Brothers in Arms in the European Car Wars: Management-Labour Pacts in the Context of Regime Competition

During the 1990s, virtually all major European car companies arrived at company-level collective agreements on employment and competitiveness. In brief, these pacts aim at maintaining or creating jobs and at improving the competitiveness of the plant or company in inter- as well as intracompany competition. This paper first presents two approaches to analyse such employment pacts. It then introduces selected cases of company-level employment pacts in the European car industry. The main part of the paper analyses these employment pacts and discusses their implications for labour relations. The author concludes that the employment pacts in the European car industry may not just be seen as examples of concession bargaining, but rather as new, emerging forms of cooperative and consensual labour relations, which are about adjusting the governance of the employment relationship to the imperatives of joint competitive success.1 Introduction 2 Collective bargaining on employment 2.1 Employment pacts: Levels and contents 2.2 The employment policy perspective 2.3 The regime competition perspective 3 Collective bargaining on employment in the European car industry 3.1 The European car industry: The European car wars 3.2 Fiat 3.3 Ford 3.4 General Motors 3.5 Mercedes Benz (Daimler Chrysler) 3.6 PSA Peugeot-Citroën 3.7 Renault 3.8 Rover (BMW) 3.9 Volkswagen 3.10 Volvo 4 Collective agreements on employment: Analysis and implications 4.1 The emergence of bargaining on employment 4.2 The contents of the employment pacts 4.3 The character of bargaining on employment 4.4 Employment pacts and multilevel employee representation 4.5 The role of the European works councils 4.6 The role of the state 4.7 Employment pacts: Examples of convergence? 4.8 The effects of employment pacts on employment 5 Conclusio

Innovative Agreements on Employment and Competitiveness in the European Union and Norway

Employment is currently the 'big issue' in the European Union. Against a background of consistently high unemployment rates, governments and social partners have undertaken numerous efforts t o create jobs and get the unemployed onto the labour market. Since the early 1990s, collective bargaining in many European countries has adopted a partnership approach t o improve employment and competitiveness. This report describes the recent initiatives known as 'pacts for employment and competitiveness' (PECs) which are a combination of three main elements: competitiveness, employment and partnership. PECs aim t o influence the level and structure of employment through a mix of market regulation, collective bargaining at the various levels, public policy intervention on tax, social security contributions, training, education and innovation. Examining social partner activity at company and sectoral level, this report is based on a recent study on collective bargaining and employment carried out by the EIRO (European Industrial Relations Observatory) network. The subject is viewed in the context of national labour market developments, employment policies and collective bargaining. The report includes a European-level overview as well as a description of the employment situation, recent collective agreements, and National Action Plans for Employment for the 15 EU Member States and Norway

The Future of Collective Bargaining in the Euro Zone

In der Europäischen Währungsunion werden Tarifverhandlungen unter neuen Rahmenbedingungen ablaufen. Dieser Artikel beschäftigt sich mit der Zukunft kollektiver Verhandlungssysteme in Euroland. Zunächst werden Überlegungen zu Eigenschaften, Entwicklung und Performance von Kollektivverhandlungssystemen vorgestellt. Im zweiten Teil werden die Auswirkungen der dritten Stufe der europäischen Währungsunion auf die Kollektivverhandlungssysteme in Euroland, vor allem mit Blick auf einerseits die konstitutionellen Entscheidungen der Akteure über die Struktur des Verhandlungssystems und andererseits den institutionellen Wettbewerb untersucht. Der dritte Teil spekuliert über die Zukunft von kollektiven Verhandlungssystemen in Euroland. Abschließend werden Organisationsprinzipien für eine europäische Arbeitsmarktverfassung vorgeschlagen.With European Monetary Union, collective bargaining will operate within a new framework of rules. This paper discusses the future of collective bargaining in the Euro zone. First, some thoughts on the nature, evolution and performance of collective bargaining systems are introduced. In the second part, the consequences of the third phase of EMU, and the question of the future of collective bargaining in the Euro zone are analysed, with special reference to the constitutional decisions of the actors on bargaining structure on the one hand, and institutional competition on the other. The third part speculates about the future of collective bargaining systems in the Euro zone. Finally, organisation principles for a European labour market constitution are proposed