labor unions in media

Media workers in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom have long organized labor unions to improve their pay rates, benefits, working conditions, and training programs; defend their rights in the workplace; and respond to technological change. They have also promoted social justice around diversity, equity, and professionalism in media industries. While media workers initially launched trade unions in the 18th century, they have increasingly established big industrial unions since the mid-20th century.

Media workers encompass employees, freelance and contract contributors, interns, and apprentices in journalism, including newsroom workers—reporters, editors, photographers, and videographers, among others—and workers in the production, printing, advertising, circulation, and other departments. A labor union is a collective organization that workers form to protect their interests and rights in the workplace. A craft union is a model of unionism in which workers organize around a particular trade, such as reporters or print workers, while an industrial union represents workers across an industry regardless of trade or skill.

This entry examines the history of labor unions in the media, some notable labor unions in the print and broadcast media fields, labor union organizing in an era of digital media, and the increasing unionization of freelance journalists.

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The origins of labor unions in print media

Before print media workers created ongoing trade unions, they established temporary printers’ associations, dealing with workplace grievances as they arose. Journeymen printers started one such association in New York City in 1776. The printers united, demanding higher wages, and when their employers begrudgingly granted them a wage increase, the printers’ association disbanded. Ten years later, 26 printers in Philadelphia launched the first strike of workers across a single trade in the United States. When the printers won a six-dollar-a-week wage increase, they, too, dissolved their association shortly after. Around this time, a society of compositors also negotiated a piecework scale of wages in London, England, in 1785.

Throughout the next century, printers launched longer-lasting unions. Initially, these unions included the New York-based Typographical Society (1795–98), the Franklin Typographical Society of Journeyman Printers of New York (1799–1804), the New York Typographical Society (1809–26), and the Philadelphia Typographical Society (1802–31). Sixty-six printers in Quebec City organized the first such ongoing union of printers in Canada in 1827. In 1836, the pioneering National Typographical Society (becoming the National Typographical Association in 1837) was formed in Washington, D.C. bringing together many union locals known as chapels. However, the association dissolved within three years due to struggles during an economic depression. Yet the printers regrouped, starting the National Typographical Union in May 1852. The union adopted a new constitution in 1869, accepting Canadian members and becoming the International Typographical Union (ITU). As print media companies introduced new technology into the workplace at that time, other craft workers, such as stereotypers, bookbinders, and pressmen organized, initially joining ITU. By 1882, though, some craft workers asserted their own identity: the International Brotherhood of Bookbinders and the Lithographers and Photoengravers of America were formed, while the International Printing Pressmen’s Union was founded in 1887.

In the 19th century, ITU took a progressive stance compared to other unions regarding gender and racial diversity and equity issues. While ITU vigorously opposed the Women’s Typographical Union No. 1 of New York City for 15 years, it finally chartered the union in 1869. Although ITU revoked part of its constitution in 1873 that permitted female members, its 1885 General Laws noted that the union should not refuse women members based on sex. Three years later, ITU instructed its locals to organize female workers and pay equal wages for the same work regardless of sex. ITU had also declared in 1869 that union locals had discretion to admit Black workers.

The evolution of editorial workers’ unions

Labor unions have advocated for higher wages and better working conditions for editorial workers since 1891. A wage disparity between the unorganized editorial workers and the organized newspaper workers in production departments became an issue around which the former mobilized in the United States, initially in Pittsburgh, Denver, Sacramento, and New York. The movement to organize news writers spread to Canada between 1902 and 1904, when three ITU locals were established. ITU chartered the first Canadian news writers’ local in Ottawa, but like its counterparts in the United States, it was short-lived, suspended in 1903 as a result of nonpayment of membership dues. Around this time in the United Kingdom, the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) was founded in 1907, and by 2020, it had more than 30,000 members. Yet ITU news writers’ locals continued to struggle until 1923, when ITU relinquished jurisdiction of news writers to the American Federation of Labor.

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By 1933, American editorial workers realized that they needed their own parent union to represent them. Led by Heywood Broun, they established the American Newspaper Guild (ANG), mobilizing mainly around higher pay. Broun also led the organizing efforts of his local union, the Newspaper Guild of New York in 1934 (now the NewsGuild of New York). In 1937, workers in the commercial departments of print publications started joining ANG. Continuing to expand its membership, ANG chartered the Wire Service Guild (now the News Media Guild) as an autonomous union local in March 1958, initially including members from the three wire services at the time—International News Service, United Press, and Associated Press.

