Adelheid Hege

The legitimacy of collective actors and trade union renewal

Over the last three decades, during a period of deep and far-reaching change, European trade unions have lost both regulatory power and membership. Nevertheless, though their strength may have been impaired, trade unions continue to fulfil their customary roles. This is because the legitimacy of European trade unions as social actors is both rooted in history and consolidated in institutions. In this article we argue that the crisis of trade unionism is not one of external legitimacy but rather the loss of internal legitimacy. An understanding of this phenomenon requires close consideration of the nature of representation itself, and of the way in which the relationship between representatives and those they represent is continually constructed and reconstructed. The hypothesis developed in this article is that the construction of relations of representation — a matter to which studies of trade union systems frequently pay scant attention — is fundamental to trade union legitimacy. Union actors’ understanding of and action on their own representative capacity is therefore decisive for their transformation in a globalized world. Au cours des trente dernières années, durant une période de changements profonds et d’une grande portée, les syndicats européens ont subi des pertes tant de pouvoir normatif que de capacité d’attraction au niveau de l’affiliation. Néanmoins, même si leur force a pu être ébranlée, les syndicats continuent à jouer leur rôle habituel. Cela tient à la fois à l’enracinement dans l’histoire et à la consolidation dans des institutions de la légitimité des syndicats européens en tant qu’acteurs sociaux. Dans le présent article, les auteurs soutiennent que la crise du syndicalisme n’est pas une crise de légitimité externe mais plutôt une perte de légitimité interne des acteurs syndicaux. Pour mieux la cerner, il faut s’intéresser à la nature de la représentation elle-même à travers laquelle se construit et se reconstruit en permanence la relation entre les représentants et les représentés. Les auteurs avancent également l’hypothèse que la construction des relations de représentation — souvent occultées dans l’étude des systèmes syndicaux — est au fondement de la légitimité syndicale. La façon dont les acteurs syndicaux comprennent leur capacité représentative et envisagent leur action est donc décisive pour la transformation des syndicats dans la mondialisation. In den letzten dreißig Jahren, einem Zeitraum tiefgreifender und weit reichender Veränderungen, haben die europäischen Gewerkschaften nicht nur ihre Regelungsmacht, sondern auch viele Mitglieder verloren. Aber obgleich sie möglicherweise an Stärke eingebüßt haben, erfüllen die Gewerkschaften weiterhin ihre herkömmliche Rolle. Dies liegt daran, dass die Legitimität der europäischen Gewerkschaften als soziale Akteure in der Geschichte verankert und durch Institutionen gefestigt ist. Wir behaupten, dass die Krise der Gewerkschaftsbewegung keine Krise der externen Legitimität darstellt, sondern vielmehr auf den Verlust der internen Legitimität zurückzuführen ist. Um dieses Phänomen zu verstehen, ist es notwendig, das Wesen der Interessenvertretung bzw. Repräsentation selbst und die Art und Weise, wie die Beziehung zwischen Repräsentanten und den von ihnen Repräsentierten fortlaufend konstruiert und rekonstruiert wird, genau zu untersuchen. Wir gehen von der Hypothese aus, dass der Aufbau von Repräsentationsbeziehungen, dem in Studien über gewerkschaftliche Systeme häufig zu wenig Aufmerksamkeit geschenkt wird, für die Legitimität der Gewerkschaften von grundlegender Bedeutung ist. Für die Umgestaltung der Gewerkschaften in einer globalisierten Welt ist es daher von entscheidender Bedeutung, dass sie ihre eigene Repräsentationskapazität erkennen und darauf einwirken.

Referential unionisms and globalization: A comparative study of workplace union dynamics

How do unions contend with change in the face of strong external pressures associated with globalization? Comparative workplace ethnographies point to the persistent diversity of local actor responses. This article advances the concept of referential unionisms to understand the adaptive processes at play. Focusing on the interactions between collective identities, repertoires of action, power resources, and representative and strategic capacity, it examines how two workplace unions in the manufacturing sector in France and in Canada cope with management strategies to meet their multinational company performance objectives through the restructuring of social and productive relations in their sites.

Decentralization and Legitimacy in Employee Representation: A Franco-German Comparison

France and Germany differ considerably in terms of the legal rights assigned to workplace systems of employee representation, and of the strength and structure of their trade unions. Nevertheless there are important similarities in the actual practice of workplace industrial relations, the authors argue on the basis of their comparative case-study research. Elected representatives can act effectively only when they are able to develop a strategic approach and thus distance themselves from the day-to-day concerns of individual groups of their constituents. They can gain the legitimacy to do so only when they maintain close links with the external trade union.

Workplace Representatives: Strategic Actors of Union Renewal?

Workplace representatives (shop stewards) provide insight into union transformations. This article explores the renewed research interest in terms of the representativeness of unionism and of workplace representatives, the complexity of the sites of representation and employer strategies, the search for new references and the centrality of workplace representatives in union renewal strategies.

Understanding Diversity in Collective Representation: Common Principles Underlying the Performance of Workplace Representatives in Different Representation Regimes

The international literature on workplace representation tends to focus on distinctive characteristics of different representation regimes to the detriment of an understanding of how groups of workplace representatives actually do their work. This article identifies cross‐cutting principles underlying the role of workplace representatives, making the argument that these principles, rather than institutional characteristics, explain commonalities and differences in workplace representation.

The Transformation of French Industrial Relations: Glorification of the Enterprise and Disaffection on the Streets

This article examines the key debates and intellectual currents in French industrial relations in the past decade. The focus of attention has shifted from working conditions, relations between social groups, macro-social processes and conflict to the labour market, the company and social and technological innovation. Both economists and industrial sociologists now see the firm as the central object of their research, a change of focus which has required innovations in theory and in methodology. But dramatic events since 1995 show that the national level retains its importance.