Download or read book The Impact of Globalisation on Employment Relations A Comparison of the Automobile and Banking Industries written by Roger Blanpain and published by Springer. This book was released on 2002-07-31 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although no one disputes that employment relations worldwide have been greatly affected by globalisation, no clear consensus has emerged on the nature and significance of this impact. The seven contributions to this symposium pursue a comparative approach, suggesting that direct analysis of employment relations in distinct industries in two comparably-sized economies since the advent of globalisation leads to a more precise understanding of the interaction of globalisation and employment relations, and sets a pattern for other studies to follow. The economies studied in the symposium are Australia and Korea, and the industries are automobile (and auto parts) manufacturing and retail banking. In both countries, labour unions play a key role in the way in which employers and governments react to political and economic pressures. Among the particular topics discussed by the contributors are the following: effects of the 1997 financial crisis in Korea; the extent to which the automobile industry in one country (Korea) depends on parts and raw material from another country (Australia); cross-border cooperation between unions; the growing trend toward enterprise bargaining; conciliation and arbitration of industrial disputes; and the role of government-sponsored industrial relations commissions. The contributing authors are all industrial relations authorities in Australia or Korea. The in-depth analysis they offer in these very specific areas will be of value to labour lawyers and industrial relations scholars everywhere for the light it sheds on this crucial aspect of contemporary social and economic development.
Download or read book Involvement of Employees in the European Union European Works Councils the European Company Statute Information and Consulations Rights written by Roger Blanpain and published by Springer. This book was released on 2001-12-21 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Globalization and Employment Relations in the Auto Assembly Industry written by Roger Blanpain and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2008-02-25 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This important study—based on a three-year empirical research project in seven countries—focuses on employment relations in the auto assembly industry and shows that the influence of globalisation is tempered to varying degrees by institutional employment patterns at the local level. Twenty-one scholars and researchers representing all seven countries analyse the data, clearly describe the differences across both countries and firms, and offer conclusions and recommendations that greatly facilitate our understanding of the globalisation process at the level of human resources in industrial production. For each of the seven countries—two liberal market economies (the United States and Australia), two coordinated market economies (Germany and Sweden), and three Asian market economies (Japan, South Korea, and China)—the book describes five key issues in detail: work organisation; skill formation; remuneration systems; staffing arrangements and employment security; and enterprise governance and employee–management relations. The authors offer in-depth comparative analysis of these central issues in the context of such overriding factors as corporate strategy, local institutional constraints and advantages, competitive pressures among automakers to capture emerging markets, power relations within firms, and the role that agency and interests play in shaping social action.
Download or read book Challenges of European Employment Relations written by Roger Blanpain and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2008-08-29 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Has European economic and market integration curtailed the autonomy of national industrial relations actors and institutions? Or has it reinforced their roles in securing much-needed economic adjustment? This important book offers a deeply-informed comparative perspective on these questions, drawing on empirical research on changing conditions within and beyond the EU. The book builds on papers presented at the 8th European Regional Congress of the International Industrial Relations Association, held in the UK in September 2007. The authors are leading academic authorities from Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Germany, The Netherlands, Norway, Spain, and the United Kingdom. With detailed attention to such pervasive factors as the consequences of EU enlargement, the shift from manufacturing to services, changes in the gender composition and demographic profile of the labour force, and the growing influence of multinational companies, the authors address such issues as the following: • response of national employment regulatory traditions to globalization, privatization, outsourcing and budgetary pressures; emergence of new forms of competitive advantage for both employers and employees; impact of EU-mandated information and consultation mechanisms; possibility of international union action and transnational solidarity; ‘flexicurity’ and the changing demographics of the labour force; gender democracy in trade unions; trade union mergers; statutory minimum conditions as an alternative to collective bargaining; regulation or culture change to promote equality; treatment of posted and migrant workers within increasingly transnational labour markets; growth in variable pay systems; and possible rebirth of vocational training systems and apprenticeships. Offering in-depth comparative insights into the way in which national and international systems of employment relations are evolving rapidly in the face of cross-cutting pressures for change, this book illuminates a vastly complex state of affairs. In practical terms, its many insights into how current trends affect specific working conditions open the way to new initiatives in developing and maintaining a just and equitable employment relations regime for Europe and beyond.
