INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS THEORY—A CRITICAL REVIEW*
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.1970.tb00584.x |
| Author | John Gennard,A. N. J. Blain |
| Date | 01 November 1970 |
| Published date | 01 November 1970 |
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS THEORY-A CRITICAL REVIEW*
A.
N.
J.
BLAIN?
AND
JOHN
GENNARD~
THE
aim of this article
is
to examine the state
of
industrial relations theory.
This
involves, firstly, tracing the developments from
Marx’s
exposition
of
the evolution of trade unions to the present-day theories of industrial
relations. Secondly, an assessment of three contemporary approaches will
be given. Finally, the article will suggest modifications to the theory which
the writers consider provides the best scope for the future development
of
the subject. The theoretical refinements are offered as
a
first step in the
direction of
a
more rigorous methodology for industrial relations.
HISTORICAL
BACKGROUND
Although the academic study
of
industrial relations is
a
relatively
modern development, the origins of industrial relations theory can be
traced back to before the beginning of the century. At the end of the 1860s
Karl Marx linked the rise of trade unions with the development of in-
dustry and the increasing miseration of the pro1etarians.l Combination
against the bourgeoisie was seen as
a
means of keeping up wages. Union
development was helped by the improved means of communications
created by modern industry such that workers of different localities were
brought into contact with one another and the local struggles against the
bourgeoisie became centralized. Just before the turn of the century, the
Webbs published
A
History
of
Trade
Unionism,2
which traced the develop-
ment of the British trade union movement and
Industrial
Demo~racy,~
which attempted to give
a
scientific analysis of trade unionism in the
United Kingdom. In the latter work, after analysing trade union struc-
ture, they discussed the trade union function which was seen as the en-
forcement
of
the ‘common rule’
for
a
trade in the shop and described three
alternative processes by which this could be enforced-the method
of
mutual insurance, the method of collective bargaining and the method of
legal enactment.
This
article
owes
its conception to the
L.S.E.
Industrial Relations Department’s
Labour
Problcms
Seminar,
Michaelmas Session 1969/70.
Thanks
for helpful comments
are
due
to
Professor
B.
C.
Roberts, Professor
H.
Levinson, R.
J.
Love.ridgc,
E. Owen-Smith and
N.
F.
G.
Bosanqua.
t
Research Fellow, Industrial Relations Department, London School of Economics and
Political Science.
2
Lecturer
in
Industrial Relations, London School of Economics and Political Science.
lKarl Marx, Sclcctcd
Works,
prepared by h-Ehgels-Lenin Institute, Moacow, under
editorship of
V.
Adoratsky.
Sidney and Beatrice Webb,
A
History
of
Trcrdc
Unionism, Longmans,
1896
Sidney and Beatrice Webb, Industrial
Bmomq,
Longmans,
1902
389
390
BRITISH
JOURNAL
OF
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS
In the United States
a
theoretical approach to the labour union and
movement was adopted by John Commons and Selig Perlman. Contrary
to the prevailing view at the time, CommonsY4 writing in 1925, regarded
the labour union not
as
a
bearer
of
tyranny and monopoly, but
as
a
liberating force which helped establish constitutional government in
industry and delineate the power
of
one of the parties over the other.
Perlman’s5 approach was different. The union was seen
as
being primarily
concerned with workers’ job interests and the sharing
of
job opportunities
among its members. He argued that workers were conscious
of
a
scarcity
of
jobs and that the union was designed to give them protection against
this situation.
Trade unions continued to be the centre of theory at the end of the
Second World War. At first an economic bias prevailed in the approach.
In 1944 John Dunlops published
Wage Determination under Trade Unions,
in which he attempted to apply the economist’s theory of the firm to the
trade union. He developed
a
model viewing the union
as
an economic
institution attempting to maximize some wage or employment dimension
of
its members or some combination of these. This approach to the study
of
trade unions was challenged in 1948 by Arthur
ROSS,’
who in turn laid
himself open
to
the charge of
a
restrictive approach, by concentrating
on the union purely
as
a political institution. He advanced
a
political
theory
of
trade union wage policy, based on the view that the union must
be seen as
a
political institution working in an economic context.
ROSS
argued that the political struggles within
a
union would mean that if the
present leadership wished to maintain its position, it would have
to
obtain
for its members wage increases similar to those obtained by other union
leaders. Consequently, ‘orbits of coercive comparison’ would become
important in determining union wage policy. In 1948 Clark Kerr,*
in an article entitled ‘The Model
of
the Trade Union,’ drew attention to
the narrowness
of
approach to the analysis of trade unions, arguing that
a
combination of politics and economics would provide
a
more realistic
understanding. His view was stated as follows
:
.
.
.
it
should
help
to
illuminate
the pursuit
of
wealth
and
power
(and their
interactions)
by the
economic
interest
group
of
labour and capital.
It
should
help
reduce the
area
of
presumed irrationality and
conflict
between
theory
and
practice.
It
should broaden
the
area
subject
to
explanation
and reduce the area outside the system
of
analysis.
It
should help make
something
systematic
out
of
what theory
has
disregarded.g
In the 1950s there was
a
movement away from concentration
on
the
John
R.
Commons,
Th.e
Economics
of
Collective
Action,
Macmillan,
New
York, 1925
S.
Perlman,
A
The0r-y
of
the
Labour
Movement,
Macmillan, New York, 1928
J.
T.
Dunlop,
Wage
Determination
undcr
Trade
Unions,
Macmillan, New York, 1925
’
A.
M.
Ross,
Trade
Union Wage
Policy,
University of California Press, Berkeley,
1948
Clark Kerr, ‘The Model
of
a Trade Union’, in
E.
Wight Bakke and Clark Kerr
(Eds.),
Unions, Management
and
thc
Public,
Brace
&
Co., New York, 1948.
This
interesting book contains
the seeds
of
much of the later development in industrial relations theory.
Clark Kerr,
op.
cit.,
p.
675
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