Farm Labourers: Exit, Loyalty, or Voice?

This chapter argues that most farm workers preferred loyalty to their employers, or exit and higher paid urban employment, to that of voice, and the creation of rural trade unions and farm strikes. In Eastern Europe, land reform significantly reduced the number of landless workers, but trade unions were also frequently repressed by governments. In Western Europe, organizing farm labour, even with trade unions, proved difficult because of the highly varied nature of farm work, while permanent and causal workers often had conflicting interests. Several governments following the First World War included farm workers in general legislation concerning minimum wages and the length of the workday or included general conditions for workers within a broader package to support farming. It also explains why, exceptionally, large groups of farm workers choose voice rather than loyalty and exit, and why landowners and farmers sought to arm fascist groups to restore their traditional control in the Italian countryside, and after the military coup in Spain in 1936.