This book evaluates the effects of trade worker takeovers (WTOs)the recuperation of workplaces by workerson trade union power resources. Deploying a mixed methodological framework to identify the prerequisites for successful labour-strengthening WTOs and using an adaptation of the power resources approach as a theoretical framework, it critically evaluates the experiences of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) in the United Kingdom, the United Food and Commercial Workers Unions (UFCW) in the United States and the Sindicato dos Metalúrgicos do ABC (SMABC) in Brazil.

It finds that, under certain circumstances, WTOs can strengthen the overall power resources of trade unions and identifies the prerequisites for success in that respect.