Political Economy & Comparative
Industrial Relations
Table of Contents
1 1ST LECTURE ........................................................................................................................ 5
1.1 CONCEPTS: INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS (IR) AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS (ER) ......................................... 9
1.1.1 Plan .......................................................................................................................... 10
1.1.2 Origins of IR/ER – history ............................................................................................ 10
1.2 COLLECTIVE DIMENSION OF THE STUDY OF IR/ER .......................................................................... 12
1.3 INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH– ROOTS OF THE (MODERN) IR ........................................................... 14
1.4 FRAMEWORK OF ANALYSIS OF THE STUDY OF INDUSTRIAL (EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS) (BLYTON & TURNBULL
2004) 17
2 2ND LECTURE: THEORETICAL APPROACHES: CLASSICAL THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ......... 19
2.1 FRAMEWORKS OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS .................................................................................... 21
2.1.1 Unitarism .................................................................................................................. 21
2.1.2 Pluralism and the „Oxford School” ............................................................................. 22
2.1.3 Marxism/conflict theory ............................................................................................. 23
2.2 MAIN THEORETICAL APPROACHES TO INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS ............................................................ 23
2.2.1 John Dunlop: The Industrial Relations System ............................................................. 24
2.2.2 Convergence theory .................................................................................................. 27
2.2.3 Varieties of Capitalism (VoC) ...................................................................................... 29
2.2.4 Rational choice and transaction cost theory ................................................................ 30
2.3 MAIN THEORETICAL APPROACHES TO INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS ............................................................ 31
2.3.1 Power resource theory ............................................................................................... 32
2.3.2 Institutionalism ......................................................................................................... 33
2.3.3 Corporatism .............................................................................................................. 33
2.3.4 Historical institutionalism .......................................................................................... 36
2.3.5 Action theory ............................................................................................................. 39
3 POLITICAL ECONOMY AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN (COMPARATIVE) INDUSTRIAL
RELATIONS ................................................................................................................................ 43
1
, 3.1 HOW DO WE UNDERSTAND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE WITHIN POLITICAL ECONOMY APPROACH? .................. 45
3.1.1 The background of the discussions – end of history ...................................................... 45
3.1.2 The background of the discussions – new political developments ................................. 45
3.1.3 What is an institution? ............................................................................................. 46
3.1.4 Institutional change – why? ........................................................................................ 48
3.1.5 Institutional change in historical institutionalism ......................................................... 48
3.1.6 Stability. A historical institutionalism approach ........................................................... 49
3.1.7 Critical juncture ......................................................................................................... 50
3.1.8 Institutional change. A political economy approach ..................................................... 51
3.1.9 Different modes of gradual institutional change (Streeck and Thelen, 2005) .................. 53
3.2 WHAT ARE THE THEORIES WHICH HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO UNDERSTANDING INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE WITHIN THE
STUDY OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS FROM A POLITICAL ECONOMY PERSPECTIVE? ................................................. 59
3.2.1 Varieties of capitalism approach ................................................................................ 60
3.3 IDEAL MODELS...................................................................................................................... 61
3.3.1 Coordinated market economies ................................................................................. 62
3.3.2 Liberal market economies .......................................................................................... 63
3.3.3 Complementarity ...................................................................................................... 64
4 POLITICAL ECONOMY AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN (COMPARATIVE) INDUSTRIAL
RELATIONS – BEYOND VOC ......................................................................................................... 70
4.1 CRITICISM OF VOC ................................................................................................................ 71
4.1.1 Criticism of VoC – result ............................................................................................. 72
4.2 COMPLEMENTARITY VS INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE............................................................................. 73
4.2.1 Power/interests-based perspective on complementarity ............................................. 73
4.3 INTERNAL FACTORS INFLUENCING FRAMEWORKS ........................................................................... 74
4.3.1 Institutional ‘plasticity’ (Baccaro and Howell, 2017) .................................................. 75
4.3.2 Internal factors influencing frameworks - companies vs institutional change ................. 76
4.3.3 Internal factors influencing frameworks – state/governments ....................................... 78
4.4 EXTERNAL FACTORS INFLUENCING FRAMEWORKS (ARROWSMITH AND PULIGNANO, 2013) ....................... 78
4.5 BEYOND VOC – TYPOLOGY (HANCKÉ/RHODES/THATCHER 2008) ..................................................... 79
4.5.1 Revised typology........................................................................................................ 79
4.5.2 Varieties of liberalization (Thelen 2014) ....................................................................... 80
5 THE COMPARATIVE DIMENSION IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS COMPARATIVE RESEARCH
