Labour Versus the State: The Conflicting Policy Interests and Ideas of the Canadian Trade Union Movement and the Federal Conservative Government, 1984-1988.

The subject of this research is the conflicting policy interests and ideas of Canadian organized labour and the federal Conservative government between 1984 and 1988. This conflict is placed within the context of the political and economic changes accompanying the international restructuring of capital and focusses on the opposition of the Canadian trade union movement to federal economic development policies. The struggle of ideas and interests surrounding specific policy areas is detailed. These areas include deficit reduction, the privatization of Crown corporations and government services, deregulation of certain economic activities and sectors and comprehensive bilateral free trade with the United States. Labour's opposition is shown to have manifested in a new strategy for building a broad-based coalition with other popular interests, in an effort to defeat the Conservative government and their policies at the polls. The research work concludes with speculation as to the future of labour and popular-coalition politics.