Trade Unions in Western Europe since 1945

This comparative data handbook offers an empirical base to a long-term and comparative understanding of changes and variations in European union movements. It provides information on the context and history of union development, the changes in the structure of post-war unionism until today, the long-term trends in union membership and union density, and the shifts in the cross-sectional composition of union membership. Introduction and references are included, as well as standardised tables for each country and comparative indicators.This book is the result of many years of research by the authors in collaboration with an international research team, and provides an original source for comparative and national studies or individual enquiries. It offers cross-checked and often newly-calculated statistics from the project's unique comprehensive database on national union organisations and their membership series. An original, comprehensive and up-to-date data collection on postwar union movements, Trade Unions in Western Europe since 1945 will act as an indispensable tool for anyone comparing labour relations across Europe.Part I: Introduction 1 A Guide to the Handbook 2 A Comparative Profile Part II: Country Profiles and Tables 3 Austria 4 Belgium 5 Denmark 6 Finland 7 France 8 Germany 9 Ireland 10 Italy 11 Netherlands 12 Norway 13 Portugal 14 Spain 15 Sweden 16 Switzerland 17 United Kingdom Part III: Appendix 18 European Union Organizations 19 A Note on the CD-RO

European labor and transnational solidarity: Challenges, pathways, and barriers

Organized labor in Europe faces the challenges of European political integration and global economic interdependence. National labor unions adopted alternative responses, ranging from adverse nationalist and opportunist international to solidaristic supranational strategies. The authors discuss the responses, pathways and barriers to transnational solidarity from both comparative and supranational perspectives. The paper reviews three pathways: 1) the market option: the promotion of transnational collective bargaining; 2) the hierarchy option (and problem): the formation of a European peak association and the hierarchical integration of transnational sector organizations; 3) the network option: the cross-border exchange of information by unionists and works councilors. However, these pathways have met several barriers deriving from the problems of cross-national diversiy and entrenched national labor relations. Moreover, the weak regulatory capacity of the European Union's social policy and the unwillingness of European employers to engage in transnational collective bargaining are further, external barriers to advancing the European Social Dimension

When Institutions Matter : Union Growth and Decline in Western Europe, 1950-95

During the early post-war period, Western trade union movements grew in membership and achieved an institutionalized role in industrial relations and politics. However, during the last decades, many trade unions have seen their membership decline as they came increasingly under pressures due to the social, economic and political changes. This article reviews the main structural, cyclical and institu-tional factors explaining union growth and decline. Concentrating on Western Europe, the empirical analysis compares cross-national union density data for 13 countries over the first period (1950-75) and for 16 countries over the second, "crisis" period (1975-95). The quantitative correlation and re-gression analysis indicates that structural and cyclical factors fail explain the level and changes in unionization across Western Europe, while institutional variables fare better. In a second, qualitative comparative analysis, the authors stress the need to explain cross-national differences in the level or trend of unionization by a set of institutional arrangements: the access of unions to representation in the workplace, the availability of a selective incentive in the form of a union-administered unemploy-ment scheme, recognition of employers through nation-wide and sectoral corporatist institutions, and closed shop arrangements for forced membership. Such institutional configurations support member-ship recruitment and membership retention, and define the conditions for the strategic choice of trade unions in responding to structural social-economic, political and cultural changes