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Purpose: The paper examines the approach of United Kingdom (UK) Trade Unions to the use of institutional power resources (IPR) in the second half of the twentieth century. Design/methodology/approach: Using secondary material, it examines the unions' approach to IPR in three cases; collective bargaining; worker representation and trade union structure. Findings: The paper concludes that unions did not appreciate the importance of, and lacked a strategic approach to, IPR. Although employer and government action were largely responsible for the decline of industrial relations institutions, the failure of the unions to engage with IPR contributed to this process. It explains the failure of the unions to engage with IPR by reference to their lack of strategic capabilities and skills in relation to power resources (PRs) in general and IPR in particular. Research limitations/implications: It would have been interesting to collect primary data via interviews with union actors from the period examined to test the interpretation of secondary data contained in the article. Practical implications: The paper has identified the kind of strategic decision-making which is necessary for unions to engage effectively with IPR. It is has also indicated the key skills which unions need to develop to be able to manage their engagement with IPR. Social implications: The paper has implications for the role of trade unions in society, showing the need for them to develop narratives to convince society of the importance of their role and action and to develop the skills which enable them to connect with other social groups, e.g. intermediation, engagement with coalitional resources. Originality/value: Analysis of the decline of industrial relations institutions in this period has emphasized the role of employers and the state. This paper contributes to a more balanced perspective on this decline by drawing attention to the lack of a union strategy towards IPR and the importance of the detail of the management and employment of power resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to bring together two separate strands of the literature (politics and industrial relations) on civil service management and reform to enable consideration of the industrial relations implications of these changes. Design/methodology/approach – This paper is conceptual and has no empirical base. The paper is a general review of existing literature on the subject. Findings – The paper identifies the importance of historical legacy in both management and union behaviour in the civil service. By revisiting earlier civil service reforms, the reader is able to gain an understanding of the rationale for much of the current restructuring of the civil service. Additionally, any discussion of trade union behaviour should be located in the context of union tradition and evolution. Research limitations/implications – In being a general review, the paper does not report empirical evidence but instead provides the background for future research into civil service industrial relations and management. Originality/value – This paper is the first to provide a systematic review of management restructuring in the civil service whilst at the same time considering union responses. As such, the paper is of interest to academics and practitioners in the areas of both management and politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents several labor research papers of the Royal Commission on Trade Unions and Employers' Associations in Great Britain. "The Role of Shop Stewards in British Industrial Relations"; "Disputes Procedures in British Industry"; "Industrial Sociology and Industrial Relations"; "Productivity Bargaining and Restrictive Labour Practices"; "Trade Union Structure and Government"; "Overtime Working in Britain."

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to offer a broad practitioner’s overview of recent trade union history in the UK, and to investigate organised labour’s prospects in the decades ahead. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on a review of relevant literature and trade union documentation from the period 1964 to 2014. Findings – This paper concludes that the past 50 years has been a period of change and turbulence for the movement, and suggests that this is likely to remain the case in the decades to come. Although external political and economic factors will have a significant bearing on unions’ prospects, the paper argues that unions remain powerful agents of change in their own right and that a revival of organised labour is not beyond question. Originality/value – The paper is written with unique practitioner insight from the UK’s trade union centre. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss significant changes in the concept and practice of employment relations over the last 50 years. It does so from both public policy and management perspectives and highlights the continued failure to align these two perspectives. Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws on the author’s research as an adviser at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, and his previous experience as a civil servant in the Employment Department. A range of published sources are relied on, including quantitative, survey based and qualitative, case-study and other evidence. Findings – The over-riding need to tackle inflation led governments in the 1960s and 1970s to make repeated attempts to build a stronger legal framework around collective bargaining, and to intensifying incomes policies which brought governments into frequent conflict with the trade unions. This was followed by incremental reform of trade union legislation under Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s, to which there has subsequently been no serious challenge. The question is posed whether the author is nearing the end of the road for trade union voice in the UK, or whether there is scope for a “new deal” under which trade unions can join with other key stakeholders in making a positive contribution towards economic regeneration. Looking forward, the paper discusses shifts in trade union approaches to industrial action and major challenges for employers, including managing individual conflict and employee voice. Originality/value – The paper suggests that the ambiguity of the term “employee relations” means the author needs to ask what are the specific challenges facing employee relations practitioners today. Employee relations managers are undertaking a wide range of jobs. Their current focus on employee relations reflects a shift