Model Of Industrial Relations Research Articles

An emerging ‘China-threat-corporatism’? CRRC’s acquisition of a German locomotive company and its impact on labour relations

The China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation (CRRC) is presently the largest player in the global rolling stock industry and has increasingly expanded to mature markets. In 2019, CRRC acquired a German locomotive company, establishing a manufacturing foothold in the EU. This paper presents the findings of extensive field research on the impact of CRRC’s investment on industrial relations. Drawing on comparative capitalisms research and recent debates on the German model of industrial relations, we discuss key developments in the post-merger process. Our study reveals a continuity in industrial relations at the shop-floor level, characterized by stable co-determination practices. Nevertheless, the acquisition of the locomotive manufacturer has contributed to a new form of ‘China-threat-corporatism’, wherein trade unions and business associations have collaborated to advocate successfully for measures to protect the local rolling stock industry from Chinese competition.

Labour disputes in contexts of trade union fragmentation and pluralism: An empirical analysis of the case of Chile

The number of strikes in Chile has increased substantially since the late 2000s. This article analyses this development from the point of view of a key aspect of the Chilean model of industrial relations: trade union pluralism. Drawing on a representative survey of private sector companies, the authors estimate logistic regression models indicating that trade union pluralism significantly increases the probability of strike action. The analysis does not, however, indicate that the positive effect of trade union pluralism can be explained by inter‐union competition, as is suggested in some of the international literature.

Concession policy of the Soviet state: implementation mechanism

The article analyzes the experience of the concession policy implementation by the RSFSR and the USSR during the 20s of the twentieth century and the approaches used in its framework, which allowed solving simultaneously a wide range of tasks related to the rise of the domestic economy and overcoming foreign policy isolation. This experience of the Soviet state can be used to solve the challenges the Russian Federation is facing today. The authors substantiate that the concession policy of the Soviet state was a rationally constructed mechanism able to solve a number of tasks. 1) Creation of foreign concessions in the Soviet country contributed to withdrawal from the diplomatic blockade declared by Western countries. 2) Through the concession policy the obligations of the Russian Empire to foreign investors were renewed in the conditions of a socialist economy. 3) By creating concessions the Soviet government headed by V.I. Lenin attracted the material and technological resources of the European countries and the USA for the development of the economy of the Soviet country. 4) At concession enterprises models of industrial relations with a high level of labor organization and living conditions of workers were formed at the expense of foreign investors, which then had to be introduced everywhere. 5) The concession policy covered the national suburbs and contributed to unification of the economic potential of the republics as part of the USSR. The analysis of the legal regulation of concession relationships carried out in this article gives reason to suppose that the concession policy of the Soviet state should not be reduced to the NEP because its implementation started earlier. In fact, it was launched with the adoption of the Decree of the Council of People’s Commissars of November 23, 1920 On General Economic and Legal Conditions for Concessions and within its framework a range of tasks that went far beyond the economic recovery envisaged by the NEP through private law principles was solved. Attention should also be paid to the constitutional nature of the regulation of concession legal relations, which was determined by the “Treaty on the USSR Foundation of 1922” and the Constitution of 1924.

Trade unions negotiating the Swedish model: racial capitalism, whiteness and the invisibility of race

In October 2022, a new employment protection regulation, often seen as a core aspect of the Swedish model of industrial relations, was implemented in Sweden. While the debate around the new regulation was heated, one interesting omission was that, in the unions’ advocacy for maintaining various forms of labour market security, the racialised labour market was never discussed, despite a strong racially segmented labour market with varying working conditions. In this article we explore how three white, male-dominated trade unions representing employees in different class locations positioned themselves around the change in the new Employment Act. Inspired by contributions on racial capitalism, we unravel how trade unions take part in the contestation over industrial relations in a context in which neoliberal and ethnoracial policies are growing. Using the ‘Swedish model’ as an ‘empty signifier’ – highly variable in meaning, hence contestable – we find that the unions advance three different positions on employment protection regulation: flexible, skilled and protective, and in doing so contribute to the self-racialisation of white male workers in working life.

It takes two to code: a comparative analysis of collective bargaining and artificial intelligence

The extension of artificial intelligence (AI) and algorithmic management mechanisms by companies has led to growing trade union demands to regulate their use. This article explores the role of collective bargaining and employee participation mechanisms in regulating the use by companies of AI and algorithms. This is done through a comparative analysis of institutional developments at EU level, as well as in four countries with different industrial relations models (Denmark, Germany, Hungary and Spain). The article shows that there are remarkable differences between countries in the roles of social partners and in the combination of protective and participative mechanisms used to respond to the challenges of AI and algorithmic management. However, the analysis also serves to highlight the limits of existing institutions and practices to cope with the complexity of challenges associated with AI and algorithmic management. This calls for institutional adaptation and additional regulatory efforts at EU and national levels to support collective bargaining.