METHODS .................................................................................................................................. 83
5.1 COMPARATIVE INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS ........................................................................................ 83
2
, 5.1.1 Why do we compare? ................................................................................................ 83
5.1.2 What do we compare in comparative IR? .................................................................... 85
5.2 SOME EXAMPLES OF COMPARATIVE CASE STUDIES .......................................................................... 87
5.2.1 Example 1: Cross-national comparison (Pulignano & Doerflinger 2013) ........................ 87
5.2.2 Example 2: Within-country comparison (between companies/ departments) (Lautsch
2002) 88
5.2.3 Example 3: Within-country comparison over time (Böheim & Zweimüller 2013) ............. 89
6 THE COMPARATIVE DIMENSION IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS SYSTEMS IN UK, BELGIUM, GERMANY, FRANCE, AND CZECHIA .............. 90
6.1 INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK..................................................................................................... 93
6.2 THE UK .............................................................................................................................. 94
6.2.1 The UK - developments .............................................................................................. 96
6.2.2 The UK – institutional change ...................................................................................... 97
6.3 BELGIUM ............................................................................................................................ 97
6.3.1 Belgium – institutional change .................................................................................... 98
6.4 GERMANY ........................................................................................................................... 98
6.4.1 Germany – developments .......................................................................................... 99
6.4.2 Germany – institutional change ................................................................................ 100
6.5 FRANCE ............................................................................................................................ 100
6.5.1 France – the dynamics ............................................................................................. 101
6.5.2 France – developments ............................................................................................ 102
6.5.3 France – institutional change .................................................................................... 103
6.6 CZECHIA........................................................................................................................... 103
6.7 INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORKS: IR SYSTEMS – UK, FR, BE, DE......................................................... 104
6.8 INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORKS: IR SYSTEMS - CZ .......................................................................... 104
6.9 COMPARISON OF DEVELOPMENTS ........................................................................................... 105
6.10 CONCLUSION!! .................................................................................................................. 105
7 THE COMPARATIVE DIMENSION IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS TRADE UNIONS, SYSTEMS OF
EMPLOYEE REPRESENTATION, AND COLLECTIVE BARGAINING .................................................. 106
7.1 WHAT ARE TRADE UNIONS AND HOW CAN WE EXPLAIN THE VARIETY OF TRADE UNIONS? ......................... 108
7.2 WHAT ARE THE MAIN DIFFERENCES IN TRADE UNION STRUCTURES? HOW CAN WE EXPLAIN THEM? ............ 111
7.3 HOW DO WE DEFINE TRADE UNION POWER? HAS THE POWER OF THE TRADE UNIONS CHANGED THROUGHOUT
THE LAST YEARS? WHY (NOT)? ...........................................................................................................
113
7.4 COLLECTIVE BARGAINING ...................................................................................................... 115
7.5 SYSTEMS OF EMPLOYEE REPRESENTATION .................................................................................. 119
3
, 7.5.1 Single system of representation and the shop steward ............................................... 120
7.5.2 Dual system of representation in Germany ................................................................ 121
7.5.3 Belgium: double system of representation ................................................................ 122
7.5.4 France: double system of representation .................................................................. 123
7.5.5 Czechia – representation ......................................................................................... 125
8 APPLYING LESSONS LEARNED: CONTEMPORARY TRENDS IN IR/ER .................................... 126
8.1 COLLECTIVE REGULATION AND THE FUTURE OF WORK IN THE DIGITAL ECONOMY ................................... 126
8.1.1 Digitalization and the future of work debate ............................................................... 127
8.1.2 VoC and digitalisation .............................................................................................. 129
8.1.3 Trade union power and strategies towards digitalisation ............................................ 131
8.2 SOCIAL EUROPE: THE CHANGING CONTOURS OF TRANSNATIONAL EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS IN THE EUROPEAN
UNION 132
8.2.1 CER analysis ........................................................................................................... 135
8.3 INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND THE FUTURES OF WORK: EFFICIENCY, EQUITY AND VOICE IN THE 21TH CENTURY135
8.4 AN UNEVEN AND FRAGMENTED TRANSITION TO ELECTRIC VEHICLES? EVIDENCE FROM BENELUX CAR, TRUCK
AND COMPONENT PLANTS ................................................................................................................. 138
8.4.1 Industrial relations in automotive sector ................................................................... 140
8.4.2 Industrial relations in Europe .................................................................................... 141
9 GUEST LECTURES ............................................................................................................. 143
9.1 ANNICK AERTS ................................................................................................................... 143
9.1.1 Trade union coordination in multinational companies ................................................ 143
9.1.2 Introducing IndustriAll Europe .................................................................................. 143
9.1.3 Challenging context ................................................................................................. 147
9.1.4 Way forward in multinational companies .................................................................. 151
9.2 ETUI: BART VANHERCKE........................................................................................................ 153
9.3 MASSIMO MENSI................................................................................................................. 157