from the defensive attitudes that characterised the earlier part of the period to a more positive one. The paper concludes by arguing the case for a national forum bringing together employers, trade unions and other key stakeholders to advise government on workplace issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore what has happened to the notion and reality of equal pay over the past 50 years, a period in which women have become the majority of trade union members in the UK. It does so in the context of record employment levels based upon women’s increased labour market participation albeit reflecting their continued over-representation in part-time employment, locating the narrowed but persistent overall gender pay gap in the broader picture of pay inequality in the UK. Design/methodology/approach – The paper considers voluntary and legal responses to inequality and the move away from voluntary solutions in the changed environment for unions. Following others it discusses the potential for collective bargaining to be harnessed to equality in work, a potential only partially realised by unions in a period in which their capacity to sustain collective bargaining was weakened. It looks at the introduction of a statutory route to collective bargaining in 2000, the National Minimum Wage from 1999 and at the Equality Act 2010 as legislative solutions to inequality and in terms of radical and liberal models of equality. Findings – The paper suggests that fuller employment based upon women’s increased labour market activity have not delivered an upward pressure on wages and has underpinned rather than closed pay gaps and social divisions. Legal measures have been limited in the extent to which they have secured equal pay and wider social equality, whilst state support for collective solutions to equality has waned. Its replacement by a statutory minimum wage initially closed pay gaps, but appears to have run out of steam as employers accommodate minimum hourly rates through the reorganisation of working time. Social implications – The paper suggests that statutory minima or even voluntary campaigns to lift hourly wage rates may cut across and even supersede wider existing collective bargaining agreements and as such they can reinforce the attack on collective bargaining structures, supporting arguments that this can reduce representation over pay, but also over a range of other issues at work (Ewing and Hendy, 2013), including equality. Originality/value – There are then limitations on a liberal model which is confined to promoting equality at an organisational level in a public sector subject to wider market forces. The fragmentation of bargaining and representation that has resulted will continue if the proposed dismantling of public services goes ahead and its impact upon equality is already suggested in the widening of the gender pay gap in the public sector in 2015. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the changing strike activity in the UK over the last 50 years. Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws on a wide literature on UK strikes and an extensive trawl of newspaper sources. It is divided into four main sections. The first two summarise, in turn, the changing amount and locus of strike activity between 1964 and 2014. The third discusses the changing relationship and balance between official and unofficial strikes. The last covers the role of the courts and legislation on strikes, highlighting some key moments in this turbulent history. Findings – The period 1964-2014 can be divided into three sub-periods: high-strike activity until 1979; a transition period of “coercive pacification” in the 1980s; and unprecedentedly low-strike activity since the early 1990s. Unions were more combative against the legislative changes of the 1980s than they are normally given credit for. Research limitations/implications – Given its broad scope, this paper cannot claim to be comprehensive. Originality/value – This is a rare study of the changing nature of UK strikes over such a long time period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- The purpose of this editorial is to introduce this special issue on "International trade union networks, European works' councils and international labour regimes". Design/methodology/approach -- The editorial provides an overview and introduces the papers which make up the special issue. Findings -- These papers allow us to consider the social, political and institutional dimensions of grass roots organising across countries and continents. Originality/value -- The issue adds new insights into the topic in addition to the more typical focus on institutional levels of union engagement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore performance management in four UK trade unions. Specifically, the extent to which managers in the four unions accept or dismiss the unitarist, disciplinary and performative values that arguably characterise performance management practices. Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative research design was adopted to investigate trade union managers’ interpretations of performance management. Managers were targeted because they held the power to shape performance management practices in their specific areas. The research employed qualitative semi-structured interviews. Findings – Performance management in trade unions is linked to the structure, purpose and orientation of different types of trade union. It is also linked to the wider environmental context. The trade union managers’ interpretations of performance management are linked to disciplinary and performative values. As such they are comparable to the unitarist forms of performance management described in the literature. There are moreover, similarities and differences between the approaches to performance management between trade unions and for profit or public sector organisations. Originality/value – The paper adds to the emerging literature on internal trade union management by highlighting a particular aspect of human resource management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the relationship between union presence and labour productivity in a sample of British engineering firms. Rather than use a single indicator of union presence to determine union effects, several indicators of union presence are combined to form an index of union presence. Average union non-union effects on labour productivity estimated using this measure, or using a dummy variable indicating the presence of closed-shop arrangements, are found to be statistically insignificant. However, there is some variation around