ההסתדרות, הממשלה והמיעוט הערבי בישראל בשנות הממשל הצבאי

Soon after the establishment of the State of Israel, the Histadrut became the primary, and in most cases the only institution of a non-military kind operating within the Palestinian population. During this period, Israel's industrial relations had clear corporatist features. Power relations in this model are based on the balance in which no side can force its will on any other and a dynamic of compromise that recognizes conflicting interests. Most of the research dealing with the relationship between the Palestinian population and the Histadrut during the first two decades of the State views the Histadrut as part of a monolithic Zionist establishment, acting in light of unified goals of oppression and dispossession of the Palestinian population. In this research I propose a more nuanced and multi-faceted analysis of historical relations between the Histadrut and the Government in the establishment of policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians in Israel. The article maintains that these relations were shaped in accordance with the Israeli version of the corporatist model of industrial relations, which comprises both cooperation and conflict. While the goals of Jewish Histadrut officials working among the Palestinian population reinforced Zionist hegemony and the rule of the Mapai Party, in practice they were attentive to Palestinian voices and endeavored to meet their needs and to integrate them in the Histadrut.

The German Model of Industrial Relations: Balancing Flexibility and Collective Action

We give an overview of the “German model” of industrial relations. We organize our review by focusing on the two pillars of the model: sectoral collective bargaining and firm-level codetermination. Relative to the United States, Germany outsources collective bargaining to the sectoral level, resulting in higher coverage and the avoidance of firm-level distributional conflict. Relative to other European countries, Germany makes it easy for employers to avoid coverage or use flexibility provisions to deviate downwards from collective agreements. The greater flexibility of the German system may reduce unemployment, but may also erode bargaining coverage and increase inequality. Meanwhile, firm-level codetermination through worker board representation and works councils creates cooperative dialogue between employers and workers. Board representation has few direct impacts owing to worker representatives’ minority vote share, but works councils, which hold a range of substantive powers, may be more impactful. Overall, the German model highlights tensions between efficiency-enhancing flexibility and equity-enhancing collective action.

The German Model of Industrial Relations: Balancing Flexibility and Collective Action

The German Model of Industrial Relations: Balancing Flexibility and Collective Action

The German Model of Industrial Relations: Balancing Flexibility and Collective Action

The German Model of Industrial Relations: Balancing Flexibility and Collective Action

The German Model of Industrial Relations: Balancing Flexibility and Collective Action

The German Model of Industrial Relations: Balancing Flexibility and Collective Action

Employment Layoff Policy During Covid-19 Pandemic (Legal Comparative Analysis Based on Indonesia and Singapore Law)

The Covid-19 pandemic has made Employment Layoffs in Industrial Relation become unavoidable both in developing and developed countries. Throughout 2020, the number of layoffs, which can be seen from the unemployment rate in these two countries, has increased. Employment Layoff in Indonesia is subject to the provisions of Law No. 13 of 2003 concerning Manpower Law as partially amended by Law No. 11 of 2020 concerning Job Creation, while Singapore regulates it in the Employment Act of Singapore Chapter 91. Government intervention in implementing the Layoff Policy tend to be greater in Indonesia than in Singapore. This is the impact of the Corporatist Industrial Relations Model system used in Indonesia, while Singapore uses the Contractualist Industrial Relations Model system which relies more on the industrial relations settlement mechanism to the parties. This article was prepared by using Legal Research Methods, especially comparative law between Indonesian Law and Singapore Law.

Disentangling the transformation of the German model: The role of firms’ strategic decisions and structural change

This paper explores the transformation of the German employment and industrial relations model from a political economy approach. Using the IAB Establishment Panel, the evolution of atypical employment and the coverage of the dual system of industrial relations is analysed in different groups of firms. Additionally, using a shift-share technique, we estimate the impact of the change in the employment structure on this process. The results reveal that once institutional constraints were relaxed, firms across the whole economy increased their use of flexible work and individualized the wage bargaining. Moreover, our findings suggest that structural change played a minor role in the process.