Download or read book International Labour Standards and Platform Work written by Mathias Wouters and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2021-11-25 with total page 585 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Platform work – the matching of the supply of and demand for paid labour through an online platform – often depends on workers who operate in a “grey area” between the archetype of an employee and a self-employed worker. This important book explores the utility of the International Labour Organization’s existing standards in governing this phenomenon. It indicates that despite their relevance, many standards have little or no impact. The standards apply to the issue but they fail to connect with it. The author shows how three ILO conventions – the Home Work Convention, 1996 (No. 177), the Private Employment Agencies Convention, 1997 (No. 181), and the Domestic Workers Convention, 2011 (No. 189) – can be revitalised to have an impact on the platform work debate. In the course of the analysis he responds in depth to such questions as the following: What are digital labour platforms? What does decent work mean? Did the ILO centenary fundamentally change anything? What is the link between private employment services and platform work? How do crowdworkers relate to homeworkers and teleworkers? Are platform workers engaged in domestic work? What form could a future ILO standard on platform work take? Given that the ILO plans to start discussions on a potential future standard for platform work in 2022, this book will prove very useful in highlighting the issues and standards that such discussions should consider. Research has shown that the techniques and tools of the platform economy have spread far beyond gig work, resulting in widespread “gigification” and restructuring of workplace behaviours and relationships, jobs, and communities across the world. For this and other reasons, including the book’s detailed analysis of issues not addressed elsewhere, labour lawyers, in-house counsel, researchers, and policymakers will gain valuable insight into what decent work in the platform economy would require, thus greatly broadening the discussion on this difficult-to-regulate phenomenon.
Download or read book Employment and Vulnerabilities in the World of Orchestral Musicians Symphonic Metamorphoses written by Heather Kurzbauer and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2023-10-25 with total page 392 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The state subsidies and philanthropy that traditionally allowed orchestras to flourish have greatly diminished in the wake of recent financial crises and the COVID-19 pandemic. As in other fields affected by the precarious labor arrangements prevalent in the world of work today, it is the employees and freelancers—in this case, the musicians themselves—who suffer most. In this deeply knowledgeable and provocative book, a highly acclaimed scholar who combines the roles of law professor, music journalist, and orchestral violinist presents the first major legal study to focus on labor relations and the institutional dynamics at play within orchestras. Drawing on personal interviews with more than 250 orchestral musicians and other stakeholders—whose testimonies and actions often stand in contradiction to narratives provided by cultural economists and government cultural policymakers—the author uncovers the deteriorating welfare of musicians in two countries, the United States and the Netherlands, in which she has considerable practical orchestral experience. The methodology will reverberate with great intensity to musicians worldwide with its novel system of “movements” that focus on different vulnerabilities besetting orchestral players to highlight such issues and topics as: orchestra financing, with a special focus on the nonprofit sector and the changing nature of state subsidies in Europe; the impact of the perception of orchestras as “elitist” and of limited social value; discriminatory practices in auditions and hiring; legal and practical relevance of contemporary questions of employee categorization (regularly employed; self-employed; false self-employed); and how fair practice codes and collective bargaining agreements can be designed, implemented, and enforced. An interdisciplinary approach to a multiplicity of vulnerabilities in the sector, the study incorporates economic, historical and legal research along with a consideration of sociological factors. Case studies—from the EU Court of Justice, the Dutch Supreme Court, the Supreme Court of the United States, and the U.S. National Labor Relations Board—offer practical insight into specific legal issues, including the fundamental question of how musician employees are differentiated from freelancers. Reflecting on the cutbacks and compromises that traumatize orchestral negotiations in today’s musical world, the book not only provides orchestral musicians with a wealth of useful information and suggestions for future action but also adds to the growing body of legal literature on the self-limitations of labor law and the increasing vulnerability of workers. Practitioners in labor and employment law as well as academics in the field will benefit from a powerful analysis of workers’ vulnerabilities in today’s labor market.
