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Full-Text Articles in Labor Relations

Trade Unions And Collective Bargaining: Suggestions For Emerging Democracies In Eastern Europe And The Former Soviet Union, Harry C. Katz, Sarosh Kuruvilla, Lowell Turner Jan 2013

Trade Unions And Collective Bargaining: Suggestions For Emerging Democracies In Eastern Europe And The Former Soviet Union, Harry C. Katz, Sarosh Kuruvilla, Lowell Turner

Lowell Turner

This paper provides lessons for industrial relations reform efforts in the new nations emerging from the former Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc. Our purpose is to identify the basic industrial-relations practices that enable the advanced industrial countries to compete in world markets. The paper does not provide a detailed descriptive account of the existing industrial-relations institutions in the formerly communist countries, nor does it assess the likely short-run consequences of the economic restructuring under way across the new nations. Rather, our focus is on the experiences in the advanced economies and the lessons those experiences contain regarding successful industrial-relations practice.


The Politics Of The Labor Movement Revitalization: The Need For A Revitalized Perspective, Lucio Baccaro, Kerstin Haman, Lowell Turner Jan 2013

The Politics Of The Labor Movement Revitalization: The Need For A Revitalized Perspective, Lucio Baccaro, Kerstin Haman, Lowell Turner

Lowell Turner

[Excerpt] Unions everywhere are struggling. Globalization, with its supporting neo-liberal ideology, encourages employers and governments to push vigorously against the constraints of employment regulation. Unions have to fight to protect past gains, resist decline and find new allies. To some extent, labor is always on the defensive in a capitalist economy, where ownership and economic decision-making lie largely beyond the reach of workers and unions. Yet the competitive pressures of today's increasingly global capitalism accentuate the pressure. Firms have new options and increasing mobility, far beyond those that most workers and unions can claim. One response is common to all …


Institutions And Activism: Crisis And Opportunity For A German Labor Movement In Decline, Lowell Turner Oct 2012

Institutions And Activism: Crisis And Opportunity For A German Labor Movement In Decline, Lowell Turner

Lowell Turner

In recent decades, German unions have rested on their institutional laurels even as the ground has slipped away. This article analyzes two recent innovative campaigns based on grassroots mobilization that, the author argues, offer possibilities for renewed union strength. A breakthrough campaign against a militantly anti-union firm in the retail industry demonstrates the potential for a German brand of social movement unionism. The story line and institution-building strategy of this campaign fall entirely outside the framework of traditional German industrial relations. A second, very different campaign, from deep inside that traditional framework, has mobilized union members in Nordrhein-Westfalen (IG Metall’s …