Marching to Different Tunes: Commitment and Culture as Mobilizing Mechanisms of Trade Unions and Community Organizations Maite Tapia Abstract This study examines mobilizing mechanisms using a British community orga- nization and a British trade union as exemplars. Although there has been substantial work on union revitalization on the one hand, and the emergence of alternative, community organizations on the other, no study has compared the challenges these organizations face in encouraging member mobilization. The findings illustrate how the trade union engages in a service-driven culture, cultivating instrumental commitment between the members and the union. The community organization, in contrast, engages in a relational culture and exem- plifies a form of social commitment between the members and the group. As a result, different types of commitment and organizational cultures help explain why sustained member mobilization within a trade union is harder to achieve than within a community organization. Mobilization is a process of increasing the readiness to act collectively. (Gamson 1975: 15) 1. Introduction This article compares the mobilizing mechanisms of trade unions and com- munity organizations. My starting point is the following paradox: trade unions have numerous members and resources but often find it difficult to mobilize their members (e.g. Bronfenbrenner and Juravich 1998; Heery et al. 2000). Community organizations, on the other hand, have much smaller memberships, don’t have as many resources but display a tremendous Maite Tapia is at ILR School, Cornell University. British Journal of Industrial Relations doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8543.2012.00893.x 51:4 December 2013 0007–1080 pp. 666–688 © John Wiley & Sons Ltd/London School of Economics 2012. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.