The emergence of coercive federal Australian labour law, 1901–2020

Over the past two decades, industrial relations scholarship has observed a trend towards an increasingly punitive industrial environment along with the ‘re-regulation’ of labour law. Absent from much of this literature, however, has been an empirical and historical measurement or comparison of the scale and quality of this systemic change. By surveying coercive and penal federal industrial legislation over the period 1901–2020, this study shows empirically that over the last 40 years, there has been a steep increase in the amount of coercive federal labour legislation in Australia. It further measures and compares the volume of coercive labour legislation enacted specifically against ‘labour’ and ‘capital’ or both throughout the same period (1901–2020). Analysis reveals a correlation between a high volume of coercive labour legislation with low levels of trade union power and organisation. Argued here is that coercive labour legislation has been crucial to transitioning from a liberal conciliation and arbitration model of Australian industrial relations towards a neoliberal framework of employment legislation. In the former, regulation was more collective, informal and egalitarian (embodied by the sociological concept of ‘associative democracy’). Under a neoliberal framework, regulation is now more individualised, technical, punitive and rarely enforced, resulting in less equal material outcomes.

Platform Economy and Crowdworking as Challenges for the German Model of Industrial Relations

Mit den Prozessen der Digitalisierung in Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft entstehen neue Konstellationen von Arbeit. Dazu tragen digitale Plattformen bei, die Dienstleistungs- und Arbeitstätigkeiten vermitteln. Mit diesen ‒ unter dem Begriff Crowdwork bekannten ‒ Arbeitsformen gehen Probleme in der Regulation von Arbeit einher. Der Beitrag erörtert die Herausforderungen der Plattformökonomie für das bislang stabil-robuste System der Arbeitsbeziehungen in Deutschland. Dazu werden die Charakteristika der Dreiecksbeziehung bei digitalen Plattformen zur Vermittlung von Arbeit, die Heterogenität von Plattformen und die divergenten Formen von Crowdworking systematisiert. Auch wenn deren langfristige Relevanz vielfach noch ungewiss ist, konfrontiert die plattformvermittelte Arbeit die etablierten Akteure und Institutionen der Arbeitsbeziehungen mit neuen Herausforderungen. Diese Herausforderungen auf der Mikro-, Meso- und Makroebene werden im Beitrag identifiziert und analysiert. Anschließend werden die Regulierungsoptionen aus der divergenten Sicht der unterschiedlichen Akteure (Crowdworker, Gewerkschaften, Staat) rekonstruiert und in ihrer Reichweite und Relevanz für Mitbestimmung und Tarifautonomie diskutiert.

Transport and logisitics workers face new challenges and adapt new trade union strategies

22 | International Union Rights | 27/3 FOCUS | IMPACTS OF COVID-19 ON WORK AND THE CHALLENGE FOR UNION RIGHTS Transport and logisitics workers face new challenges and adapt new trade union strategies During the early days of the crisis, before lock-down starts occurring and when globally there was uncertainty about the nature, duration and scale of Covid-19, it became clear that there were problems in supply chain resilience. From the outset, consumer panic buying and millions of workers relocating to work from home changed the already vast scale of e-commerce and left huge gaps on shelves in shops and warehouses. Throughout these supply chains are ITF affiliated members. From passenger services to air freight, from ships holding 10,000 containers of essential goods to the dockers unloading and moving to storage. The pickers in the warehouses who were getting consumers the essential goods that they needed. The vast road and rail networks that all these goods are transported along are all serviced by ITF affiliated members. Where transport workers usually are invisible except to a few, in these circumstances, they have arrived at the forefront of consciousness. However, beneath the global glory that transport workers were able to see more visibly than ever before, remain systemic problems that our members faced pre-Covid. Fragmentation of contracting systems throughout supply chains, dependant workers not able to access their ultimate employer, the knowledge and ability to form and join unions to bargain in the most basic sense has compromised union density. Articles are written elsewhere about the seafarers’ crisis, but with over 300,000 crew trapped at sea, even our most mature and exclusive model of global industrial relations is under strain. Everyday complaints about lack of access to PPE, unpaid and excessive hours of work and unachievable performance targets remain a constant threat to health and wellbeing. With workers reporting a lack of access to appropriate PPE, warehouses continue to be closed for deep cleaning following reports of clusters of infection and in some of the worst cases, deaths of our members. Some employers determined that it was more important to keep supply chains moving than take the time to perform proper risk assessments and check on access to toilets, handwashing facilities and sanitation stations to enable full compliance with WHO or governmental guidelines, in some cases avoiding their own corporate procedures. Within the ITF family, the spiking increase of ecommerce and just in time delivery to support the vast numbers of homeworkers, was exacerbated by the millions of workers furloughed by industries such as cruise and aviation, ITF affiliate members whose industries were decimated by travel restrictions and closed borders. Furthermore, we have many reports of our members being unable to leave warehouses until picks were completed, or trucks until deliveries were completed, airplanes where passengers were not following regulations on face coverings or other provisions. This has left our members struggling to combine increased domestic responsibilities with their work, some having to self-isolate from their own families without employer pay or support. The associated high volumes of stress are also unsurprising. ITF has had media coverage of the unacceptable conditions for our drivers hauling goods. We already had evidence of border crossing lorry drivers within the European Union identifying as victims of human trafficking. The inability of workers to be able to identify and negotiate with employers to achieve the life saving equipment needed, only contributed further to the detriment faced on the road by workers who were miles away from home for months on end, with no access to rest, toilet or sleeping facilities and receiving pay well below recognised minimums (see report on ITF website). Some of our seafarers are unable to even talk to their families. In some extreme cases we have received reports of the ships’ satellite being switched off to prevent them from accessing social media or other forms of contact with the outside world, and to stop them from complaining to their union or to the dedicated support systems within the ITF. The associated impact on mental health and wellbeing is real, including regularly receiving personal threats of suicide, leaving the ITF Inspectorate and unions representing our seafarers facing...

