What future for industrial relations in Europe?

Pages569-579
Published date04 June 2018
DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/ER-02-2018-0056
Date04 June 2018
AuthorRichard Hyman
Subject MatterHR & organizational behaviour,Industrial/labour relations,Employment law
What future for industrial
relations in Europe?
Richard Hyman
Department of Management,
London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to perform a systematic cross-country comparison of key features of
industrial relations in Europe in a context where consolidated post-war institutions are under attack on many
fronts. The author discusses a number of key similarities and differences across the countries of Europe,
and end by considering whether progressive alternatives still exist.
Design/methodology/approach This paper draws upon academic literature and compares the
contributions to this special issue in the light of common problems and challenges.
Findings The trend towards the erosion of nationally based employment protection and collective
bargaining institutions is widely confirmed. In most of Central and Eastern Europe, where systems of
organised industrial relations were at best only partially established after the collapse of the Soviet regime,
the scope for unilateral dominance by (in particular foreign-owned) employers has been further enlarged.
It is also clear that the European Union, far from acting as a force for harmonisation of regulatory standards
and a strengthening of the social dimensionof employment regulation, is encouraging the erosion of
nationally based employment protections and provoking a growing divergence of outcomes. However,
the trends are contradictory and uneven.
Originality/value This paper contributes to an updated cross-country comparative analysis of the
ongoing transformations in European industrial relations and discusses still existing progressive
alternatives.
Keywords Europe, Trade unions, Industrial relations, Neoliberalism, Collective bargaining, Globalization,
Austerity
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
As is clear from the other contributions to this special issue, the systems of industrial
relations consolidated in most of Western Europe after 1945 and constructed in the
ex-dictatorships of southern Europe in the 1970s are under attack on many fronts.
Meanwhile, in most of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), where systems of organised
industrial relations were at best only partially established after the collapse of the Soviet
regime, the scope for unilateral dominance by (in particular foreign-owned) employers has
been further enlarged. It is also clear that the European Union (EU), far from acting as a
force for harmonisation of regulatory standards and a strengthening of the social
dimensionof employment regulation, is encouraging the erosion of nationally based
employment protections and provoking a growing divergence of outcomes.
In the following discussion, I first discuss the transformations within global capitalism
which everywhere have threatened established systems of institutionalised industrial
relations. I then turn to the nationally specific dynamics which have resulted in growing
diversity across Europe: what Lehndorff (2015a) terms divisive integration. I end by
considering what progressive options remain.
The new Great Transformation
Karl Polanyi (1944), writing three-quarters of a century ago, interpreted the development of
capitalist economies as the outcome of a double movement. The first, in the nineteenth
century, involved the imposition of freemarkets (though the whole idea of free markets is
an oxymoron, since all markets are social and political constructs). The damaging social
Employee Relations
Vol. 40 No. 4, 2018
pp. 569-579
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0142-5455
DOI 10.1108/ER-02-2018-0056
Received 20 February 2018
Accepted 20 February 2018
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0142-5455.htm
569
Industrial
relations in
Europe

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