This paper reflects on a study of a large chemical plant published over forty years ago and the changes that have taken place in the nature of work and employment in the meantime. It examines the ways in which utopian ideas have influenced accounts of changing workplace relations often associated with the advance of new technologies. The study itself is seen to lie on the cusp of the major transformations reflected in the location of industrial plant, the nature of the division of labour, and the practice of management. Deindustrialization – involving the closure of many manufacturing facilities – is identified as a critical moment opening up other rapid changes in the composition of the labour force and the application of new technologies to new settings in the service economy. Across the period a change of discourse is registered, seen most clearly in the move from ideas of industrialism to those involving capital and labour. The paper documents a spatial, sectoral, and temporal shift in capital, culminating in its penetration of civil society and daily life, creating major questions for social-scientific approaches to industrial relations and for the organizational practices of trade unions
{"title":"After the Long Boom: Living with Capitalism in the Twenty-First Century","authors":"H. Beynon","doi":"10.3828/hsir.2019.40.7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/hsir.2019.40.7","url":null,"abstract":"This paper reflects on a study of a large chemical plant published over forty years ago and the changes that have taken place in the nature of work and employment in the meantime. It examines the ways in which utopian ideas have influenced accounts of changing workplace relations often associated with the advance of new technologies. The study itself is seen to lie on the cusp of the major transformations reflected in the location of industrial plant, the nature of the division of labour, and the practice of management. Deindustrialization – involving the closure of many manufacturing facilities – is identified as a critical moment opening up other rapid changes in the composition of the labour force and the application of new technologies to new settings in the service economy. Across the period a change of discourse is registered, seen most clearly in the move from ideas of industrialism to those involving capital and labour. The paper documents a spatial, sectoral, and temporal shift in capital, culminating in its penetration of civil society and daily life, creating major questions for social-scientific approaches to industrial relations and for the organizational practices of trade unions","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-10-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47696841","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The spread of what are called 'irregular' or 'non-standard' jobs, rising female economic activity rates and the appearance of new 'gig', 'sharing', or 'crowd' work have promoted changed forms of employment to create a 'modern' labour market. This paper revisits employment during the late nineteenth century, revealing how, in major commercial centres, workers adopted idiosyncratic ways of earning a living in order to make ends meet. This invites two observations. First, the present-day labour market is less 'modern' than is supposed. Second, the 1940s to 1960s emerged as the era when 'traditional', permanent employment covered the bulk of the working population, with complementary social insurance to protect against risk. The post-1945 settlement was a political product, underwritten by the state, whose roots can be traced back to pre-1914 policy debates on labour market reform. If, as appears the case, this settlement has had its day, what risks do we run as we revert to employment practices characteristic of a much earlier age?
{"title":"Casual Employment and Its Consequences: A Historical Appraisal of Recent Labour Market Trends","authors":"N. Whiteside","doi":"10.3828/hsir.2019.40.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/hsir.2019.40.1","url":null,"abstract":"The spread of what are called 'irregular' or 'non-standard' jobs, rising female economic activity rates and the appearance of new 'gig', 'sharing', or 'crowd' work have promoted changed forms of employment to create a 'modern' labour market. This paper revisits employment during the late nineteenth century, revealing how, in major commercial centres, workers adopted idiosyncratic ways of earning a living in order to make ends meet. This invites two observations. First, the present-day labour market is less 'modern' than is supposed. Second, the 1940s to 1960s emerged as the era when 'traditional', permanent employment covered the bulk of the working population, with complementary social insurance to protect against risk. The post-1945 settlement was a political product, underwritten by the state, whose roots can be traced back to pre-1914 policy debates on labour market reform. If, as appears the case, this settlement has had its day, what risks do we run as we revert to employment practices characteristic of a much earlier age?","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-10-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46442221","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
What has come to be known as the 'dependency' theory of Australian trade-union development is associated with William Howard, whose work draws on the experience of the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration (the Court) under its second president, Henry Bournes Higgins. Central to this theory is that unions had no need to organize at the workplace as they acquired 'de facto recognition' in their dealings with employers once registered under arbitration legislation. This paper explores two related assumptions that underpin Howard's thesis. First is that under arbitration the role of Australian unions was limited to facilitating the Court's dispute-settling function; the second, a corollary of the first, relates specifically to the benefits accruing to unions and their members upon registration under the Act. Both removed the need for unions to develop strong workplace organization and be responsive to members' needs; hence Howard's description of Australian unions as 'cogs in the bureaucratic machine'. The paper concludes that there is merit in the second assumption but not the first, given the collaborative relationship that developed between Higgins and Australian unions