Transport and logisitics workers face new challenges and adapt new trade union strategies

22 | International Union Rights | 27/3 FOCUS | IMPACTS OF COVID-19 ON WORK AND THE CHALLENGE FOR UNION RIGHTS Transport and logisitics workers face new challenges and adapt new trade union strategies During the early days of the crisis, before lock-down starts occurring and when globally there was uncertainty about the nature, duration and scale of Covid-19, it became clear that there were problems in supply chain resilience. From the outset, consumer panic buying and millions of workers relocating to work from home changed the already vast scale of e-commerce and left huge gaps on shelves in shops and warehouses. Throughout these supply chains are ITF affiliated members. From passenger services to air freight, from ships holding 10,000 containers of essential goods to the dockers unloading and moving to storage. The pickers in the warehouses who were getting consumers the essential goods that they needed. The vast road and rail networks that all these goods are transported along are all serviced by ITF affiliated members. Where transport workers usually are invisible except to a few, in these circumstances, they have arrived at the forefront of consciousness. However, beneath the global glory that transport workers were able to see more visibly than ever before, remain systemic problems that our members faced pre-Covid. Fragmentation of contracting systems throughout supply chains, dependant workers not able to access their ultimate employer, the knowledge and ability to form and join unions to bargain in the most basic sense has compromised union density. Articles are written elsewhere about the seafarers’ crisis, but with over 300,000 crew trapped at sea, even our most mature and exclusive model of global industrial relations is under strain. Everyday complaints about lack of access to PPE, unpaid and excessive hours of work and unachievable performance targets remain a constant threat to health and wellbeing. With workers reporting a lack of access to appropriate PPE, warehouses continue to be closed for deep cleaning following reports of clusters of infection and in some of the worst cases, deaths of our members. Some employers determined that it was more important to keep supply chains moving than take the time to perform proper risk assessments and check on access to toilets, handwashing facilities and sanitation stations to enable full compliance with WHO or governmental guidelines, in some cases avoiding their own corporate procedures. Within the ITF family, the spiking increase of ecommerce and just in time delivery to support the vast numbers of homeworkers, was exacerbated by the millions of workers furloughed by industries such as cruise and aviation, ITF affiliate members whose industries were decimated by travel restrictions and closed borders. Furthermore, we have many reports of our members being unable to leave warehouses until picks were completed, or trucks until deliveries were completed, airplanes where passengers were not following regulations on face coverings or other provisions. This has left our members struggling to combine increased domestic responsibilities with their work, some having to self-isolate from their own families without employer pay or support. The associated high volumes of stress are also unsurprising. ITF has had media coverage of the unacceptable conditions for our drivers hauling goods. We already had evidence of border crossing lorry drivers within the European Union identifying as victims of human trafficking. The inability of workers to be able to identify and negotiate with employers to achieve the life saving equipment needed, only contributed further to the detriment faced on the road by workers who were miles away from home for months on end, with no access to rest, toilet or sleeping facilities and receiving pay well below recognised minimums (see report on ITF website). Some of our seafarers are unable to even talk to their families. In some extreme cases we have received reports of the ships’ satellite being switched off to prevent them from accessing social media or other forms of contact with the outside world, and to stop them from complaining to their union or to the dedicated support systems within the ITF. The associated impact on mental health and wellbeing is real, including regularly receiving personal threats of suicide, leaving the ITF Inspectorate and unions representing our seafarers facing...