this average, and the union impact on value added per employee is found to depend significantly on firm size, the estimated effects being more negative in larger firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The primary purposes of this paper are to investigate the hypothesis that differences in trade union wage coverage between industries are a significant source of variation in earnings between industries and to attempt to estimate any union--non-union earnings differential. The stimulus for this paper was the publication, in the New Earnings Survey (NES) for 1973, of a unique series of data which, inter alia, indicate the percentage of workers in each industry whose wages are subject to collective agreements of various kinds. Prior to the publication of the "collective agreement" (CA) data the only recently available data on the extent of trade union organization in the United Kingdom were the published data on aggregate trade union membership. At the industry group level of disaggregation these data must be allocated to industries in an ad hoc way. The result is that only limited reliance can be placed on them. Pencavel's (1974) recent study of the relative wage effects of trade unions, the only one for the United Kingdom, used such data and is therefore subject to the limitations of those data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that the ‘turn to organising’ in British unions over the past decade has largely ignored the broader questions of the purpose of such activity. As a consequence, unions have mainly focused on building solidarities between workers in their individual workplaces rather than developing a wider view of workers’ interests and the objectives of that solidarity. Using Hyman’s typology of union identities (2001), it is evident that ‘class’ identity has largely been sidelined in debates about union renewal in Britain. The paper argues that this limits the scope of union renewal both in practice and in theory. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper draws on research in three English Midlands local education authorities to analyse the changing role of the teacher trade union representative in schools. It focuses on representatives of the largest teachers' union in England and Wales--the National Union of Teachers. The paper draws on mainstream industrial relations literature, and more recent research into school sector industrial relations, to assess how the role of the union representative is changing in an era of autonomous schools. The research indicates that new issues are emerging in schools, and these have the potential to transform the role of the representative. Where representatives can respond to the emergence of these new issues there is the prospect of a new, more participative trade union culture developing in schools. However, it is far from certain that school union representatives will want to assume these increased responsibilities, and this poses a major challenge for the development of teacher trade unionism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

British trade union renewal has focused on the twin strategies of organising and partnership. Drawing on experience from North America, and fledgling developments in Britain, this paper argues that reciprocal community unionism could provide another weapon in the union movement's armoury for reversing decline. The paper provides a brief historical overview of the intersection between unions and community in Britain before addressing reciprocal community unionism in more detail. The final part of the paper then looks at the work of Battersea and Wandsworth Trade Union Council's Organising Centre in South West London during 2000 and 2001. The case study highlights the ways in which trade unionism can develop when focused on a particular locality, and the advantages of having extra-workplace organisation in any place. The case also illustrates some of the barriers preventing this model of trade unionism being translated to other boroughs, towns and cities in the UK. In the conclusion, the paper then calls for further experimentation in the development of reciprocal community unionism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the theory and practice of community unionism. It is now widely argued that if trade unions are to reach employees in small workplaces, those on part-time or temporary contracts, and women, black and ethnic minority workers, they need to sustain alliances beyond the walls of the workplace. Increasing the scale of political mobilization in this way can help secure trade union organization amongst new groups of workers while giving unions the power to raise questions of economic and social justice at a wider scale. After summarizing current developments in North America, the paper focuses on the situation in the UK in more detail. By highlighting the pioneering community unionism of the Iron and Steel Trades Confederation (ISTC) and Battersea and Wandsworth Trades Union Council (BWTUC), the paper explores the implications of community unionism for the future of trade unionism in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses linked data on over 1,500 workplaces and 20,000 individuals from the 1998 British Workplace Employee Relations Survey to analyze the relationship between labor unions and the availability of six employer-provided family-friendly policies. Although unions were negatively associated with the availability of work-at-home arrangements and flexible working hours options, they appear to have increased the availability of three other policies designed to help workers balance the demands of work and family: parental leave, special paid leave, and job-sharing options. They did so both by negotiating for additional benefits (monopoly and collective voice effects) and by providing workers with information about existing policies and assisting them in using those policies (facilitation effects). