering the Collective Impulse: Formal Organization and Informal Associations Among Workers in the Australian Colonies, 1795-1850

We believe there is a need to move beyond simply privileging formal or informal organization as the most authentic expression of worker activity, but rather to recognize both and analyse the interrelationship between the two. The present article provides a method for achieving this as well as presenting the resultsof applying this method to a particular country and historical context [namely, workers in the Australian colonies from 1795 to 1850]. --From authors' introduction