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Full-Text Articles in Labor Relations
Intermediary Cooperative Associations And The Institutionalization Of Participate Work Practices: A Case Study In The Danish Public Secto, Ole Henning Sørensen, Virginia Doellgast, Anders Bojesen
Intermediary Cooperative Associations And The Institutionalization Of Participate Work Practices: A Case Study In The Danish Public Secto, Ole Henning Sørensen, Virginia Doellgast, Anders Bojesen
Virginia Doellgast
Scandinavian countries are known for having a high adoption of cooperative models of work design. This article investigates the role of parity labour market associations, termed intermediary cooperative associations, in the dissemination of these models. Findings are based on an examination of the Centre for the Development of Human Resources and Quality Management (SCKK), a social partnership-based organization that funds workplace development projects at state workplaces, and of nine participative development projects that received financial and logistical support from the SCKK. These projects increased union and management commitment to partnership-based approaches to problem-solving, despite their ambiguous results for both …
Collective Voice Under Decentralized Bargaining: A Comparative Study Of Work Reorganization In Us And German Call Centres, Virginia Doellgast
Collective Voice Under Decentralized Bargaining: A Comparative Study Of Work Reorganization In Us And German Call Centres, Virginia Doellgast
Virginia Doellgast
This article compares the process of and outcomes from work reorganization in US and German call centres, based on four matched case studies in the telecommunications industry. Both German cases adopted high-involvement employment systems with broad skills and worker discretion, while the US cases relied on a narrow division of labour, tight discipline and individual incentives. These outcomes are explained by differences in institutional supports for collective voice. Works councils in the German companies used their stronger participation rights to limit monitoring and encourage upskilling at a time when US managers were rationalizing similar jobs. Findings demonstrate that industrial relations …
Identity Work: Sustaining Transnational Collective Action At General Motors Europe, Ian Greer
Identity Work: Sustaining Transnational Collective Action At General Motors Europe, Ian Greer
Ian Greer
What are the conditions under which transnational collective action is initiated and sustained? This paper presents a case study of General Motors Europe, where labor leaders have mobilized the workforce and bargained with management at the transnational level repeatedly over more than a decade as a response to management whipsawing and threats of plant closures. In contrast to structuralist interest-based theories of union behavior, we identify a process of “identity work‟ that was necessary to sustain transnational worker cooperation.
Labor Relations In A Globalizing World, Harry C. Katz, Thomas A. Kochan, Alexander Colvin
Labor Relations In A Globalizing World, Harry C. Katz, Thomas A. Kochan, Alexander Colvin
Alexander Colvin
[Excerpt] This book traces how labor, management, and governments acting as individuals or as groups have shaped and continue to shape the employment relationship. Employment is analyzed through the perspective of industrial relations, the interdisciplinary field of study that concentrates on individual workers and groups of workers, unions and other forms of collective representation, employers and their organizations, and the environment in which these parties interact.
Reviving The American Labor Movement: Institutions And Mobilization, Richard W. Hurd, Ruth Milkman, Lowell Turner
Reviving The American Labor Movement: Institutions And Mobilization, Richard W. Hurd, Ruth Milkman, Lowell Turner
Richard W Hurd
[Excerpt] The reawakening of the American labor movement under new leadership with new strategic orientations is a remarkable chapter in late 20thcentury American economic and political history. Given up for dead by so many at home and abroad, under relentless attack from American employers and with government supports disappearing, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFLCIO) and a core of key member unions have re-emerged since the mid-1990s as prominent workplace, community and political actors. With both strategic reorientation and new local mobilization, these unions have fought to reverse decline and re-energize the movement. While the …
Trade Unions And Collective Bargaining: Suggestions For Emerging Democracies In Eastern Europe And The Former Soviet Union, Harry C. Katz, Sarosh Kuruvilla, Lowell Turner
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 Conflict Over Conflict Management, David B. Lipsky, Ariel C. Avgar
The Conflict Over Conflict Management, David B. Lipsky, Ariel C. Avgar
David B Lipsky
[Excerpt] In this article we look at the traditional approach to workplace conflict, the evolution of conflict management, criticism of this process by progressive and traditional critics, and then consider whether they can be reconciled by taking what we call a strategic view of conflict management in the workplace. This view calls for an alignment between the goals of the conflict management system and the overarching nature of the organization in which that system is implemented. The management of conflict, according to this approach, should complement the organization’s strategic posture and existing structures. We maintain that the level of fit …
Reviving The American Labor Movement: Institutions And Mobilization, Richard Hurd, Ruth Milkman, Lowell Turner
Reviving The American Labor Movement: Institutions And Mobilization, Richard Hurd, Ruth Milkman, Lowell Turner
Lowell Turner
[Excerpt] The reawakening of the American labor movement under new leadership with new strategic orientations is a remarkable chapter in late 20thcentury American economic and political history. Given up for dead by so many at home and abroad, under relentless attack from American employers and with government supports disappearing, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFLCIO) and a core of key member unions have re-emerged since the mid-1990s as prominent workplace, community and political actors. With both strategic reorientation and new local mobilization, these unions have fought to reverse decline and re-energize the movement. While the …
The Politics Of The Labor Movement Revitalization: The Need For A Revitalized Perspective, Lucio Baccaro, Kerstin Haman, Lowell Turner
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 …
Industrialization Strategy And Industrial Relations Policy In Malaysia, Sarosh C. Kuruvilla
Industrialization Strategy And Industrial Relations Policy In Malaysia, Sarosh C. Kuruvilla
Sarosh Kuruvilla
[Excerpt] In this chapter, a different view is taken of the relationship between industrialization strategies and industrial relations policy and practice. I argue that it is not the logic of industrialism or the levels of industrialization per se but the choice of an industrialization strategy and the shifts between such strategies that influence changes in industrial relations policies.
Linkages Between Industrialization Strategies And Industrial Relations/Human Resource Policies: Singapore, Malaysia, The Philippines, And India, Sarosh Kuruvilla
Linkages Between Industrialization Strategies And Industrial Relations/Human Resource Policies: Singapore, Malaysia, The Philippines, And India, Sarosh Kuruvilla
Sarosh Kuruvilla
The case studies of Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, and India presented in this paper support the author's contention that a country's industrialization strategy for economic development profoundly influences its industrial relations (IR) and human resources (HR) policy goals. The author finds that import substitution industrialization was associated with IR/HR policy goals of pluralism and stability, while a low-cost export-oriented industrialization strategy was associated with IR/HR policy goals of cost containment and union suppression. In countries that moved from a low-cost export-oriented strategy to a higher value added export-oriented strategy, the focus of IR/HR policy goals shifted from cost containment to …
Bargaining For Competitiveness: Law, Research, And Case Studies, Richard N. Block Editor
Bargaining For Competitiveness: Law, Research, And Case Studies, Richard N. Block Editor
Upjohn Press
This book offers an analysis of the relationship among collective bargaining, firm competitiveness, and employment protections and creation in the United States. The contributors provide an overview of the legal framework and the economic and industrial relations research on collective bargaining, competitiveness, and employment, then follow with four case studies that provide insights into the process of collective bargaining and its current status in the evolving U.S. labor-management system.