4
Industrial Relations
Table of Contents
1 1ST LECTURE ........................................................................................................................ 5
1.1 CONCEPTS: INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS (IR) AND EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS (ER) ......................................... 9
1.1.1 Plan .......................................................................................................................... 10
1.1.2 Origins of IR/ER – history ............................................................................................ 10
1.2 COLLECTIVE DIMENSION OF THE STUDY OF IR/ER .......................................................................... 12
1.3 INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH– ROOTS OF THE (MODERN) IR ........................................................... 14
1.4 FRAMEWORK OF ANALYSIS OF THE STUDY OF INDUSTRIAL (EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS) (BLYTON & TURNBULL
2004) 17
2 2ND LECTURE: THEORETICAL APPROACHES: CLASSICAL THEORETICAL PERSPECTIVES ......... 19
2.1 FRAMEWORKS OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS .................................................................................... 21
2.1.1 Unitarism .................................................................................................................. 21
2.1.2 Pluralism and the „Oxford School” ............................................................................. 22
2.1.3 Marxism/conflict theory ............................................................................................. 23
2.2 MAIN THEORETICAL APPROACHES TO INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS ............................................................ 23
2.2.1 John Dunlop: The Industrial Relations System ............................................................. 24
2.2.2 Convergence theory .................................................................................................. 27
2.2.3 Varieties of Capitalism (VoC) ...................................................................................... 29
2.2.4 Rational choice and transaction cost theory ................................................................ 30
2.3 MAIN THEORETICAL APPROACHES TO INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS ............................................................ 31
2.3.1 Power resource theory ............................................................................................... 32
2.3.2 Institutionalism ......................................................................................................... 33
2.3.3 Corporatism .............................................................................................................. 33
2.3.4 Historical institutionalism .......................................................................................... 36
2.3.5 Action theory ............................................................................................................. 39
3 POLITICAL ECONOMY AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN (COMPARATIVE) INDUSTRIAL
RELATIONS ................................................................................................................................ 43
1
, 3.1 HOW DO WE UNDERSTAND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE WITHIN POLITICAL ECONOMY APPROACH? .................. 45
3.1.1 The background of the discussions – end of history ...................................................... 45
3.1.2 The background of the discussions – new political developments ................................. 45
3.1.3 What is an institution? ............................................................................................. 46
3.1.4 Institutional change – why? ........................................................................................ 48
3.1.5 Institutional change in historical institutionalism ......................................................... 48
3.1.6 Stability. A historical institutionalism approach ........................................................... 49
3.1.7 Critical juncture ......................................................................................................... 50
3.1.8 Institutional change. A political economy approach ..................................................... 51
3.1.9 Different modes of gradual institutional change (Streeck and Thelen, 2005) .................. 53
3.2 WHAT ARE THE THEORIES WHICH HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO UNDERSTANDING INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE WITHIN THE
STUDY OF INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS FROM A POLITICAL ECONOMY PERSPECTIVE? ................................................. 59
3.2.1 Varieties of capitalism approach ................................................................................ 60
3.3 IDEAL MODELS...................................................................................................................... 61
3.3.1 Coordinated market economies ................................................................................. 62
3.3.2 Liberal market economies .......................................................................................... 63
3.3.3 Complementarity ...................................................................................................... 64
4 POLITICAL ECONOMY AND INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE IN (COMPARATIVE) INDUSTRIAL
RELATIONS – BEYOND VOC ......................................................................................................... 70
4.1 CRITICISM OF VOC ................................................................................................................ 71
4.1.1 Criticism of VoC – result ............................................................................................. 72
4.2 COMPLEMENTARITY VS INSTITUTIONAL CHANGE............................................................................. 73
4.2.1 Power/interests-based perspective on complementarity ............................................. 73
4.3 INTERNAL FACTORS INFLUENCING FRAMEWORKS ........................................................................... 74
4.3.1 Institutional ‘plasticity’ (Baccaro and Howell, 2017) .................................................. 75
4.3.2 Internal factors influencing frameworks - companies vs institutional change ................. 76
4.3.3 Internal factors influencing frameworks – state/governments ....................................... 78
4.4 EXTERNAL FACTORS INFLUENCING FRAMEWORKS (ARROWSMITH AND PULIGNANO, 2013) ....................... 78
4.5 BEYOND VOC – TYPOLOGY (HANCKÉ/RHODES/THATCHER 2008) ..................................................... 79
4.5.1 Revised typology........................................................................................................ 79
4.5.2 Varieties of liberalization (Thelen 2014) ....................................................................... 80
5 THE COMPARATIVE DIMENSION IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS COMPARATIVE RESEARCH
METHODS .................................................................................................................................. 83
