Pattern Bargaining: An Investigation into its Agency, Context and Evidence
| Published date | 01 March 2008 |
| Author | Vera Glassner,Franz Traxler,Bernd Brandl |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.2007.00664.x |
| Date | 01 March 2008 |
Pattern Bargaining: An Investigation into
its Agency, Context and Evidence
Franz Traxler, Bernd Brandl and Vera Glassner
Abstract
Pattern bargaining stands out as both an under-researched and controversial
subject. This article is an analytical and empirical contribution to this debate.
Theoretically, it provides a conceptual framework, which enables analysis to
systematically differentiate between distinct forms of pattern bargaining in
terms of scope, agency, development and function, which arise from differing
contexts in terms of interest configuration, power relations and economic con-
ditions. This framework is used to develop testable hypotheses on pattern
bargaining as a mechanism of inter-industry bargaining co-ordination. The
empirical part of the article examines these hypotheses for collective bargaining
from 1969 to 2004 in Austria, which is commonly seen as a paradigm case of
pattern bargaining. The article concludes by highlighting the broader implica-
tions its findings have from a cross-nationally comparative perspective.
1. Introduction
In Europe, decentralized forms of bargaining co-ordination have received
growing attention (e.g. Sisson and Marginson 2002; Traxler et al. 2001). This
mainly reflects intensified market competition, which has created the need for
enhanced flexibility as well as a situation of growing mutual interdependen-
cies among economic actors. While bargaining decentralization accommo-
dates flexibility, bargaining co-ordination is the superior response to
interdependencies. Among the distinct forms of decentralized co-ordination,
pattern bargaining appears to become increasingly important. It is the most
decentralized version of co-ordination in that a certain bargaining unit at
industry or company level sets the pace for the other units, without a pre-
eminent role of central-level, ‘peak’ organizations of business and labour in
the co-ordination process.
Franz Traxler, Bernd Brandl and Vera Glassner are at the Department of Industrial Sociology,
University of Vienna.
British Journal of Industrial Relations doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8543.2007.00664.x
46:1 March 2008 0007–1080 pp. 33–58
© Blackwell Publishing Ltd/London School of Economics 2007. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd,
9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.
The special importance of pattern bargaining ensues from the general
decline of the peak organizations. At the national level, this follows from two
partly interrelated processes. Peak organizations are most remote from the
level of companies and establishments, such that they are badly prepared to
co-ordinate bargaining when it moves to this level. Furthermore, there has
been a tendency of industry-level associations to merge on both sides of
industry. The rise of multi-sector unions and employers’ associations increas-
ingly challenges the authority of their confederations. ‘Disguised’ pattern
bargaining within a multi-level framework may help the confederations
contain the centrifugal forces of centralization. For instance, in Norway,
centralized bargaining is supplemented by pattern bargaining in that the
metal industry sets the pace for the high-wage labour market segment, while
commerce, hotels and restaurants or textiles do so for the low-wage segment
(Traxler 2003). At the European level, the European Trade Union Confed-
eration and its European Industry Federations are weak relative to their
national affiliates, while European employers’ associations are almost com-
pletely absent. This situation rules out any classical form of hierarchical
peak-level co-ordination. If there is a possibility to cope with the growing
interdependencies of the national bargainers within the single market by
means of cross-border co-ordination, then pattern bargaining is presumed to
be the most feasible approach (Sisson and Marginson 2002; Traxler 2002). In
the United States, research has addressed pattern bargaining under premises
reverse to those in Europe. In response to thoroughgoing decay of union
power, scholarly discussions centred on whether pattern bargaining was
fading away from the early 1980s onwards, after it had been the solely
available vehicle for co-ordination in the United States for a long time (e.g.
Capelli 1990; Freedman and Fulmer 1982; Ready 1990a,b).
Analyses of pattern bargaining fundamentally diverge in all relevant
aspects, including the nature of the phenomenon as such: most essentially,
the American line of the debate resulted in a major controversy over whether
pattern bargaining should be understood as a process or an outcome. This
conceptual dissent originates in a property, which makes pattern bargaining
distinct from any other form of bargaining co-ordination. As Traxler et al.
(2001: 148) note, peak-level modes of bargaining co-ordination are always
intended to synchronize different bargaining units, whereas co-ordination by
pattern bargaining may be a side effect unintended by the bargaining parties
involved. This brings some authors (e.g. Ready 1990a) to focus solely on
outcomes. One may consider ‘patterned’ bargaining outcomes that are
entirely unintended a borderline case of negotiated co-ordination in relation
to convergence effects triggered by the market. Concealed co-ordination
intentions are likely to be more typical of pattern bargaining. At any rate, it
is hard to relate a certain process to an observed outcome if corresponding
intentions either do not exist or remain implicit. Pattern bargaining tends to
lack clear evidence as (presumptive) pattern setters declare their claim to
negotiate ‘pilot’ agreements as rarely as other bargainers express their will-
ingness to follow. In some cases, they may be unwilling, but compelled to
34 British Journal of Industrial Relations
© Blackwell Publishing Ltd/London School of Economics 2007.
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