From the outset, ANG organized editorial workers in Canada, initially in Toronto and Montreal, in September 1936. A small group of editorial workers at Toronto newspapers, many of whom were women, aimed to unionize the city’s four daily newspapers, and the Toronto Newspaper Guild (TTNG), Local 87 of ANG, was born (now Unifor Local 87-M). Some newspaper workers in British Columbia organized and obtained collective agreements with autonomous unions: Workers at the Vancouver Sun started the Vancouver Newspaper Guild in 1941 and won a contract in 1942, with wage increases, severance pay, and overtime provisions, while the Victoria Island Newspaper Guild (VING) was founded in 1945, securing a contract in 1946. By the end of the decade, ANG won its first collective agreement in Canada at the Toronto Star in 1949, resulting in a monumental pay increase for reporters and photographers with at least five years of experience. That year, the Canadian Wire Service Guild was also formed (now the Canadian Media Guild [CMG]).

As ANG’s membership continued to grow outside of the United States as well as include more people of color and women members, the union’s members sought special recognition. In 1951, Canada was established as a “region” in the union. During the 1960s, VING played an instrumental role in mobilizing ANG members to remove “American” from the union’s name to reflect that it had Canadian members. In 1971, ANG became The Newspaper Guild (TNG). Soon after, the union committed to opening a Canadian office and appointing a Canadian director. In the midst of the civil rights movement of the 1960s, TNG also combated racial discrimination in the news industry in hiring and promotion. In the 1970s, TNG addressed sex discrimination in the news workplace. By 2015, the union had changed its name to The NewsGuild (TNG), recognizing that it represented more than newspaper workers.

Entertainment media workers unionize

As editorial workers organized in the 1930s, entertainment media workers followed suit. The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) was formed in Los Angeles as a self-governing organization of film actors and, later, background actors and extras in 1933. Four years later, SAG obtained its first contract with producers, the same year that the American Federation of Radio Artists (AFRA) was founded. AFRA negotiated its first national-level collective agreement with NBC and CBS in 1938. In these formative years, union members discussed plans to merge these performers’ guild into one big union, but by 1940, they had failed to make progress on this front. In the 1940s, background actors and extras sought more autonomy, leaving SAG to start the Screen Players Union in 1945. At the time, diversity was a central concern of SAG: The union adopted a resolution in 1946 to oppose discrimination against Black people in the film industry. As television was introduced, the Television Authority of the Associated Actors and Artistes of America was formed in 1949 to represent television actors until joining AFRA in 1952, becoming the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA). Yet that was not the only union merger. In 1954, the Screen Writers Guild united with the TV Writers Guild and the Radio Writers Guild to launch the Writers Guild of America (WGA). Later that year, AFTRA adopted a no discrimination clause for its 1952–54 television Network Code, stating that producers shall not discriminate against any person due to race, sex, creed, color, or national origin. In 2012 SAG and AFTRA merged.

Journalism workers’ unions converge across media industries

Newspaper unions adopted a strategy of labor convergence that can be traced back to the 1950s. At the time, media chains had grown and become more powerful, adopting a strategy of corporate convergence, so newspaper unions considered merging with other media and communication workers’ unions, consolidating their contract negotiations to strengthen their collective bargaining power. Unions such as TNG, ITU, and the Communications Workers of America (CWA) discussed plans to merge and organize workers across the print, telecommunications, and broadcasting industries, among others. Their newspaper members came from both editorial and production departments in the United States and Canada.

In the 1960s and 1970s, the unions became more concerned with technological change. ITU was a craft union that had been losing members due to the introduction of computerized typesetting. Automation was streamlining the production process and deskilling newspaper workers’ labor. After years of internal debate, ITU members finally voted to merge with CWA in 1986, joining the union’s more than 600,000 members, most of whom were telephone and telecommunications workers. Recognizing the distinct nature of these members’ work, CWA established a Publishing and Media Workers Sector in 1987.

Left on its own, TNG spent the next decade exploring merger options. In 1995, TNG, representing about 40,000 members, voted to endorse a merger with CWA. The merger agreement recognized that TNG could retain its autonomy and benefit from the expertise and enhanced power of a bigger union, which had become vital due to technological and corporate convergence. TNG also granted its Canadian members special recognition, founding TNG Canada, which could still access the international TNG benefits, among them the union’s defense fund. TNG officially became part of CWA’s media sector in 1997, while TNG Canada became TNG Canada/CWA. TNG Canada/CWA was officially recognized as autonomous within CWA in 2007, changing its name to CWA Canada.