Download or read book New Directions in the Study of Work and Employment written by Charles J. Whalen and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: . . . the book is both wide-ranging and thought provoking. . . New Directions in the Study of Work and Employment is a first rate collection of papers that provides a state-of-the-art overview of debates on the health and standing of the field of industrial relations. John Kelly, Transfer Charles Whalen s excellent edited volume New Directions in the Study of Work and Employment is a conversation about renewing the academic discipline formerly known as industrial relations. . . The chapters of this book are uniformly of high quality and provocative. . . It inspires the reader to engage and mend the world a bit. David Jacobs, Heterodox Economics Newsletter . . . an intellectually stimulating collection of informed, sound, and innovative responses to modern labor problems. . . . New Directions is a timely work that deserves wide readership by anyone with an association or interest in industrial relations. Although the matter of revitalization of the field of IR is not nearly a new topic, dismissing this volume as simply another typical prescription in the lineage of IR revitalization commentary would be a gross miscalculation. For one, the sheer breadth and depth of the contributing scholars brings a unique intellectual richness to this project. Also, this book distinctively tackles the issue of revitalization from a multitude of perspectives from social capital to network theories to labor and employment law, and from research and theory to teaching and practice and does so in a way that is comprehensive, continuous, and in dialog throughout. Finally this book makes a significant contribution because of its specific recommendations for IR revitalization. Instead of telling scholars and practitioners the need for a new direction but providing few feasible alternatives, New Directions proffers real pathways for progress. This book is a useful guide for navigating the ever-developing world of work and employment relations. Sean Rogers, Perspectives on Work Where is the field of industrial relations going? How can it be rejuvenated? How can it be reformulated to deal with current problems? These are among the difficult questions this stimulating book addresses. George Strauss, University of California, Berkeley, US This book deserves to be widely read. The academic study of industrial relations has recently struggled to adjust to the brave new world of work and employment relations. Too often there has been a retreat into the study of very small issues and insufficient emphasis on the big picture. The chapters in this volume make a valuable contribution to filling this gap. Most important of all, the book is forward-looking. Ken Mayhew, University of Oxford, UK Charles Whalen has assembled a timely and comprehensive examination of the world of work by a distinguished group of international scholars. Robert B. McKersie, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, US This book represents a breath of fresh air, provided by many of the most prominent scholars in industrial relations today. It anchors the field to its past, but more importantly highlights pathways to the future. It is indispensable reading, and will form a solid foundation for continued dialogue about new directions for the study of work and employment. Morley Gunderson, University of Toronto, Canada Work and its associated problems are more important to individuals and society than ever before. That is why it is so crucial to re-envision the field of industrial relations (employment relations), which brings together economics, sociology, psychology, history, human resource management, political science, and all other areas of scholarship related to work. This compendium by leading industrial relations scholars makes a vital contribution in that direction. Paula B. Voos, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, US Industrial relations is confronting major challenges. This valuable book deserves a warm welcome since it illustrates and maps a series o
Download or read book Labour Markets Industrial Relations and Human Resources Management in Europe written by Roger Blanpain and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2012-03-01 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Social models are always contested and ambiguous. This is particularly evident in the field of human resources management, where decisions that ultimately affect the patterns of social relations are made every day. This collection of in-depth essays focuses on some central human resources elements – gender, youth, ageing, educational background, training, workers’ rights – providing an up-to-date summary and analysis of how employers are dealing – and should be dealing – with workforce characteristics under current globalized forces. The emphasis is on Europe, but valuable insights come also from Chile, Canada, and the United States. Sixteen experts discuss such important issues as the following: the shift from intervention in favour of workers’ rights towards corporate neo-liberal policies; importance of transnational framework agreements in countries where a trade union; tradition is lacking; evidence that provision of childcare promotes female labour market participation; short-time working, labour hoarding, and labour underutilization; enhancing training policies for employable skills; enforcement of corporate social responsibility; alarmingly high rates of precarious employment; worldwide decline of full-time permanent positions; pension system reform; over-exposure of young people to non-standard employment; discouraged workers; regional imbalances in employment policy; and weaknesses of education programmes in connection with the world of work. Industrial relations and human resources professionals as well as employment lawyers worldwide will welcome this incisive analysis, and academics everywhere are sure to benefit from its evidence, insights, and proposals. The book presents a selection of papers from the international conference in commemoration of Marco Biagi entitled Europe 2020: Comparative Perspectives and Transnational Action, held at the Marco Biagi Foundation in Modena, Italy. 17–19 March 2011.
