Class politics, collective labor rights, and worker-management conflict in comparative perspective

Abstract

This article studies how perceptions of worker-management conflict are shaped by individual-level and macro-level variables. Drawing upon data from 33 countries from the 2015 International Social Survey Programme (ISSP), it uses multilevel models to examine how individual perceptions of worker-management conflict are affected by social class, union membership status, and the country-level protection of collective labor rights. The evidence supports the hypothesis that workers and union members perceive more conflict than employers and non-union members. The results also show that, as hypothesized, perceived workplace conflict is lower in countries with stronger protection of workers’ collective rights. Finally, contrary to an initial hypothesis, cross-level interactions suggest that in countries where collective rights are more strongly protected, union members perceive more worker-management conflict than non-union members. Contributions to the literature on class and power resources as well as to the recent debate on the “neoliberal convergence” of industrial relations (IR) systems are discussed.