{"title":"Australian Unions during the Formative Years of Federal Arbitration: ‘Cogs in a bureaucratic machine’?","authors":"E. Stern","doi":"10.3828/hsir.2019.40.2","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/hsir.2019.40.2","url":null,"abstract":"What has come to be known as the 'dependency' theory of Australian trade-union development is associated with William Howard, whose work draws on the experience of the Commonwealth Court of Conciliation and Arbitration (the Court) under its second president, Henry Bournes Higgins. Central to this theory is that unions had no need to organize at the workplace as they acquired 'de facto recognition' in their dealings with employers once registered under arbitration legislation. This paper explores two related assumptions that underpin Howard's thesis. First is that under arbitration the role of Australian unions was limited to facilitating the Court's dispute-settling function; the second, a corollary of the first, relates specifically to the benefits accruing to unions and their members upon registration under the Act. Both removed the need for unions to develop strong workplace organization and be responsive to members' needs; hence Howard's description of Australian unions as 'cogs in the bureaucratic machine'. The paper concludes that there is merit in the second assumption but not the first, given the collaborative relationship that developed between Higgins and Australian unions","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-10-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46326617","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Book Reviews","authors":"Dave Lyddon, J. Janssen, David Bright","doi":"10.3828/hsir.2019.40.11","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/hsir.2019.40.11","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42207428","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In January 1975, the National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) held a special national conference to discuss proposals from the national executive council (NEC) to reform the union's long-standing mode of operation, organization, and government. The preceding years had seen NUPE members in the forefront of industrial action across the public sector, which was facing financial pressures and being radically restructured. New payment and management systems were being introduced. In a significant departure, NUPE had recently established union stewards. Bob Fryer and a team at Warwick University were commissioned to make recommendations to restructure the union. Their report proposed the devolution of authority and power, the strengthening of local organization and representation (in particular by strengthening the role of union stewards), increased women's representation throughout the union (in particular 'reserved seats' for women on the NEC and divisional councils), and increased accountability for both elected lay officers and paid full-time officials. The report was accepted and NUPE began a radical new phase
{"title":"Reforming Trade-Union Governance: The Reorganization of the National Union of Public Employees","authors":"R. Fryer","doi":"10.3828/hsir.2019.40.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/hsir.2019.40.4","url":null,"abstract":"In January 1975, the National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) held a special national conference to discuss proposals from the national executive council (NEC) to reform the union's long-standing mode of operation, organization, and government. The preceding years had seen NUPE members in the forefront of industrial action across the public sector, which was facing financial pressures and being radically restructured. New payment and management systems were being introduced. In a significant departure, NUPE had recently established union stewards. Bob Fryer and a team at Warwick University were commissioned to make recommendations to restructure the union. Their report proposed the devolution of authority and power, the strengthening of local organization and representation (in particular by strengthening the role of union stewards), increased women's representation throughout the union (in particular 'reserved seats' for women on the NEC and divisional councils), and increased accountability for both elected lay officers and paid full-time officials. The report was accepted and NUPE began a radical new phase","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45365911","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The central argument of Lucio Baccaro and Chris Howell’s analysis of European industrial relations over the past four decades (with a statistical analysis of fifteen countries and detailed chapters on five) is that ‘employer discretion’ has increased everywhere, although this is evidenced more in some countries than in others. There can be little disagreement on this, nor with their using this general trend in their argument against the (now less strident) ‘varieties of capitalism’ denials of ‘convergence’ in employment relations. But the authors neglect the way capital manifests itself through the choices made by living capitalists and their managers. Nevertheless, they make an important contribution to understanding how far Western Europe’s capitalist classes and managers have, from the 1980s to the 2000s, acted in new political and industrial ways as a result of having embraced, or been taken over by, a ‘mass movement’ of managerialism in the US and Western Europe closely allied to the new free-market political right, and the much higher levels of interpenetration of US and Western European capital.