Download or read book Work Life Balance in the Modern Workplace written by Sarah De Groo and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2017-06-23 with total page 424 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The term ‘work-life balance’ refers to the relationship between paid work in all of its various forms and personal life, which includes family but is not limited to it. In addition, gender permeates every aspect of this relationship. This volume brings together a wide range of perspectives from a number of different disciplines, presenting research ndings and their implications for policy at all levels (national, sectoral, enterprise, workplace). Collectively, the contributors seek to close the gap between research and policy with the intent of building a better work-life balance regime for workers across a variety of personal circumstances, needs, and preferences. Among the issues and topics covered are the following: – differences and similarities between men and women and particularly between mothers and fathers in their work choices; – ‘third shift’ work (work at home at night or during weekends); – effect of the extent to which employers perceive management of this process to be a ‘burden’; – employers’ exploitation of the psychological interconnection between masculinity and breadwinning; – organisational culture that is more available for supervisors than for rank and le workers; – weak enforcement mechanisms and token penalties for non-compliance by employers; – trade unions as the best hope for precarious workers to improve work-life balance; – crowd-work (on-demand performance of tasks by persons selected remotely through online platforms from a large pool of potential and generic workers); – an example of how to use work-life balance insights to evaluate the law; – collective self-scheduling; – employers’ duty to accommodate; and – nancial hardship as a serious threat to work-life balance. As it has been shown clearly that work-life con ict is associated with negative health outcomes, exacerbates gender inequalities, and many other concerns, this unusually rich collection of essays will resonate particularly with concerned lawyers and legal academics who ask what work-life balance literature has to offer and how law should respond.
Download or read book Employment Policies and Multilevel Governance written by Roger Blanpain and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2009-04-29 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Europe, work has long been a symbol of full citizenship and today work is a fundamental goal of European social policy. However, although every person has the ‘right’ to work, it is becoming clearer all the time that unemployment is not due merely to a lack of encouragement to exercise this right, but (at least in part) to some deeper defects in the implementation of effective employment policies. As a contribution to defining the nature of these problems this important collection of essays targets the phenomena of multilevel governance, both vertical (European, national, regional, local) and horizontal (administrative institutions, trade unions, business representatives, NGOs), showing, with detailed analysis and data, how coordination or conflict between the various levels advances, or fails to advance, the goals of employment policy. Regarding the EU, five EU Member States are examined– plus, for comparative analysis, the parallel Canadian federal model – with the authors addressing such concrete issues as: the impact of globalisation and Europeanisation on employment policies; distribution of tasks in the Open Method of Coordination (OMC); involvement of private and economic agents; the increasing significance of international political agents; flexicurity as an employment strategy; the difficulty of integrating the excluded; coordination with education and fiscal policies; social inclusion from the point of view of international human rights; and gender ‘mainstreaming’ as a weakening of the EU guarantee of gender equality. The essays originated in a research meeting held at the Instituto Internacional de Sociología Jurídica at Oñati (Spain) in June of 2007. Some of the contributors, all employment law experts, discuss problematic aspects of the European Employment Strategy (EES) and its influence on the decentralization of employment policies and related elements of social protection. Other authors concentrate on ‘built-in’ multilevel problems resulting from existing constitutional and administrative structures, while a third group focuses on substantive approaches to employment policies within individual member states. The Bulletin contains updated versions of all papers. In this book the degree of administrative, legal, political, and cultural intricacy involved in a serious engagement with multilevel governance of employment on the European model is put on full view. As a deeply informed analysis of how the idea of multilevel governance has played out within the political and administrative reality of Member States, the book will prove of enormous value to labour and employment law professionals anywhere, as the problems identified here have a global reach.