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide a brief and partial overview of some of the issues and authors that have dominated British industrial relations research since 1965. It is cast in terms of that year being the astronomical Big Bang from which all else was created. It traces a spectacular growth in academic interest and departments throughout the 1970s and 1980s, and then comments on the petering out of the tradition and its very existence (Darlington, 2009; Smith, 2011). Design/methodology/approach – There are no methods other than a biased look through the literature. Findings – These show a liberal oppression of the Marxist interpretation of class struggle through trade unions, collective bargaining, strikes, and public policy. At first through the Cold War and later, less well because many Marxists survived and thrived in industrial relations departments until after 2000, through closing courses and choking off demand. This essay exposes the hypocrisy surrounding notions of academic freedom, and throws light on the determination of those in the labour movement and their academic allies to push forward wage controls and stunted bargaining regimes, alongside restrictions on strikes, in the name of moderation and the middle ground. Originality/value – An attempt to correct the history as written by the pro tem victors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper exploits the Workplace Industrial Relations Survey from 1990 (WIRS3) to examine the determinants of workplace injuries for a sample of manufacturing establishments in the UK. A key focus of this paper is an assessment of the role played by union-appointed safety representatives and joint health and safety consultative committees in reducing the frequency of workplace accidents. We find that joint consultative committees, with all employee representatives appointed by unions, significantly reduce workplace injuries relative to those establishments where the management alone determine health and safety arrangements. However, an important role is also found for those joint consultative committees where no employee representatives are appointed by unions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite their traditional mistrust of the use of the law and their uneasy relationship with the concept of equality, British trade unions have used the law in various ways in order to advance both gender and pay equality. Since 1970, some trade unionists have been making use of European legislation to improve legal norms and build a strong body of case law. They have developed legal expertise and detailed knowledge of the practicalities of the law and have supported numerous claims. However this use of litigation has not developed consistently over time and across unions. Litigation has been quite controversial within the trade union movement. This article seeks to investigate what are the conditions under which some trade unionists have decided to rely upon litigation to further their female members’ interests, depending on the time period. The article emphasises the crucial role these local trade unionists have played in the development of equal pay litigation. The paper builds on a ‘developmental approach’ that differentiates several ‘stages’ or phases in which union’s litigation strategies for equal pay figure differently. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This examination of establishment-level data from the Workplace Industrial Relations Surveys of 1980, 1984, and 1990 shows that the proportion of British establishments (that is, workplaces in both the private and public sector) that recognized unions for collective bargaining over pay and working conditions fell by almost 20% between 1980 and 1990. Largely accountable for this decline was a much lower rate of union recognition in establishments founded in the 1980's than in previous years, particularly in the private sector. Citing these findings, as well as recent structural changes in employment in the British labor market (such as the shift from manufacturing to services, from manual to non-manual employment, and from full-time to part-time work) and a government that continues to enact anti-union legislation, the authors foresee no reversal of unions' decline in the 1990's. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore management development in five trade unions. It investigates senior trade union managers' interpretations of management development, in particular, the extent to which they view management development as relevant to trade unions. The article also explores the link between managers' interpretations and the external environment for trade union activity. It considers the potential discord between the unitarist values and assumptions that arguably frame much management development literature and the democratic and pluralist values of trade unionism. Design/methodology/approach – This research takes an interpretive qualitative approach. In-depth interviews with nine key "elite" individuals representing five trade unions were carried out, in order to elicit their subjective interpretations of management development. Findings – Trade union managers view management development as necessary in the context of environmental uncertainty. Moreover, although management development in trade unions retains some unitarist assumptions, it is also linked to core trade union values of fairness and justice. Research limitations/implications – The in-depth qualitative interview design allows for exploration of management development activities in a small number of unions and from a management perspective. Further research is needed to explore the issues in a wider context. Practical implications – The paper begins to highlight and theorise management development in trade unions. Social implications – The article has implications in relation to the role of trade unions as employers. Originality/value – The article explores and theorises management development in relation to trade union management practices. It explores trade union education from the management development perspective rather than from an industrial relations or political education paradigm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the UK trade union movement’s avowedly secular nature, its antecedents show that religious beliefs greatly influenced many early trade unionists and, in some cases, contributed to the formation of a trade union consciousness. This paper considers the way trade union leaders in the 19th and 20th centuries drew upon religious teachings of social justice to organise their fellow workers. This context provides background for understanding how today a similar ideological commitment to collectivisation and social justice may be held by workers of faith; and how the adoption of a ‘militant secularism’ by some trade unionists may result in the closing of these conceptual spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to build on the insights of mobilisation theory to examine the interplay of structure and agency dynamics in strike activity. It proposes to do so by investigating the 2007 36-hour strike undertaken by 2,300 engineering and infrastructure workers employed by the private consortium Metronet on the London Underground, focusing attention on the relationship between workers' militancy, trade union