Institutions and Strategies: Trends and Obstacles to Recruiting Workers into Trade Unions in Poland
| Date | 01 March 2014 |
| Published date | 01 March 2014 |
| Author | Jan Czarzasty,Adam Mrozowicki,Katarzyna Gajewska |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.2012.00919.x |
Institutions and Strategies: Trends and
Obstacles to Recruiting Workers into
Trade Unions in Poland
Jan Czarzasty, Katarzyna Gajewska and
Adam Mrozowicki
Abstract
In this article, we examine the role of institutional context, organizational
structures and trade union strategies in tempering membership decline in the
number of trade unions in Poland. Empirical data include membership statistics
collected for NSZZ Solidarnos´c´ and 54 affiliates of two other largest trade
union confederations (OPZZ and FZZ) supplemented by semi-structured
interviews with union leaders. In a decentralized collective bargaining system
in Poland, a centralized trade union confederation (NSZZ Solidarnos´c´) can
more easily shift resources to efficiently organize workers than decentralized
confederations, OPZZ and FZZ, whose development is mostly driven by com-
peting trade unions representing narrower occupational groups. In conclusion,
this observation is put in a broader context of the debates about trade union
renewal in Eastern Europe.
1. Introduction
The level of membership in trade unions has previously been explained by
structural and institutional factors in international comparative research, as
well as by trade union strategies (Ebbinghaus and Visser 1999; Turner 2009;
Western 1994). The structural arguments point to the dynamics of labour
markets that diminish recruitment success: the growth of services sectors
that are universally less unionized that manufacturing (Western 1994),
the rise in atypical employment contracts (temporary/freelance contracts) and
the decrease in public sector employment. The central role of institutions and
Jan Czarzasty is at Warsaw School of Economics/Department of Economic Sociology.
Katarzyna Gajewska is an independent scholar. Adam Mrozowicki is at the University of
Wrocław, Institute of Sociology.
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British Journal of Industrial Relations doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8543.2012.00919.x
52:1 March 2014 0007–1080 pp. 112–135
© John Wiley & Sons Ltd/London School of Economics 2012. Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd,
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organizational structures is implied by quantitative comparative studies that
analyze the dynamics of trade union membership in the Western capitalist
context. These studies demonstrate that institutional context determines the
effectiveness of and motivation for recruitment (Blanchflower 2007; Ebbing-
haus and Visser 1999; Hassel 1999; Western 1994). The importance of trade
unionists’ ‘agency’, involving innovative membership recruitment strategies,
is emphasized in the literature on union organizing, mobilization and social
movement unionism. According to this approach, trade unions are actively
transforming to adjust to new challenges and to pursue strategies to retain or
gain members (Frege and Kelly 2003; Turner 2009).
The central theoretical objective of this article is to enrich the theories
of trade union membership through the application of an institutionalist
approach and an agency-centred approach in the post-socialist context. The
case of Poland provides a good testing ground for both approaches. Polish
trade unionism has experienced a sharp decline in membership from 28 per
cent in 1991 to 16 per cent in 2010 (Wenzel 2009). However, Poland has also
been characterized by well-organized attempts to stop this decline taking the
form of organizing campaigns undertaken by unions since the late 1990s
(Gardawski 2001). The initial campaigns launched in 1998 by the Indepen-
dent and Self-Governing Trade Union Solidarnos´c´ (NSZZ Solidarnos´c´)
stemmed from bilateral contacts between the Polish union and the American
AFL-CIO. Co-operation with the Service Employees International Union
(SEIU), dating back to 1993, as well as later support from the British and
German trade unions, allowed Solidarnos´c´ to acquire know-how on orga-
nizing (Czarzasty 2010: 249; Gardawski 2001: 210–11). Although trade union
organizing strategies were also adopted in other Central and Eastern Euro-
pean (CEE) countries (Pedersini 2010), organizing efforts by NSZZ Solidar-
nos´c´ in Poland occurred earlier, were more comprehensive and explicitly
based on paid union organizers (Krzywdzinski 2010). Therefore, Poland can
be considered a critical case to examine the role of trade union strategic
choices in halting the decline in union membership in post-socialist countries.
Poland is also an important case to test the applicability of institutionalist
theories about the role of collective bargaining structures for trade union
strategic choices in a post-socialist context. The institutionalist theories
suggest that incentives for union organizing are stronger in decentralized
collective bargaining systems (typical of Anglo-Saxon countries) as com-
pared with centralized systems, in which unions’ influence is secured through
their incorporation in policy-making and sectoral-level collective agreements
(Heery and Adler 2004). It is also argued that under centralized collective
bargaining, trade union confederations are likely to coordinate their efforts
in organizing workers, which enables them to transfer resources to organize
non-unionized groups on the labour market (Western 1994: 503). However,
Hassel (2007: 179) has challenged this view by showing that institutional
security, which trade unions enjoy in some centralized corporatist systems,
might limit their willingness to recruit new categories of workers. The case of
Poland provides an opportunity to advance institutional debates conducted
Trends and Obstacles to Recruiting Workers 113
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