UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON ARCHIVES
ORAL HISTORY PROJECT

Interview #708
STREECK, WOLFGANG

STREECK, Wolfgang (1946- )
Professor of Sociology and Industrial Relations
At UW: 1988-1995

Interviewed: January 31, 2005	
Interviewer: W. Lee Hansen
Length: 25 minutes

Educational background; Study of industrial relations; Teaching; Students; Industrial Relations Research Institute (IRRI).

Interview Session (January 31, 2005): Tape 1

Tape 1/Side 1

00:00:03	Wolfgang Streeck describes his education at Frankfurt University and Columbia University.

00:01:09	He joined the Wissenschaftzentrum in Berlin in 1976 to work on labor relations and labor markets.  He wrote a book on German industrial relations in the automobile industry.  WS met W. Lee Hansen at a conference in the US; Hansen asked him about coming to UW.

00:01:59	WS sees the study of industrial relations in Germany as divided between sociologists, economics, and specialists in labor law; there is no "discipline" of industrial relations.

00:03:11	He describes what attracted him to live in the US and come to the University of Wisconsin.  He was drawn to the idea of succeeding E.M. Kassalow.

00:04:50	WS had never been a teacher before he came to UW, but he welcomed the challenge to become a good teacher.

00:07:03	He was satisfied to have many excellent students in the Industrial Relations Research Institute (IRRI).  These students were a more diverse group than his graduate students in sociology.  He talks about some of his most successful students.

00:10:35	WS switched his appointment full-time to the sociology department because of his increasing involvement in the Center on Wisconsin Strategy, although he continued to teach in the IRRI.

00:11:45	He sensed that the IRRI was in trouble because people had been talking about human resources and management as an alternative to industrial relations.

00:14:57	WS thinks that there needs to be more study of the employment relationship, but for various reasons people do not want to study it.  Because of the decline of the union movement there is less pressure to study such topics.

00:18:39	The narrowing of academic disciplines has also damaged the prospect of industrial relations research.

00:20:34	WS speaks about the role of interdisciplinary programs in the university.

00:25:08	End of side.  End of tape.  End of interview.

END