{"title":"The Neoliberal Convergence of European Industrial Relations: Economic Inevitability or Result of European Political Choices?","authors":"S. Jefferys","doi":"10.3828/hsir.2019.40.9","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/hsir.2019.40.9","url":null,"abstract":"The central argument of Lucio Baccaro and Chris Howell’s analysis of European industrial relations over the past four decades (with a statistical analysis of fifteen countries and detailed chapters on five) is that ‘employer discretion’ has increased everywhere, although this is evidenced more in some countries than in others. There can be little disagreement on this, nor with their using this general trend in their argument against the (now less strident) ‘varieties of capitalism’ denials of ‘convergence’ in employment relations. But the authors neglect the way capital manifests itself through the choices made by living capitalists and their managers. Nevertheless, they make an important contribution to understanding how far Western Europe’s capitalist classes and managers have, from the 1980s to the 2000s, acted in new political and industrial ways as a result of having embraced, or been taken over by, a ‘mass movement’ of managerialism in the US and Western Europe closely allied to the new free-market political right, and the much higher levels of interpenetration of US and Western European capital.","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2019-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.3828/hsir.2019.40.9","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46947030","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The activities of the London Journeymen Millwrights Society were the catalyst for the first general Combination Act of 1799. Though a tiny local trades club, its reach throughout the major industries and services of the metropolis at that time made it a target for suppression by major commercial and political forces of those war times – the City of London Corporation and the government of William Pitt. Covering the last decades of the eighteenth and early decades of the nineteenth centuries, the study is set against the background of the technological and economic developments of the early industrial revolution. The disputes between masters and journeymen millwrights over the removal of traditional craft practices and lengthy, time-served apprenticeship laws, led to the emergence of a new breed of capitalist engineering employers in the London area. It involved side-lining the traditional ‘all-round’ time-served millwrights and their replacement by specialist engineers (fitters, filers, turners), in what was called an ‘engineering economy’. By contrast, the legacy of the journeymen millwrights’ trade club is found to be their sophisticated democratic constitution, large parts of which would be adopted by future generations of engineering and other trade unions.
{"title":"The Combination Laws and the Struggle for Supremacy in the Early Engineering Trades: The London Society of Journeymen Millwrights","authors":"J. Moher","doi":"10.3828/HSIR.2018.39.1","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/HSIR.2018.39.1","url":null,"abstract":"The activities of the London Journeymen Millwrights Society were the catalyst for the first general Combination Act of 1799. Though a tiny local trades club, its reach throughout the major industries and services of the metropolis at that time made it a target for suppression by major commercial and political forces of those war times – the City of London Corporation and the government of William Pitt. Covering the last decades of the eighteenth and early decades of the nineteenth centuries, the study is set against the background of the technological and economic developments of the early industrial revolution. The disputes between masters and journeymen millwrights over the removal of traditional craft practices and lengthy, time-served apprenticeship laws, led to the emergence of a new breed of capitalist engineering employers in the London area. It involved side-lining the traditional ‘all-round’ time-served millwrights and their replacement by specialist engineers (fitters, filers, turners), in what was called an ‘engineering economy’. By contrast, the legacy of the journeymen millwrights’ trade club is found to be their sophisticated democratic constitution, large parts of which would be adopted by future generations of engineering and other trade unions.","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48240015","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In 2007, UNITE the Union became Britain’s largest trade union with 2.1 million members, following the amalgamation of the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU) and AMICUS. Given their similar size and status, UNITE can be defined as a ‘balanced-partner’ amalgamation. The initial plan had included the GMB but it had withdrawn from the talks in 2006. Since 1979, in response to the adverse industrial relations context and loss of members all three potential partners had competed for new members by launching rival bids for mergers. An amalgamation offered a way to replace such competition with institutionalized co-operation, and resources could then be committed to regenerate union membership. The article analyses unions’ strategies and policies in relation to Mintzberg and Waters’s categories of ‘deliberate’ and ‘emergent’ strategies. However, such strategies may not be realized or only partially so, as a result of unintended consequences and unknown or misunderstood factors. Union mergers are beset with such examples because unions embody complex, political processes in which discrete groups – lay members and full-time officers – interact and compete to promote and negotiate distinctive visions as to the role and future of the union. Hence to analyse mergers in and between distinctive trade unions, a longitudinal, processional analysis, which explores the role of key personnel and their power resources, was required.