In addition, the Communications, Energy, and Paperworkers Union (CEP) was formed in Canada in 1992 when three unions merged: the Communications and Electrical Workers of Canada, the Energy and Chemical Workers Union, and the Canadian Paperworkers Union. After the merger, CEP had 15,000 members in its media section. A major outcome of such labor convergence was that TTNG left the international TNG in 1994 and affiliated with CEP (now Unifor). The newspaper unions had shifted from craft-based to cross-industrial-type collective organizations.

Media workers unite in the digital era

Online employees at newspapers, such as The New York Times, started joining TNG locals like the NewsGuild of New York as far back as 1995, soon after the Web became commercialized. Likewise, TNG secured a collective agreement in 2001 between the San Francisco Chronicle and its online editorial and advertising employees. In the early 21st century, workers at new media companies also began organizing unions. For instance, NUJ won union recognition at AOL UK in 2005. In the United States, workers at Truthout, a nonprofit outlet, became the first online-only news organization to join a labor union—the St. Louis Newspaper Guild (now United Media Guild) in 2009. In Canada, about 15 staff members at Canoe.ca joined Unifor Local 87-M in 2015, becoming the first group of workers at a stand-alone online news outlet to unionize in the country.

In June 2015, employees at Gawker.com, an online-only media news site, joined WGA, East, leading workers at more than 60 digital-only and legacy news media organizations to unionize with WGA, East or TNG. By November 2019, over 2,600 workers formed 23 unions with WGA, East, covering 64 media outlets, including VICE, HuffPost, Vox Media, and Hearst Media. Workers at BuzzFeed and legacy media outlets, such as the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, and The New Yorker, had joined TNG. While these workers have typically organized around long-standing issues, such as decent pay, benefits, and more editorial control, they have also emphasized efforts to improve racial, ethnic, and gender diversity in the media workforce and in media content.

This movement to unionize workers at digital media outlets spread to Canada when VICE Canada employees formed a bargaining unit within CWA Canada local CMG in late 2015. BuzzFeed Canada and The National Observer workers joined CWA Canada in 2019 and 2020, respectively. VICE UK workers also organized, but management thwarted their unionization efforts in 2016, opting instead to launch an internal staff council. Yet the VICE UK NUJ chapel achieved official union recognition with the company in 2019. The VICE Canada and VICE UK workers said that the organizing efforts in the United States inspired them to organize.

Freelance contributors and student interns join media unions

Freelance writers have also united with media employees. In the United Kingdom, freelance journalists have been able to join NUJ since it was founded in 1907. The union created a special freelance branch in 1951, and by 1973, the union had secured agreements with some publishers that standardized rates for freelance contributors. In the 2000s, NUJ secured agreements, including for casual workers on employers’ premises and an agreement with the Guardian Media Group in 2000 that lays out standard rates for freelance contributors. In Canada, CMG started a freelance branch in 1998. The CMG Freelance Branch united with the Professional Writers Association of Canada in 2020, forming the Canadian Freelance Guild within parent union CWA Canada. In addition, the Canadian Freelance Union was established in 2009 as a CEP local (now Unifor) to represent independent media workers. In the United States, the National Writers Union (NWU) was created in 1981 to represent writers in all genres, including journalism, advocating for better pay and treatment of workers. NWU has negotiated voluntary freelance contributors’ agreements with media outlets including The Nation, Jacobin, and In These Times that set standards for rates, payment, and grievance procedures. In 2009, TNG local Pacific Media Workers Guild launched a special unit called Guild Freelancers, while the Chicago News Guild, another TNG local, started the bargaining unit Working Journalists for freelance media professionals in 2013.

In addition, labor unions have established programs to protect journalism student interns. NUJ has a special category of student associate membership that is open to journalism students or those who work in student media over the age of 16. In 2011, CWA Canada launched a free associate members program to advocate for as well as provide student journalists and recent graduates with access to paid internship programs (such as the Canadian Press newswire service), mentoring opportunities, and professional development events. Unions have also advocated for language in collective agreements and in labor legislation that supports paid internships with an educational value. VICE Canada is an example of a media outlet that incorporated such intern language in its first collective agreement in 2016. By representing freelance contributors and interns, media workers’ collective organizations have further become big industrial unions.

The original version of this article was published by SAGE Publications in The SAGE Encyclopedia of Journalism.