leadership and left-wing politics within a highly distinctive and union favourable "opportunity structure" context. Design/methodology/approach – Semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 24 RMT union informants within Metronet and the London Underground (including union members, reps, branch and regional officers); analysis was made of documentary industrial relations and trade union material; and personal fieldwork observation. Findings – Although favourable specific contextual and contingent factors served as both provocations and resources for strike action, notably in enhancing workers' bargaining position and lending feasibility to a strike mobilisation approach, the role of trade union leadership and left-wing politics at every level of the union in collectivising workers' experiences and aspirations in forms which directly encouraged combativity was also crucial. Research limitations/implications – The specificity of the case study limits the degree of generalisation that can be made to other industries. Researchers are encouraged to test the proposed analytical approach further. Originality/value – The paper provides case-study empirical evidence into an important arena of employment in the UK, contributes to our understanding of the multi-dimensional causes of strike activity; and adds an important political dimension to the analysis of collective mobilisation often neglected in both industrial relations and social movement literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper celebrates some of the considerable strengths of Hyman’s 1970s/early 1980s analysis of unions in general and bureaucracy specifically, and reapplies it to more recent developments within British unions, while at the same time providing a critique of Hyman’s refutation of the ‘rank-and-file’ versus ‘union bureaucracy’ conception of intra-union relations. It argues that the wider set of implications Hyman drew from the accentuated pressures towards the bureaucratisation of workplace unionism that he identified ‘bent the stick’ too far in the opposite direction. In attempting to defend and refine the classical revolutionary Marxist analytical framework, the paper maintains that the conflict of interest that exists between full-time officials and rank-and-file members is a meaningful generalisation of a real contradiction within trade unionism, notwithstanding the variations and complexities involved. It examines the nature and social dynamics of full-time union officialdom, shop stewards and workplace unionism, and the relationship between the two. In the process, the limits and potential of both Hyman’s ‘earlier’ and ‘later’ writings are highlighted and some broader generalisations are drawn with relevance to current dilemmas for trade unionism. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

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Purpose - This paper aims to illustrate how innovative trade union strategies are emerging around the learning agenda and how these are being used to extend union strategies within the workplace and the community. However, it also shows how such strategies can be confronted with difficulties particularly when they are located in fixed spaces leaving them unable to develop or become sustainable once these spaces are challenged or closed due to inconsistent state and employer support. Design/methodology/approach - An in depth case study approach was adopted for the research, using predominantly semi-structured interviews with a wide range of individuals over an 18 month period. Findings - The paper suggests that although unions are increasingly pushing forward their learning agenda and developing workplace and community learning centres, which undoubtedly generate benefits for all stakeholders, their learning strategies are often fixed into specific, closed locations and spaces, finding it difficult to develop once these spaces are challenged or closed due to restructuring and organisational change. Research limitations/implications - The paper does not suggest that this case is representative of all learning initiatives but it does seem that learning as a part of the inclusion and union renewal agenda is not clearly co-ordinated in terms of their social, spatial and employment position. Originality/value - This paper represents new empirical research presented at a time when learning initiatives as well as community initiatives are high on government's agenda particularly as they are encouraging "the third sector" to play an increasing role in providing public services. Similarly, the paper addresses issues of ethnicity, migration and learning, again a topic high on government agendas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to examine why and how the Trades Union Congress (TUC) - the labour movement's peak body, "think tank" and exemplar - engages in alliance building with civil movements and groups. In particular, it investigates: the rationale for such; the nature of the alliances and the extent to which they inform TUC revival efforts or a new approach to trade unionism. Design/methodology/approach- Semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight senior TUC personnel. Most interviewees provided documentary evidence to elaborate on their comments. The dimensions of a thematic analysis of this and web site evidence were structured to reflect the above areas of inquiry. Findings - The findings are that: interest in the TUC and labour movement in alliance building with civil groups is building at all levels; TUC engagement with, promotion of and guidance on civil alliances is largely emergent and sporadic; notwithstanding this, certain parts of the TUC have increased its promotion of and to a lesser extent direct engagement with alliances. It also is shown that: such engagement looks likely to continue to grow as a feature of other revival strategies and there is little assessment of whether alliance building can help strengthen the British labour movement. Practical implications - The findings inform the paper's discussion of potential TUC and union revival purpose, policy and practice. Originality/value - This paper provides an in-depth empirical study of the TUC's involvement in alliance building with other social movements and groups. Policy-maker and practitioner interest in such is growing rapidly, particularly in light of the debatable effectiveness of familiar British union revival strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article challenges the view, voiced especially by S. Ogilvie, that the ‘revisionist’ interpretation of the history of craft guilds is wide of the mark. The paper suggests