Download or read book American Labor and the Law written by Matthew W. Finkin and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2019-01-11 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the United States and worldwide, the “labor question” has recrudesced. Old issues have resurged, sometimes in altered guise. New issues have emerged. Both test the twentieth century's solutions. This work explores the arc of labor law in the United States up to the changes that have reordered business and employment at the century's turn – the resurgence of old issues in new dress and the emergence of new issues, of which the deployment of technologies – roboticization and computerization – has been the catalyst. It closes on the issues labor law is facing in the twenty-¬first century, including the imponderable of yet a new need to address the de¬finition of citizenship. The author's thorough coverage of the relevant terrain draws on social and legal history, and also on the current wealth of economic studies across the range of such pressing issues as the following: – wages; – precarity of work; – employee representation; – health and safety; – job discrimination; – employee mobility; – privacy; – job displacement; – anti-retaliation; – wrongful dismissal; – accelerating use of automation, robotization, and computerization; – segmentation and polarization of the labor market; – ¬ ssurization of jobs; – labor segmentation and polarization; – union implosion; and – privatization of law. At a critical moment when the various strands of all these issues are becoming intertwined, this hugely informative book elucidates how labor law stands today in the United States, and by extension in many other countries. This book provides a necessary background for comparative engagement with economic change. Because the developments it deals with are global, this is critical reading for policy makers, academics, students, and an enlightened public to put what is happening in larger historical context as seen from the paradigm neoliberal economy and its legal institutions.
Download or read book New Developments in Employment Discrimination Law written by Oana ?tefan and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2012-11-01 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on a data set of 696 documents – competition and state aid judgments, orders and opinions of the European Courts, and Advocates’ General opinions referring to various soft law instruments – this detailed textual and doctrinal analysis investigates the way in which the EU Courts deal with soft law, how the normative status of these instruments is acknowledged, and how their effects are recognized. It reveals that several ‘champion’ instruments feature frequently in the case law: the guidelines on fines and the leniency notice in competition law, the state aid instruments on aid to be granted to enterprises in difficulty, regional aid, de minimis aid, and aid to be granted to SMEs – all of them having in common the fact that they regulate highly litigated areas. The analysis treats issues such as the following: ; the pathway from judicial ignorance to judicial acknowledgement of soft law; ; the judicial creation of legal ‘hybrids’; the judicial review of soft law; the potential use of soft law as a ‘sword’ or as a ‘shield’ in a court of law; the distinction between legally binding force and legal effects; how soft law can produce legal effects through the operation of general principles of law such as legitimate expectations, legal certainty, or human rights; and how the Courts locate soft law on a strong constitutional pluralist background. Although the analysis might appear to relate to a fairly narrow spectrum of EU law, in fact the interaction of soft law and legal principles reaches into many diverse areas of law, and increasingly so in the twenty-first century. Consequently, this ground-breaking book will prove immeasurably valuable to any practitioner, academic, or policymaker interested in how the EU Court is fulfilling once again its constitutionalizing role, even in an area traditionally lacking formalism and conventions: that of soft instruments of governance.
