Jens Lind

The Transformation of Employee Participation: Consequences for the Work Environment

This article reviews the research literature on the relationship between employee participation, influence and the work environment. The main part of the literature points to a positive connection in line with how it has been almost institutionalized in Karasek and Theorell’s demand—control model. However, more recent research into psychosocial work environment problems questions the model’s assumption of high job control compensating for high job demands. Taking its point of departure in a ‘deconstruction’ of the concept of participation based on research on employee participation from the past few decades, the article questions why increased employee participation does not seem to result in a healthy work environment.The article concludes that there are limitations to the demand— control model in modern working life given the contextual changes in the employer—employee relationship, which may mean a transformation of the significance of participation.

Work environment quality: The role of workplace participation and democracy

The article explores how employee participation influences the quality of the work environment and workers’ well-being at 11 Danish workplaces from within six different industries. Both direct participation and representative forms of participation at the workplace level were studied. Statistical as well as qualitative comparative analyses reveal that work environment quality and high levels of participation go hand in hand. Within a typology of participation models the highest level of participation, including strong elements of collective participation, and also the best work environment, measured as ‘psychosocial well-being’, were found at workplaces managed in accordance with democratic principles.

Activation for what purpose? Lessons from Denmark

Purpose – This paper evaluates why activation programmes are still an important and core component of most European countries’ social- and labour market policies when it has become increasingly cle ...

Unemployment and Labour Market Policies in the Scandinavian Countries

Looked upon from outside, the Scandinavian welfare states exhibit important similarities with regard to labour market policy. Their governments all do a great deal m response to unemployment and they use the same type of measures for this purpose. Compared with what is regarded as normal in other modern Western nations, large amounts of money and other resources are spent on reducing unemployment or at least the burdens of unem ployment. It may thus seem that there is a Scandinavian model for labour market policy. However, when we take a closer look, we soon find that there are significant differences. The same types of programmes exist m all four countries, but they are applied in very different mixes. The main dividing line to be drawn here is between passive and active measures. We argue that active labour market policies are basically oriented towards commodification of labour power, i.e. the aim is to establish, keep or restore the saleability of labour power m the market. Passive measures, on the other hand, comprise no commodification element, although they are more or less linked to a requirement that recipients take the jobs available in the labour market. However, they generally lessen the pressure upon people to accept job offers from employers and in that sense there is no doubt a decommodifying function. From this perspective we maintain that the Swedish labour market policy contains the clearest element of commodification because it is most pronouncedly oriented towards making labour power saleable in the market. The opposite pole is represented by Denmark, where decommodifying cash benefits play the most important role. Norway and Finland are somewhere in between. For a long time Norway has had very low unemployment and accordingly less strong motives to develop its policy in the one or the other direction, while Finland, although having the reasons, has not put as much emphasis on active measures as Sweden or developed as generous passive measures as Denmark.

European trade unionism in transition? a review of the issues

** Director, European Trade Union Institute, Brussels, Belgium. *** Senior Research Fellow, Institut for Sociale Forhold og Organisation, Aalborg Universitet, Denmark. In recent years European trade unionists have debated how changes in industrial relations systems will impinge upon current union activity and organisation. They cite labour market restructuring, workplace change and developments in the European Union’s (EU) social policy agenda as constituting both threats and opportunities for action. In addition, a wide range of strategies, implemented by employers to raise competitiveness, require unions to accommodate concurrent trends towards intemationalisation, as capital seeks to reduce production costs, and localism, arising from the fragmentation of markets. Some of the questions raised by these issues are the following: Are these changes promoting convergence or divergence? How are these changes mediated by different institutional arrangements and public policy choices? To what extent are the same trade union responses appropriate in different countries? Can trade unionists influence the direction of policy or must they merely be influenced by it?

Are Three Cracks in the Danish Model of Industrial Relations

The Danish system of industrial relations bears a lot of similarity to the traditional Scandinavian model of industrial relations. In this article the authors argue that whilst the Danish model has weathered the forces of change remarkably well up to now, a number of recent developments have started to produce ‘cracks’ in the model.

Is the Danish model still a sacred cow?: Danish trade unions and European integration

The aim of this article is to describe and explain how Danish trade unions have reacted to European integration since 1973 when Denmark joined the EEC. The authors have earlier conceptualized the orientation of Danish unions towards the European scene rather as foot-dragging and building on the defence of the ‘Danish model’, a model that has been cherished and guarded as a sacred cow. In this article we ask whether this is still the case after the changes that have taken place on the European and the Danish scene during the past decade. The answer is that it is. The article has two sections. In the first section we identify and describe the central features of Danish trade unionism and the Danish industrial relations system (the ‘Danish model’). In the second section we address the attitudes and policies pursued by Danish unions during different phases of European integration.

The modernisation of trade unions in Denmark

The experience of the past 20 years of declining membership rates in most European countries is no doubt the main reason for identifying a crisis of trade unionism, prompting a direct opportunity to look further into what might be the reason, what has gone wrong and what should be done to modernise trade unions to get them back on the main track again. In Denmark, however, declining membership rates are not the starting point for investigating what unions could do better. Unlike most other European trade unions, the Danish trade unions have experienced a constant increase in trade union membership rates - approximately 80% of all wage earners are unionised in 1994 - but this does not indicate that trade unionism in Denmark does not have any problems. Neither does it mean that the unions are beyond criticism nor that they do not need to implement changes in a modernising effort. The unions are aware of this and indeed so are their critics. To evaluate the necessity for modernisation, the changes in society - especially changes in working life and the political/ideological environment - are a starting point, and this is closely connected to the second topic to be dealt with here, namely the changing contours of the (potential) members. Thirdly to be discussed are issues and trends in collective bargaining, including the international perspectives, and fourthly trade union structures and internal functioning. Finally some main perspectives of change will be pointed out concentrating on the role of trade unions in society and membership participation.

Unemployment or Basic Income? — Danish Debates

Apart from the never ending discussion on how to stimulate economic growth and employment, unemployment has been the reason for three other recurrent debates in Denmark over the past 20 or so years. The first takes up unemployment benefits and the motivation of the unemployed to find employment, the second addresses how to engage the unemployed if they cannot be employed in a ‘normal’ job and the third, most prevalent during the 1970s and 1990s, turns on the merits and disadvantages of whether or not a basic income system would be the most reasonable way of dealing with the unemployment issue. It is the purpose of this essay to review the discourses on these three central issues of unemployment and public provision.

Denmark: the long-lasting class compromise

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to offer a critical examination of industrial relations in Denmark. Design/methodology/approach The approach is based upon available data and a mixture of Marxist theory and systems theory. The theoretical position is discussed in relation to the academic discourses on the main characteristics of Danish industrial relations and provides a review of the foundation and historical development of the Danish system. Findings From this basis, it is analysed how the stagnation or decline has taken place in recent years regarding representation of workers’ interest as well as the ability of the Danish system to maintain its key importance when challenged by decentralisation, decreasing union affiliation rates, cuts in unemployment insurance and social dumping due to labour migration. Originality/value It is an original paper which offers a critical analysis of the institutional decline and increasing inequality that are the result of the liberalist political-economic hegemony.