that Ogilvie oversimplifies the revisionist position; ignores significant new work on European crafts; as a result underestimates the role of the guilds in England and the Low Countries; and incorrectly presents her own case study of the Württemberg worsted industry as typical of European industry in general. Rather than a return to what amounts to a generalized eighteenth-century debunking of the guilds, the paper pleads for more quantitative and regionally specified investigations of the economic contributions of craft guilds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose -- The purpose of the paper is to compare employment relations in the hotel industry in Australia and the UK. Australian industry employment is regulated by the state and union recognition is enshrined. A substantial proportion of Australian hotel employers engage directly in firm-level bargaining with trade unions, with unionisation rates across the industry far higher than in the UK. The analysis focuses on employment strategies emphasising numerical/temporal and functional flexibility since efforts to enhance workplace flexibility underpin employment regulation in Australia. Design/methodology/approach -- The paper draws on interviews conducted in 13 exclusive, luxury hotels in Australia. Interviewees consisted of HR and departmental managers, employees across all hotel departments and relevant union officials. Findings -- Labour utilisation practices in Australian luxury hotels reflect relatively sophisticated and systematic endeavours on the part of employers. The specific content and effect of these strategies varies in accordance with hotels' bargaining arrangements. Whilst employee relations outcomes were not entirely without problems in Australian luxury hotels, they do signify that regulation and trade union recognition can produce substantial benefits for employers and employees. Research limitations/implications -- Recognition of potentially positive employment relations outcomes in Australia points to the need for further research in the UK to reassess employers' attitudes to trade unions in a changing employment relations landscape. Originality/value -- The paper offers a comparison between Australia and the UK in an area that is still relatively under-researched. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Workplace bullying is increasingly recognized as an important area of debate, particularly among researchers adopting a psychological perspective of work. This paper examines definitions of workplace bullying and explores less orthodox approaches within a British context. It focuses primarily on managers as perpetrators, and comments on the ‘bullying organization’, the relevance of human resource management and of gender. Context, the workplace balance of power, workers’ collective resistance and trade unions are then emphasized as significant factors and the potential for developing a contextualized, politicized and interdisciplinary approach to workplace bullying is suggested. Links with mobilization theory are explored, and the issue is also examined within the UK public sector environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to analyse the impact of the unions' bargaining power on production and wages. In our model a competitive final good is produced from two substitutable intermediate goods. One of them is produced in a unionized unskilled Sector and the other in a unionized skilled one. Potential workers decide at their cost to become skilled or remain unskilled and, thus, labor supplies are determined endogenously. We find that in a right-to-manage bargaining framework, the reallocation of the labor supplies due to a change in the unskilled (or skilled) unions' bargaining power may have a positive impact on the final goods production. At the same time, total labor earnings increase with the unskilled unions' bargaining power if the final goods production increases too. We also show that minimum wage legislation is equivalent in its effects to an increase in the bargaining power of the unskilled unions. However, in an efficient bargaining framework, an increase in the unskilled (or skilled) unions' bargaining power has always a negative impact on the final goods production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that the malaise that has characterised Britain's trade unions since the late-1970s can be located in an international context that also provides possibilities for renewal. It suggests two chronological phases in the response to decline, and then analyses the current debates in relation to partnership and organising. The paper concludes with an assessment of ideas of community unionism and their applicability in the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the extent to which union decline in Britain has been characterized by convergence or divergence in union membership rates for people with different personal and job characteristics. It compares individual union membership in 1975 and 2001 to identify some significant factors of convergence and divergence, which indicate temporal instability in the relationship between union membership and a number of its determinants. Identification of these factors of convergence and divergence should be useful to several parties, including industrial relations scholars and union organizers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The health and safety risk faced by individual employees can be treated as an unobservable latent variable which manifests itself at workplace level through reported counts of work-related injuries and illnesses over a given interval. This paper presents results from count data regressions using data from the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey. The findings strongly support the view that employees in larger establishments have a lower probability of being injured or falling ill. In addition, establishments with a higher proportion of unionized employees, and with health and safety committees, were associated with higher numbers of reported injuries and illnesses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we exploit the longitudinal element of the 1990 and 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Surveys for Britain to investigate the effect of unionism on establishment closings. Contrary to both recent U.S. research and long-standing British work, we find a strong positive association between two measures of unionism—union recognition for collective bargaining purposes and union coverage—and plant closings. This association is robust to the inclusion of highly detailed industry controls but is driven by plants that are pans of multiestablishment entities. No such relationship obtains in the case of single-plant enterprises. In explaining our findings, we address their consistency with the widely perceived reduction in the "disadvantages of (British) unionism" in recent years. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the reasons that can be offered for the lower trade union membership rates of female part-time workers in the UK and focuses in particular on female part-timers' attitudes to trade unions. The findings are based on original research: 50 qualitative interviews with female part-time workers in the retail industry. The paper argues that female part-timers are supportive of the aims of the trade union movement and concludes that an integrated approach is necessary in order to understand part-timers' unionization rates. This includes structural factors, the approach that trade unions have taken towards part-time workers and attitudes towards trade unions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The TUC's ‘New Unionism’ project contains contradictory tendencies in its promotion of both partnership relationships with employers and the adoption of more aggressive organising techniques. This paper investigates the impact of partnership-organising tensions on union activity at the workplace level in local government and the NHS. We explore these tensions by considering three dimensions of workplace union organisation: management-union relations; activist leadership style; and activist full-time officer relations. The paper rejects the argument that partnership and organising can be complementary union renewal processes. Instead, partnership relations detach senior activists from union members and restrict member participation and mobilisation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents a comprehensive and comprehensive analysis of the Taff Vale Railway strike in 1900. It will focus on the contention which existed between capital and labor and gives due recognition to the structural forces impacting upon Taff Vale as a business. It is demonstrated that Taff Vale, just like many others in the industry, came under increasing financial pressure during the 1890s as a result of rising costs and declining prices. This reversal in financial fortunes was more extreme at Taff Vale than elsewhere because of mounting local competition, and this in large measure explains the doggedness with which unionization and union demanded were resisted. Victory in the strike won for management at Taff Vale, and across the railway industry, gave greater scope to introduce operational and technological changes which would otherwise may have been delayed or frustrated completely. The arguments advanced in the article are founded upon a detailed analysis of the surviving financial and activity data for Taff Vale and other railway companies, supported by documentary evidence drawn from parliamentary papers, contemporary reports, and the surviving Taff Vale company papers held at the British Public Record office.

Focuses on the nature of changes in the structure of wages and earnings over the post-war period in Great Britain. Influence of market imperfection, trade unions and non-competing groups on wage structure; Factors affecting wage structure from the view of neoclassicism; Examination of income distribution between wages and profits.

Most of the literature on strikes has addressed one of four issues: causation, variation between sectors and countries, trends over time and the relationship between strikes and other forms of collective and individual protest. Very little research has addressed the equally important questions of strike outcomes and trade union membership despite the substantial body of research on the causes of trade union membership decline and strategies for membership growth. In this paper we reverse the usual sequence of trade union membership as a causal factor in the genesis of strikes and examine the impact of strikes on trade union membership levels. After setting out the relevant theory and hypotheses, we use a unique seven-year dataset of trade union membership joiners and leavers from a major British trade union with a substantial record of strike activity. Controlling for other possible determinants of trade union membership, we find that months in which there is strike action, whether national or local, are associated with a significantly higher rate of membership growth, measured both by the number of joiners and by the ratio of joiners to leavers. Data from new union members suggest that perceived injustice and perceived union effectiveness both motivate the decision to join. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the relationship between the pay of young men relative to adult men and the size of the youth cohort. The evidence presented indicates that during the post-war period, relative hourly earnings and relative union negotiated wage rates were both negatively influenced by the size of the youth cohort. This fact indicates that the relative availability of young workers influences their rates of pay even if these are the outcome of union negotiations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing studies of British trade union membership concentration have used the variance of logs and concentration ratio measures to show a tendency towards increasing concentration. This paper proposes the Herfindahl index as a more appropriate measure. The annual variation in concentration is analysed by means of the Herfindahl index and shows some fluctuation, particularly prior to 1947. Divergent trends are also shown for manual and white-collar membership concentration. An explanation of the aggregate trend and of these different occupational trends is advanced in terms of bargaining structure and the development of general unionism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Postwar concern about our industrial relations system has been dominated by three issues: pay; performance at workplace, company and national level; and industrial action. In each case the focus of interest is the link between the institutions, procedures and processes of the system and the outcomes that it generates. This paper evaluates evidence on these three issues for the last quarter-century, since the publication of the Donovan Report in 1968. Special attention is given to information from successive WIRSs. The evidence suggests that (i) industrial action is of minor importance; (ii) the industrial relations system can no longer be held to stymie company performance; (iii) the pay-jobs trade-off is as intractable as ever. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some common management themes of the 1980s can be traced to Donovan and are revealed in practice by the 1990 Workplace Industrial Relations Survey. The paper considers the relevance of factors not endorsed by Donovan and concludes that, while in terms of industrial action in manufacturing -- the focus of concern in the mid-1960s -- there is evidence that more order and responsibility has been injected into industrial relations at plant level, we cannot yet maintain that inflationary dangers have been overcome. Collective bargaining is, however, now revealed as affecting only a minority in the private sector, and public services behavior looks increasingly out of step. The paper suggests that future surveys may therefore need to be recast to capture changing patterns of employer - employee relationships and their links to economic success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent research has attempted to explain the impact of changes in union bargaining on the UK productivity miracle of the 1980s. A central part of these explanations is the concept of ‘effort’ or ‘working conditions’ as an observable component of negotiations. After reviewing the evidence, this paper shows that, in models where effort and wages are jointly negotiated in an environment of weakening union power, a positive effort-wage association—as observed in the early 1980s in the UK—emerges only under quite special assumptions. We show that the stylized facts are better explained by a model where effort and wages are bargained over sequentially. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines changes in union wage differentials in Britain between 1980 and 1984 on the basis of two comparable establishment-level data-sets. This period saw considerable economic and legislative change with potential effects on the outcomes of collective bargaining. Despite these changes, the mean differential shows little change between these two years, and what there is attributable to compositional changes, such as the shift away from the manufacturing sector and the downward shift in the establishment size distribution. The impact of the changes in unemployment and union coverage that took place is found to be minimal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What precisely is the impact of unionization on wages? The estimated union/non-union wage differential appears to fluctuate widely across various empirical studies. For example, based on a time-series estimation of a macro-model, Minford (1983) arrives at a figure of 70 per cent for the union mark-up. Studies based on industry cross-sections, however, appear to converge on 25 per cent for the United Kingdom. (See for example, Mulvey, 1976; Metcalf, 1977; Parsley, 1980. An exception is Mulvey and Abowd, 1980, who, after bias correction, arrive at about 6 per cent.) But many think that such cross-section studies are unreliable (e.g. Nickell, 1982) and misleading (e.g. Geroski and Stewart, 1982). In fact, concluding from his extensive survey, Lewis (1983) argues that, in general, industry cross-sections measure more than the union/non-union wage differential and therefore report an upward biased mark-up.
This paper has presented results on the union/non-union wage differential using individual-level cross-section data. It appears that, once account is taken of working characteristics such as job demands and job severity, the wage differential becomes smaller. The mark-up for 1968-1969 is slightly higher
than the figure of 8 per cent for 1975 arrived at by Stewart (1983). But it is still pretty close to his estimate, much lower than that of 25 per cent associated with most British industry cross-section studies, and bears no comparision to the time-series estimate of 70 per cent obtained by Minford (1983). However, it is worth bearing in mind that the sample size we have utilized is relatively small. Our results on job security variables and job benefit variables also suggest that it might be worthwhile concerning ourselves with an explanation of the "enlarged wage differential" instead of the conventional "pure wage differential". This should be possible with the availability of more information, which would enable us to impute monetary values to all... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While the economic changes effected by the British Conservative government in the 1980s are transparent, there is considerable debate as to whether there was a political dimension to the "Thatcher Revolution." This paper argues that the Conservatives were successful in undertaking social structural reforms that effectively moved the political center of gravity in Britain to the right and toward the government's preferred market-oriented policy agenda. The government's strategy-manifest in the sale of council houses to tenants and of shares in privatized corporations to individuals, and its attack on organized labor-was narrowly targeted on the swing electorate among wealthier members of the lower socioeconomic strata. The Labour party has acknowledged the successes of the Conservatives' structural reforms, and has moved its policy platform, in Downsian fashion, to the right in order to regain electoral competitiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents views of the author regarding relevance of blacklisting for journalism. Topics discussed include blacklisting organization exposed by professor David Leigh, employers being blacklisted in the construction industry for political and trade union activity and views of journalist Ian Cobain regarding the same.

Economists have long suggested that labor unions suffer a free rider problem. The argument is that, since union-set wages are available to all workers covered by unions irrespective of their union status, and union membership entails costs, workers will only join if they are coerced or are offered non-wage goods that they value above membership costs. Yet U.S. and British empirical research has found a substantial union membership wage premium among private-sector union-covered workers, implying that there is no free rider problem. The authors of this study hypothesize that these findings arise due to selectivity problems associated with identifying the union membership effect. Their analysis, which uses rich data from a new linked employer-employee survey for Britain and exploits the within-establishment variation in wages as a function of individual union membership status, demonstrates that the apparent wage premium for members is illusory. Hence, a potential free rider problem remains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]