Despite an abundance of literature on the Second International relatively little is known about the work of the International Secretariat of National Trade Union Centres (ISNTUC). Foundect in 1901 by the German and Scandinavian labour leaders, this exclusively trade union International (the forerunner of the post-war International Federation of Trade Unions) included representatives of most of the major labour movements of Europe and the USA. Under German leadership it occupied itself with exclusively trade union issues, a limitation which was contested by revolutionary labour federations. Study of the ISNTUC therefore reveals much about conceptions of internationalism within the internationally organized labour movement.

In comparative perspective, U.S. employers have been unusually hostile to unions. Their labor policies varied from one time and industry to another, however, in defiance of familiar interpretations of American “exceptionalism”. It is argued that before World War I, open shops and trade agreements represented different solutions for common labor problems. The timing of changes in technology and industrial structure relative to union growth determined which strategy would be more attractive to employers. This argument is developed by comparing one open shop industry (the machine trades) with its British counterpart and, more briefly, with some U.S. industries where trade agreements prevailed.

Historians have recently paid serious attention to the roles of working-class groups in the creation of British social policy, but have largely ignored involvement by sweated workers. This article reveals among chainmakers long-run campaigns against sweating – successively demanding state action to abolish domestic workshops, regulate hours, restrict female work, fix rates for the job, and institute co-operative production. Failure in these campaigns led, with major initiatives from female workers, to advocacy of a statutory minimum wage. The Trade Boards Act (1909) reflected such pressures for state aid, though the form the legislation took brought only limited benefits.