THE STRIKE RECORD OF FOREIGN‐OWNED MANUFACTURING PLANTS IN GREAT BRITAIN
| Published date | 01 March 1979 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8543.1979.tb00631.x |
| Date | 01 March 1979 |
RESEARCH NOTE:
MANUFACTURING PLANTS IN GREAT BRITAIN
NEIL
MILLWARD*
THE
STRIKE RECORD
OF
FOREIGN-OWNED
As
a contribution to the wider debate on the impact of foreign-based firms upon
industrial relations
in
Great Britain, this note presents some new information on the
more limited question
of
the strike-proneness
of
foreign-owned manufacturing plants.
The emphasis is on new data and a discussion
of
its methodological strengths and
weaknesses (compared with the data reported by earlier writers), rather than on
interpretation
or
explanation of the results
vis-a-vis
industrial relations theory.
As
with previous empirical studies
in
this field, the starting point
for
this work was the
Department
of
Employment’s records
of
stoppages
of
work arising from industrial
disputes. It
is
important
to
remember that these records rely upon information supplied
by the Department’s local office managers, supplemented by information obtained from
other sources:
for
example, certain nationalised industries and statutory authorities, the
press and,
in
the case
of
larger stoppages, from the organisations concerned. Coverage
is
thought to be virtually complete, although clearly with small stoppages
only
just above
the official minimum reporting limit’ there may well be significant under-recording.
For
this reason, results which include data
for
small establishments are less reliable than
those referring
only
to larger establishments.
A
fuller discussion of the limitations of the
data is available elsewhere2
There have been two previous studies
of
strike-proneness and foreign ownership and
they have come to somewhat different conclusions. Steueret
~1.~
broadly concluded that
‘the foreign-owned firm is less strike-prone than its domestic counterpart’, judging
by the three indicators; strike frequency, numbers
of
workers involved and working
days lost. Their results covered two years,
1963
and
1968,
and referred to all manufac-
turing industries plus agriculture, forestry and fishing and mining and quarrying4 in the
United Kingdom. At about the same time ForsythS concluded that foreign-owned
firms in Scotland were
more
strike-prone than indigenous firms, basing this conclu-
sion on United States owned manufacturing firms during the period
1960-69.
Forsyth
considered that the divergence in the results could be explained in a number
of
ways:
(1)
Differences in the structure and behavioural characteristics
of
the two foreign-
owned sectors relative to the respective indigenous sectors,
the
most important
of
these
being differences
in
industrial structure, size and age
of
firms, bargaining systems used
and policies on trade union recognition;
(2)
Differences in methodology;
(3)
The operation
of
a regional factor which has a differential impact across regions
on the relative strike proneness of foreign-owned and indigenous firms.
Forsyth concluded that all three factors played some part
in
the differing results
although only industry structure and size of firm were important
of
those characteristics
listed in item
(1).
He called for more research on the matter. Subsequent sections
of
this
paper report such an exercise, albeit
a
very limited one. But first some comments
on
the
methodology
of
both
the
Forsyth and the Steuer
et
al.
papers are necessary.
*
Principal Research Officer, Department
of
Employment,
London.
Any
views
expressed
in
this
Note are the private views
of
the author
and
do
not
represent the views
of
the Department
of
Employment.
99
To continue reading
Request your trial