RESOLUSI KONFLIK HUBUNGAN INDUSTRIAL DALAM SISTEM PENYELENGGARAAN KETENAGAKERJAAN DI KABUPATEN PASURUAN

National development in the labor sector that includes related elements between government, employers and workers is felt necessary to base their interests on their respective principles, so that dynamic industrial relations will be created, but the dynamics of industrial relations in Indonesia have recently been marked by the problem of lack - harmony between the entrepreneur and his workers. The government as the main sector in industrial relations must act based on the provisions of legal products from the industrial relations sector so that the PPHI process can be realized in accordance with the expectations of all parties. In the context of maintaining industrial relations in Pasuruan, regulations in the form of Regional Regulation No. 22 of 2012 concerning the employment system has been created. It is hoped that through this research, an easy-to-understand resolution model that illustrates efforts to resolve industrial relations disputes in accordance with Regional Regulation No. 22 of 2012. And this research is expected to produce a model of industrial relations conflict resolution which is the development of the Marshall model by considering the history of conflict through a picture of the birth of a particular conflict

Re-engineered and Integrated Industrial Relations Model for Governance Integrity: Multiple Case Studies in Bangladesh

This paper re-engineers the ‘industrial relationships between the leaders and the employees (RLE)’ model in the Bangladeshi manufacturing companies, where labour management, supply, and demand of workflow and workers, employee’s conditions and rights are significant factors. Researchers have pondered the ‘industrial relationships between leaders and employees’ component as part of ‘human resource management’ and have adept the integration by using soft systems technology, where this component’s codes are associated with employees’ rights protocols of ‘Universal declaration of human rights (UDHR), ‘International labour organisations (ILO) and ‘Bangladesh labour act 2006’ (BDL). Here, qualitative method’s multiple case studies are applied with purposeful sampling to choose twelve cases (12) and eighty-seven (87) participants’ for in-depth interviews, which are transcribed and coded methodically in NVIVO. Here, re-engineered ‘industrial relationships between leaders and employees model’ is the outcome. The concept of integration is novel, which is an addition to the knowledge of literature and the advancement of ‘industrial relationships between leaders and employees’ model.

Voluntarism, Corporatism and Path Dependency: The Metalworkers’ Unions Amalgamated Engineering Union and IG Metall and their Place in the History of British and German Industrial Relations

Abstract Germany and Britain have served as models of either corporatist or voluntarist industrial relations. The more recent typology of ‘varieties of capitalism’ then identified Britain as a model case of a ‘liberal market economy’ while Germany was portrayed as a (state) ‘co-ordinated market economy’. The mainstream of German-language labour history also tells this success story. Some research on the evolution of co-determination has portrayed its subject as a long-standing trait of German capitalism, with predecessors dating back as far as 1848. With its focus on the history of two key trade unions in core industries of Britain and Germany, the British metalworkers’ union the Amalgamated Society of Engineers / Amalgamated Engineering Union and the German Metal Workers’ Union / IG Metall, this article questions both exceptionalism and continuity. It argues that a path dependency exists in the structure of both unions and the industrial relations around them—but that this never came close to a linear evolution of voluntarism or corporatism. On closer examination, the history of both unions includes localist as well as centralist practices. From the 1890s both unions were part of collective bargaining with strong employers’ associations; especially after 1945 both were open to corporatist compromises. For West Germany only, such a compromise was found in the early 1950s, and not before, while in Britain that same compromise was attempted but failed during the crucial years between 1965 and 1979. Therefore, to quote Stefan Berger, this article argues that ‘similarities between the British and the German labour movements have been underestimated’.

Transition Dynamics in European Labour Markets During Crisis and Recovery

The crisis has resulted in a substantial rise in unemployment in Europe and a notable divergence in unemployment rates and labour market outcomes post-crisis. In this paper, we offer a detailed examination of the transitional dynamics underpinning changes in employment, unemployment and inactivity across the EU member states during the long period from before the crisis until the recent recovery (2004–2016). We document substantial differences in transitional dynamics across countries and disparate shifts in these over time. We also find systematic cross-country differences in the medium- and long-run trajectories of employment and unemployment generated by these dynamics, which can broadly be associated with differences in labour market institutions and models of labour market regulation and industrial relations (varieties of capitalism or production regimes). Applying a counterfactual analysis, we further document how altering the dynamics of labour market transitions may contribute to reducing significantly the levels of unemployment, and cross-country disparities in these, across the EU.