Download or read book The Global Labour Market written by Roger Blanpain and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2008-01-01 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As global power relations increasingly favour international capital, it becomes crucial for labour and employment lawyers to center their field in a supranational context. As long as wages, social security, and taxes remain national matters, states compete at this level in order to attract foreign investment. This does not bode well for employees or the self-employed. Most ameliorative measures come in the form of unenforceable andsoft lawand guidelines and recommendations. The conference recorded in this vitally important book confronts this losing battle of local responses to global challenges. The book reprints the papers submitted to that conference by twenty-three outstanding scholars from fourteen countries. Among the many critical issues they expose and discuss are the following: and the proliferation of varieties of non-standard employment; and protection of migrant workersand rights by regional organizations; and global and regional trends in the human resources function; and work training and education policy; and effectiveness of equality and non-discrimination standards; and involvement of employees in workplace decisionmaking; and and the need for an equitable social safety net. In the course of the discussion the authors examine cases from many countries, including not only EU Member States (both West and East) and the U.S., but also Japan, Chile, South Africa, and Indonesia. With a focus on the nexus of multinational enterprises and international standards, the book provides both a sharp image of where labour law stands in todayands worldandrevealing serious social problems in a clearer light than is usually encounteredandand a very valuable guide to directions to pursue and potential solutions, offered by some of the most engaged and committed minds in the field. It is an indispensable resource for legal workers in this andeye of the stormand of globalization.
Download or read book Systems of Employee Representation at the Enterprise written by Roger Blanpain and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2012-08-01 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Amid the trend towards decentralized industrial relations, various new and modified systems of employee representation are taking hold in many countries worldwide. In this highly informative examination of this field of international labour law – originally presented as a series of papers for the 11th JILPT Comparative Labor Law Seminar held in Tokyo in February 2012 – twelve distinguished scholars from Australia, China, France, Germany, Japan, Korea, Sweden, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, and the United States describe their countries’ current perspectives on this issue, along with their own analysis and commentary. Among the specific questions addressed for each jurisdiction are the following: What is the legal framework for an employee representation system? How is the representative body formed and what are its declared powers? Are there legal mechanisms preventing intervention by the employer? Are non-standard employees involved? What methods of deliberation and decision-making are used? How are the activities of representatives protected? Who bears the costs? What is the relationship with collective bargaining? With labour unions? Each contributor also describes typical ways in which the employee representative system works, offering concrete examples such as dismissal, wage determination, and equal treatment. Some deal with situations in which employee representation is in fact nonexistent or malfunctioning in real workplaces. There is also pervasive attention paid to the fundamental matter of what ‘representation’ is for, and the probable future direction of employee representation. Given the need to secure representation for non-union and non-standard employees at the workplace, these reports on the conditions and new developments in this important field provide ample basis on which to build a better system of employee representation in this era of diversified workforces in the globalized market. Accordingly, this book will prove of inestimable value to practitioners and policymakers in labour and employment law anywhere in the world.
Download or read book The Legal and Institutional Framing of Collective Bargaining in CEE Countries written by Ivana Palinkaš and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2018-04-09 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The formerly communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) have witnessed a profound transformation of their labour laws since the 1990s and, especially, after their accession to the European Union. Today, in comparison to the other Member States, they continue to have weak trade unions and employers’ associations and an underdeveloped system of collective bargaining. Moreover, the recent economic and financial crisis highlighted the need to invest further efforts in bringing the CEE industrial relations closer to the ‘old’ Member States, in order to facilitate a more meaningful enforcement of the EU-wide economic and social policies. This is the first book to scrutinise this important matter in depth. Focusing on four current CEE labour law regimes – in Slovenia, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, and Poland – that also have different collective bargaining trends and can be said to exemplify some of the main legal and institutional frameworks for collective bargaining that the CEE countries have developed, the author addresses the following major issues: – the transition from a centralised to an open market economy and the degree of continuing residual characteristics; – the extent to which labour laws since the 1990s have enabled an adequate institutionalisation of industrial relations to allow free and voluntary collective bargaining at the national, sectoral, and company levels; and – the effectiveness of the standard-setting role of trade unions and employers’ associations insofar as they have persisted or come into play. The analysis always keeps in focus the development of labour laws in relation to a number of such interlinked elements as market transformation, type of privatisation of state ownership, and attitudes towards welfare. It draws on both the relevant literature and on twenty-five interviews with legal and policy experts from social partners’ organisations and staff within the ministries for social affairs in the selected countries. In support of the study’s general finding that the laws in CEE countries could provide more stimulus for sectoral and cross-sectoral collective bargaining, the author offers deeply informed recommendations and insights into legal shortcomings and pinpoints how the existing legal frameworks can be enhanced. Any professional or academic in the field of industrial relations, and particularly those concerned with complex transitions such as those occurring in the CEE countries and elsewhere in the world, will find this book of great value.
