The United States lags behind most other nations in the world with respect to job-protected leave and paid leave from work, such as parental leave. The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) of 1993 is the only federal leave policy, and it provides 12 weeks of job-protected leave for personal care or family care to address serious illnesses or health conditions. However, leave under the FMLA is unpaid, and restrictive eligibility requirements prohibit over 40 percent of the workforce from taking advantage of its provisions. Given the FMLA's shortcomings, states have passed their own leave laws, offering paid leave, covering more workers, lengthening leave durations, or expanding definitions of "family" for the purposes of family caregiving leave. My dissertation applies both quantitative and qualitative analytical approaches to explore relationships between social movements and gender-neutral leave legislation (i.e., paid and/or job-protected family, parental, and sick leave) in U.S. states. It addresses two key questions: First, how and to what extent do union-community coalitions (or social movements) influence state leave legislation? Second, under what conditions do they have influence? (Abstract shortened by ProQuest.).