Inclusion or Dualization? The Political Economy of Employment Relations in Italian and Greek Telecommunications
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/bjir.12136 |
| Published date | 01 June 2016 |
| Author | Andreas Kornelakis |
| Date | 01 June 2016 |
British Journal of Industrial Relations doi: 10.1111/bjir.12136
54:2 June 2016 0007–1080 pp. 385–408
Inclusion or Dualization? The Political
Economy of Employment Relations in
Italian and Greek Telecommunications
Andreas Kornelakis
Abstract
Recent literature argues that trade unions in restructuring service industries
have responded to the challenges of the post-industrial eraby accepting dierent
forms of labour market dualization. This articleexamines two case studies from
Italy and Greece, in which unions adopted divergent responses to intensified
market pressuresunleashed by the liberalization of national telecommunications
markets. In the Italian case, collective bargaining was successfully centralized,
resulting in the inclusion of traditional labour market ‘outsiders’. In contrast,
bargaining centralization failed in Greek telecommunications, leading to
intensified dualization. These dierent paths of institutional change are
explained as resulting from dierences in ideological cleavages among unions
and distinct legacies in employers’ associations.
1. Introduction
Recent literature on institutional change in co-ordinated market economies
focuses on common trends of labour market dualization, in which
encompassing bargaining is eroded in favour of more narrow systems
preserving institutional protections fortraditional ‘insider’ groups. The global
intensification of competition and shifts in employment from manufacturing
to services have been broadly associated with more selfish union behaviour.
Employers sought to encourage labour market deregulation as a response
to increased competitive pressures. However, the outcomes of dualization
are often attributed to the institutional reforms that were engineered by
coalitions of trade unions with (social democratic) governments (Davidsson
and Emmenegger 2013; Hassel 2014; Palier and Thelen 2010). According to
this literature, unions tolerated dualization in services to protect their core
Andreas Kornelakis is atthe University of Sussex.
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386 British Journal of Industrial Relations
membership in established industries.A related body of social pacts literature
outlines the conditions that facilitated the reform of labour markets (Avdagic
2010; Baccaro and Lim 2007). These scholars argue, along similar lines, that
trade unions consented to reforms towardsgreater labour market flexibility so
that they could retain their institutional role in the policy-making process.
This article departs from these analyses’ focus on the conditions under
which dierent coalitions of interests result in intensified dualization.Instead,
it examines the conditions that may enable an alternative path of coalitions
that temper labour market dualization by bringing outsider groups under the
protectiveumbrella of collective bargaining. In addition, contrary to the social
pacts literature thathas focused on unions’ concessions at the national level, it
seeks to understand the conditions that enable the establishment of inclusive
bargaining institutions at the sector level.
In liberalized services sectors, such as telecommunications, this outcome
appears least likely due to intense market pressures. Across Europe,
telecommunications unions faced the challenge of either accepting labour
market dualization or establishing new sectoral bargaining structures
to integrate outsider groups working for new competitors and their
subcontractors (Doellgast 2009; Doellgast et al. 2009; MacKenzie 2009).
This has particularly been challenging in a sector where there is one big
former monopolist with dierent regulatory and labour cost interests to new
competitors. The leading case of this article focuses on the centralization
of bargaining in the Italian telecommunications industry, which extended
coverage to outsiders and tempered dualization. This presents a puzzle, as
based on dualization theory, we would expect liberalization to intensify the
cleavages between insiders and outsiders. I seek to explain this outcome
with a view to answering the question: under what conditions are unions
and employers able to overcome dierences in interests, and form the
coalitions necessary to establish centralized bargaining? The empirical puzzle
is constructed in tandem with the Greek telecommunications case, which
faced similar pressures,but in which dualization intensified. Although, similar
to Italy, Greece has a centralized bargaining system at the national level,
the Greek telecommunications sector retained a decentralized bargaining
structure.
The comparison between these two cases helps to shed light on the
conditions that may explain dierent trajectories of institutional change at
sector level, within similar national models. It is argued that the observed
variation is explained not only by the dierent strategic choices made by
trade unions, which are traced to the dierent role of ideology, but also by
the variable institutional legacies in employer’s associations, which oered
dierent capacities to intermediate the diverse business interests.
The remainder of the article is structured as follows. The following
section reviews the relevant political economy literature on dualization
and social pacts, as well as the employment relations’ literature on the
telecommunications industry, specifying the conditions under which previous
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2015 John Wiley& Sons Ltd/London School of Economics.
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