Download or read book When Good Jobs Go Bad written by Jeffrey S. Rothstein and published by Rutgers University Press. This book was released on 2016-03-16 with total page 201 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Chinese factories making cheap toys for export, to sweatshops in Bangladesh where name-brand garments are sewn—studies on the impact of globalization on workers have tended to focus on the worst jobs and the worst conditions. But in When Good Jobs Go Bad, Jeffrey Rothstein looks at the impact of globalization on a major industry—the North American auto industry—to reveal that globalization has had a deleterious effect on even the most valued of blue-collar jobs. Rothstein argues that the consolidation of the Mexican and U.S.-Canadian auto industries, the expanding number of foreign automakers in North America, and the spread of lean production have all undermined organized labor and harmed workers. Focusing on three General Motors plants assembling SUVs—an older plant in Janesville, Wisconsin; a newer and more viable plant in Arlington, Texas; and a “greenfield site” (a brand-new, state-of-the-art facility) in Silao, Mexico—When Good Jobs Go Bad shows how global competition has made nonstop, monotonous, standardized routines crucial for the survival of a plant, and it explains why workers and their local unions struggle to resist. For instance, in the United States, General Motors forced workers to accept intensified labor by threatening to close plants, which led local unions to adopt “keep the plant open” as their main goal. At its new factory in Silao, GM had hand-picked the union—one opposed to strikes and committed to labor-management cooperation—before it hired the first worker. Rothstein’s engaging comparative analysis, which incorporates the viewpoints of workers, union officials, and management, sheds new light on labor’s loss of bargaining power in recent decades, and highlights the negative impact of globalization on all jobs, both good and bad, from the sweatshop to the assembly line.
Download or read book Labour Productivity Investment in Human Capital and Youth Employment written by Roger Blanpain and published by Kluwer Law International B.V.. This book was released on 2010-03-08 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Unemployment levels are on the rise nearly everywhere, and the rate is particularly high among young people. If this trend is not reversed, the potential long-term economic and social damage is incalculable. For this reason a particular urgency attended an international conference on the subject held in March 2009 at the Marco Biagi Foundation in Modena, Italy, in the course of which specialists in labour law, human resources management, labour economics, sociology, education, and statistics met to present and compare research. This issue of the Bulletin of Comparative Labour Relations includes a selection of the papers presented at that conference. Although the selected essays present findings on specific issues in particular countries, the general applicability at the global level is evident. Assessing measures taken to deal with youth unemployment in thirteen countries (Italy, Spain, Russia, Sweden, Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Poland, Israel, Nigeria, the United States, China, and Singapore), twenty-five leading authorities describe and analyse such aspects of the problem as the following: vocational education and training; quality of employment as well as quantity; links between educational institutions and local, national and international enterprises; consultation and co-operation between employers’ associations and trade unions; job security vs. employment security; funding for postgraduate programmes, internships, and on-the-job vocational training; career development for future managers; safeguards for workers in a framework of flexibility; labour market pressure from unskilled immigrant workers; ‘earn-as-you-learn’ schemes; work in the informal economy; and the rationale behind the phasing out of passive labour market measures for school leavers such as unemployment benefits.
