Søren Kaj Andersen

A New Mode of European Regulation? The Implementation of the Autonomous Framework Agreement on Telework in Five Countries

This article examines the implementation of the first autonomous framework agreement signed by European social partners in a number of member states. Although the telework agreement states that it is to be implemented in accordance with national procedures and practices specific to management and labour, practice is often different. The approach adopted reflects the specific policy character of the telework agreement and the ongoing power struggle between unions, employers and the state.

Nordic Metal Trade Unions on the Move: Responses to Globalization and Europeanization

Despite economic globalization, the liberalization of European markets and rapid technological changes, membership density in the trade unions in the metal sector in the Nordic countries remains exceptionally high compared to any other European region. The coverage of collective agreements has also remained intact, and unemployment is low by European standards. Nevertheless, the Nordic metal unions face a number of dilemmas. They all recognize a need to engage more actively in international, and especially European-level, policy-making, including the coordination of bargaining processes. Yet they fear that European regulation may undermine their national bargaining autonomy. They also recognize the need for a common Nordic position with regard to European policies; but differences in industrial structures and traditions of labour market regulation, alongside different national relationships to the European Union and Economic and Monetary Union, represent obstacles to closer cooperation between the Nordic metal federations. Moreover, a lasting problem is the winning of the support of their members for European and global activities.

Bargaining in the crisis - a comparison of the 2010 collective bargaining round in the Danish and Swedish manufacturing sectors

The economic crisis weighed heavily on the 2010 collective bargaining rounds in the Danish and Swedish manufacturing sectors — the pattern-setting sectors in both countries. This article analyses and compares the bargaining rounds from agenda-setting to signing, pointing to the significant differences in bargaining structures, processes and output. On the whole, the crisis seems to have had little effect on the Danish bargaining system due to a strong centralization on the employer side through the Confederation of Danish Industries, union moderation and the coordination of bargaining areas by Denmark’s mediation institution. Conversely, the bargaining round in Sweden puts a question-mark over the viability of the whole Swedish bargaining system. Union coordination was shattered when the white-collar unions broke ranks and concluded agreements before the LO unions. But more importantly, Teknikföretagen — the biggest employers’ federation — quit the Industrial Agreement after the negotiations and, once again, Swedish social partners are being forced to readjust the procedural framework for collective bargaining. La crise économique a lourdement pesé sur les rounds de négociation collective 2010 dans les secteurs manufacturiers danois et suédois, qui sont les secteurs qui donnent le ton dans les deux pays. Cet article analyse et compare les rounds de négociation, depuis la fixation de l’agenda jusqu’à la signature, en soulignant les différences significatives dans les structures de négociation, les processus et les résultats. Dans l’ensemble, la crise semble avoir eu peu d’effet sur le système de négociation danois en raison de sa forte centralisation du côté des employeurs, par le biais de la confédération des industries danoises, mais aussi de la modération syndicale et de la coordination des domaines de négociation par l’institution de médiation danoise. À l’inverse, le round de négociations en Suède conduit à s’interroger sur la viabilité de l’ensemble du système de négociation suédois. La coordination syndicale a été brisée lorsque les syndicats des employés ont rompu les rangs et conclu des accords avant les syndicats ouvriers. Mais il y a plus important encore: après les négociations, la plus importante fédération d’employeurs, Teknikföretagen, a dénoncé l’accord sur le développement industriel et la formation des salaires; une fois de plus, les partenaires sociaux suédois sont forcés de réadapter le cadre procédural de la négociation collective. In Dänemark und Schweden hat die Wirtschaftskrise die Kollektivverhandlungen des Jahres 2010 im produzierenden Gewerbe — in beiden Ländern die Sektoren mit Vorbildfunktion — schwer belastet. In diesem Artikel werden die Verhandlungsrunden, von der Festlegung der Tagesordnung bis zur Unterzeichnung, analysiert und verglichen und die wesentlichen Unterschiede der Verhandlungsstrukturen, Verfahren und Ergebnisse dargestellt. In Dänemark scheint die Krise insgesamt aufgrund der starken Zentralisierung auf Arbeitgeberseite durch den Verband der Dänischen Industrie, der Zurückhaltung der Gewerkschaften und der Koordinierung der Verhandlungsbereiche durch die dänische Mediationsstelle nur wenig Einfluss auf das Verhandlungssystem gehabt zu haben. In Schweden hingegen wurde in dieser Verhandlungsrunde der Fortbestand des gesamten schwedischen Kollektivverhandlungssystems in Frage gestellt. Die gewerkschaftliche Koordinierung wurde zunichte gemacht, als die Angestelltengewerkschaften ausscherten und noch vor den LO-Gewerkschaften Vereinbarungen abschlossen. Von noch größerer Bedeutung war jedoch, dass Teknikföretagen — der größte Arbeitgeberverband — nach den Verhandlungen mit der Begründung aus dem Tarifvertrag ausgestiegen ist, dass die Vereinbarung ihr Ziel der Sicherung der Wettbewerbsfähigkeit verfehlt habe. Die schwedischen Sozialpartner müssen so wieder einmal den Verfahrensrahmen für Kollektivverhandlungen neu justieren.

Employer Associations and Unions in the Public Sector

Comparative and international industrial relations have been one of the major growth industries throughout the 1990s (Bamber and Lansbury, 1998; Ferner and Hyman, 1998; Van Ruysseveldt and Visser, 1996; Hyman and Ferner, 1994, among others). One amazing feature of these more recent trends has been the fact that public sector labor or employment relations have not played any major role in this comparative analysis although different kinds of information have been available from national levels and pressures for change and modernization have been increasing in all industrialized countries.

Multi-track approach to public-sector restructuring in Europe: impact on employment relations; role of the trade unions

The article discusses a) restructuring trends in Europes public sector (in an employment relations perspective), b) the response of the trade unions to this process, and c) the overall impact of these developments on employment relations in the sector. We present an analysis emphasising the differences in the regulatory systems applied to public-sector restructuring processes in the EU Member States, arguing that there are significant variations in the development dynamics in employment relations, and, further, that these dynamics can be traced to at least three different regulatory regimes. The first regime of the three posited regimes emerged from the unique pattern of development observed in the UKs public sector, featuring large-scale privatisation schemes, the introduction of elements of competition and new forms of management. The second type of regime is evident in the Nordic countries, in the Netherlands and - albeit in modified form - in Italy, characterised by a certain measure of restructuring of the public-sector labour market, and based largely on co-operation between public-sector employers and the trade unions. The third type of regime is represented by Germany and France, with their independent regulatory systems in which centralism and sets of rules are paramount, with very few changes in the general pattern of employment relations. While identifying the significant variations listed above, we also argue that a common trend is evident in the EU Member States: a trend towards centralised decentralisation of relations on the public-sector labour market. Our study suggests that, viewed in a broad West European perspective, decentralisation - despite the many attempts to achieve it and despite its adoption, in principle at least, by politicians and the social partners - has been on a modest scale. This is clearly evident if decentralisation is considered in relation to wage-development. The tight budgetary constraints felt by West European governments may well be the single determining factor in what can be regarded as rather rigid control, at centralised level, of the framework for wage development in Western Europe. Admittedly, collective agreements can be negotiated and concluded at decentralised level - but preferably within the framework determined at centralised level.