{"title":"The Making of UNITE the Union: The Dynamics of Amalgamation","authors":"R. Undy","doi":"10.3828/HSIR.2018.39.5","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/HSIR.2018.39.5","url":null,"abstract":"In 2007, UNITE the Union became Britain’s largest trade union with 2.1 million members, following the amalgamation of the Transport and General Workers’ Union (TGWU) and AMICUS. Given their similar size and status, UNITE can be defined as a ‘balanced-partner’ amalgamation. The initial plan had included the GMB but it had withdrawn from the talks in 2006. \u0000 \u0000Since 1979, in response to the adverse industrial relations context and loss of members all three potential partners had competed for new members by launching rival bids for mergers. An amalgamation offered a way to replace such competition with institutionalized co-operation, and resources could then be committed to regenerate union membership. \u0000 \u0000The article analyses unions’ strategies and policies in relation to Mintzberg and Waters’s categories of ‘deliberate’ and ‘emergent’ strategies. However, such strategies may not be realized or only partially so, as a result of unintended consequences and unknown or misunderstood factors. Union mergers are beset with such examples because unions embody complex, political processes in which discrete groups – lay members and full-time officers – interact and compete to promote and negotiate distinctive visions as to the role and future of the union. Hence to analyse mergers in and between distinctive trade unions, a longitudinal, processional analysis, which explores the role of key personnel and their power resources, was required.","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.3828/HSIR.2018.39.5","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49284052","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Since the early 1970s, there have been attempts – largely under the banner of a so-called European Social Model (ESM) – to introduce a social dimension to European Union (EU) integration. Over time, and despite frequent UK opposition, these attempts have resulted in the creation of a patchwork of European labour laws. However, this has not altered the status quo which prioritizes economic over social integration. This article analyses the way in which the ESM has attempted to ‘europeanize’ national labour law systems between 1973 and 2016, with due regard to the UK. The article concludes that it is difficult to speak of a clearly defined ESM which develops a social dimension to European integration that has had a significant positive influence on the UK. This became evident in the run-up to and outcome of the ‘Brexit’ referendum when rhetoric on the EU’s contribution to workers’ rights in the UK appeared insufficient to encourage a majority to support ‘Remain’
{"title":"The ‘European Social Model’ and the UK: From Europeanization to Anglicization","authors":"Rebecca L. Zahn","doi":"10.3828/hsir.2018.39.6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.3828/hsir.2018.39.6","url":null,"abstract":"Since the early 1970s, there have been attempts – largely under the banner of a so-called European Social Model (ESM) – to introduce a social dimension to European Union (EU) integration. Over time, and despite frequent UK opposition, these attempts have resulted in the creation of a patchwork of European labour laws. However, this has not altered the status quo which prioritizes economic over social integration. This article analyses the way in which the ESM has attempted to ‘europeanize’ national labour law systems between 1973 and 2016, with due regard to the UK. The article concludes that it is difficult to speak of a clearly defined ESM which develops a social dimension to European integration that has had a significant positive influence on the UK. This became evident in the run-up to and outcome of the ‘Brexit’ referendum when rhetoric on the EU’s contribution to workers’ rights in the UK appeared insufficient to encourage a majority to support ‘Remain’","PeriodicalId":36746,"journal":{"name":"Historical Studies in Industrial Relations","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.3828/hsir.2018.39.6","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47578200","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：