5.1 COMPARATIVE INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS ........................................................................................ 83
2
, 5.1.1 Why do we compare? ................................................................................................ 83
5.1.2 What do we compare in comparative IR? .................................................................... 85
5.2 SOME EXAMPLES OF COMPARATIVE CASE STUDIES .......................................................................... 87
5.2.1 Example 1: Cross-national comparison (Pulignano & Doerflinger 2013) ........................ 87
5.2.2 Example 2: Within-country comparison (between companies/ departments) (Lautsch
2002) 88
5.2.3 Example 3: Within-country comparison over time (Böheim & Zweimüller 2013) ............. 89
6 THE COMPARATIVE DIMENSION IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF
INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS SYSTEMS IN UK, BELGIUM, GERMANY, FRANCE, AND CZECHIA .............. 90
6.1 INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORK..................................................................................................... 93
6.2 THE UK .............................................................................................................................. 94
6.2.1 The UK - developments .............................................................................................. 96
6.2.2 The UK – institutional change ...................................................................................... 97
6.3 BELGIUM ............................................................................................................................ 97
6.3.1 Belgium – institutional change .................................................................................... 98
6.4 GERMANY ........................................................................................................................... 98
6.4.1 Germany – developments .......................................................................................... 99
6.4.2 Germany – institutional change ................................................................................ 100
6.5 FRANCE ............................................................................................................................ 100
6.5.1 France – the dynamics ............................................................................................. 101
6.5.2 France – developments ............................................................................................ 102
6.5.3 France – institutional change .................................................................................... 103
6.6 CZECHIA........................................................................................................................... 103
6.7 INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORKS: IR SYSTEMS – UK, FR, BE, DE......................................................... 104
6.8 INSTITUTIONAL FRAMEWORKS: IR SYSTEMS - CZ .......................................................................... 104
6.9 COMPARISON OF DEVELOPMENTS ........................................................................................... 105
6.10 CONCLUSION!! .................................................................................................................. 105
7 THE COMPARATIVE DIMENSION IN INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS TRADE UNIONS, SYSTEMS OF
EMPLOYEE REPRESENTATION, AND COLLECTIVE BARGAINING .................................................. 106
7.1 WHAT ARE TRADE UNIONS AND HOW CAN WE EXPLAIN THE VARIETY OF TRADE UNIONS? ......................... 108
7.2 WHAT ARE THE MAIN DIFFERENCES IN TRADE UNION STRUCTURES? HOW CAN WE EXPLAIN THEM? ............ 111
7.3 HOW DO WE DEFINE TRADE UNION POWER? HAS THE POWER OF THE TRADE UNIONS CHANGED THROUGHOUT
THE LAST YEARS? WHY (NOT)? ...........................................................................................................
113
7.4 COLLECTIVE BARGAINING ...................................................................................................... 115
7.5 SYSTEMS OF EMPLOYEE REPRESENTATION .................................................................................. 119
3
, 7.5.1 Single system of representation and the shop steward ............................................... 120
7.5.2 Dual system of representation in Germany ................................................................ 121
7.5.3 Belgium: double system of representation ................................................................ 122
7.5.4 France: double system of representation .................................................................. 123
7.5.5 Czechia – representation ......................................................................................... 125
8 APPLYING LESSONS LEARNED: CONTEMPORARY TRENDS IN IR/ER .................................... 126
8.1 COLLECTIVE REGULATION AND THE FUTURE OF WORK IN THE DIGITAL ECONOMY ................................... 126
8.1.1 Digitalization and the future of work debate ............................................................... 127
8.1.2 VoC and digitalisation .............................................................................................. 129
8.1.3 Trade union power and strategies towards digitalisation ............................................ 131
8.2 SOCIAL EUROPE: THE CHANGING CONTOURS OF TRANSNATIONAL EMPLOYMENT RELATIONS IN THE EUROPEAN
UNION 132
8.2.1 CER analysis ........................................................................................................... 135
8.3 INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS AND THE FUTURES OF WORK: EFFICIENCY, EQUITY AND VOICE IN THE 21TH CENTURY135
8.4 AN UNEVEN AND FRAGMENTED TRANSITION TO ELECTRIC VEHICLES? EVIDENCE FROM BENELUX CAR, TRUCK
AND COMPONENT PLANTS ................................................................................................................. 138
8.4.1 Industrial relations in automotive sector ................................................................... 140
8.4.2 Industrial relations in Europe .................................................................................... 141
9 GUEST LECTURES ............................................................................................................. 143
9.1 ANNICK AERTS ................................................................................................................... 143
9.1.1 Trade union coordination in multinational companies ................................................ 143
9.1.2 Introducing IndustriAll Europe .................................................................................. 143
9.1.3 Challenging context ................................................................................................. 147
9.1.4 Way forward in multinational companies .................................................................. 151
9.2 ETUI: BART VANHERCKE........................................................................................................ 153
9.3 MASSIMO MENSI................................................................................................................. 157
4
