The Economic Effects of Unionism on Japanese Manufacturing Enterprises

Abstract : This paper examines the relationship between unions and the economic performance of firms in the Japanese manufacturing sector. Although the effects of trade unions on the enterprise has been the subject of substantial research over the past decade, this research has focused almost exclusively on Western systems of industrial relations and union organization. In this study, Japanese enterprise unions were found to be associated with significantly lower levels of profit, lower productivity and higher levels of capital intensity. These results challenge the commonly held views of a subservient and dependent union movement in Japan.     

The Rise of Experimentalism in German Collective Bargaining

This paper addresses the debate on union strategies by analysing industrial relations change in three of Germany's most internationalized sectors: chemicals, metalworking and construction. It characterizes two logics of change in German industrial relations: a battlefield logic and an experimentalist logic. It demonstrates historical trends towards centralization of wage bargaining in each sector before looking at recent pressures for decentralization and flexibility. In chemi‐cals, the social partners control decentralization. In metalworking increasing flexibility is characterized by a mismatch between the national‐level union and the district‐level employers. Finally, the construction union seeks to replace the centralized bargaining system with a state minimum wage.     

Among the Ashes: Trade Union Strategies in the UK and German Steel Industries

The trade unions in the steel industry have faced two waves of restructuring, the first centring on closures, capacity reductions and mass redundancies, the second involving fundamental changes to patterns of work organization, labour utilization and industrial relations. Overall, the trade unions involved have failed to develop an adequate response to management-led change, relying instead on traditional methods and lines of interest representation. The challenges embodied in such developments as teamworking and craft restructuring are considered, together with union responses and the structural and ideological constraints on those responses. Contrasts are drawn with more successful union involvement in comparable changes in the German steel industry. In the conclusion, the authors review the dilemmas facing the UK unions in the steel industry and the main areas for a new agenda.     

Trade Union Recognition and Employment Contraction. Britain, 1980–1984

Information contained in the two work-place industrial relations surveys reveals that the proportion of employees, both manual and non-manual, in private sector establishments which recognised trade unions declined in the period 1980-84. The various pieces of analysis undertaken in this paper reveal that establishment closures and employment reduction concentrated among relatively large sized establishments were a major source of the observed decline in union organisation.     

Organizing the Next Generation: Influences on Young Workers' Willingness to Join Unions in Canada

This paper argues that union attitudes and behaviour are important but neglected features of the school–work transition process. Using longitudinal panel data from a study of high school and university graduates in three Canadian cities, we examine how young people's previous union membership, attitudes and educational, labour market and workplace experiences shape their willingness to join unions. This paper establishes that views about unions are emergent during youth, solidifying with age and experience. The implications of these findings for industrial relations, school–work transitions research and labour movement organizing are discussed.     

Reconceptualizing Local Union Responses to Workplace Restructuring in North America

To date no clear consensus has emerged about how industrial relations scholars ought to conceptualize union responses to workplace restructuring. Yet, local union responses to management‐initiated workplace change can differ markedly and can have important implications for the outcomes of restructuring. This study examines the experiences of three local unions engaged in workplace restructuring in the North American steel industry and suggests a reconceptualization of local union responses, away from a simple 'militant'–'cooperative' dichotomy towards a conceptualization based on the process by which local unions engage with management over restructuring.     

Strategy and Trade Union Effectiveness in a Neo-liberal Environment

In the absence of state sponsorship, unions must become more effective in the workplace or suffer the inevitable consequences. The analysis of union strategy and effectiveness, however, presents special difficulties. We adopt a strategic choice perspective, defining strategy as a framework of critical, enacted choices about the ends and means of an organization. For unions in a neo-liberal context, this means that strategy can be described in terms of the nexus between two complex dimensions: union-worker relations and union-employer relations. On this basis, we identify four broad patterns of union strategic choice in the New Zealand environment: classic, paper tiger, consultancy, and partnership unionism. Those patterns in which union-worker relations rely on 'servicing' are seen as fatally flawed at worst, and strategically vulnerable at best. On the other hand, those patterns in which union-worker relations are more securely based on servicing complemented with robust forms of organization also contain strategic tensions. These must be managed carefully if unions are to become more effective. While illustrated with New Zealand case studies, this framework provides lines of analysis for the strategic review of unions in neo-liberal contexts more generally.     

Negotiating Amalgamations: Territorial and Political Consolidation and Administrative Reform in Public-Sector Service Unions in the UK

Since 1990 there has been a series of union amalgamations among Britain's public-sector unions. This study examines three amalgamations and one aborted amalgamation. Each was initiated by union leaders reacting to government-sponsored reforms of the public sector, and all involved unions with either defensive or consolidatory merger motivations. The complex negotiations are presented as resolving issues of political, democratic and administrative concerns. It is argued that the balance of power on critical constitutional issues lay with the leaders of the consolidatory unions, particularly the dominant activist groups within such unions. As a consequence, success in amalgamation negotiations lay in satisfying such group's interests in sustaining the existing political ethos and democratic system, while securing agreement on the desired administrative reforms.     

Economic Integration and State Responses: Change in European Industrial Relations since Maastricht

The article analyses industrial relations change in the six largest EU countries since 1992 in relation to increased internationalization pressures. Based on qualitative and quantitative analysis, it distinguishes between associational and state governance, and detects that despite a predominant, but not universal, trend of weakening trade unions and collective bargaining, no overall liberalization has occurred in the political regulation of employment (employment policies, welfare state, labour law, state support to collective bargaining, public sector). Rather than converging towards neoliberalism, industrial relations emerge as more politically contingent and dependent on multiple forms of power, which are affected by internationalization in different ways.     

Catching Fire: Institutional Interdependencies in Union‐Facilitated Knowledge Diffusion

I find that school union representatives’ ‘boundary spanning’ communications throughout the school district predict the diffusion of knowledge between schools. Hence, my data reveal school union representatives as critical conduits for improvement‐related knowledge transfer and innovation. Yet, I also find that these external networks interact strongly with the level of workforce participation characterizing each school: The effects of external networks on internal knowledge diffusion are considerably stronger in more participative schools compared to less participative schools. This research contributes to industrial relations scholarship by demonstrating how union‐related institutions can foster unique social structures that directly strengthen innovation‐related capabilities, as well as how the efficacy of these networks depends on managerial norms at different areas of the organization. This study is also of timely practical relevance at a time when labour unions are increasingly painted as obstacles to, rather than potential facilitators of, improvement and innovation.     

The Nature of Some Recent Trade Union Modernization Policies in the UK

This article draws on recent research to present findings concerning the nature of some recent trade union modernization policies in the UK. In response to decline, it can be seen that the unions have increasingly been encouraged to represent and service members more as individuals than as part of a collective. This appears to be consonant with the frequently expressed view that greater individualism, both in employment and in society more generally, has largely been responsible for recent union weaknesses, and that if they are to endure the unions should adapt to it. Using data generated from interviews with full-time officers from a number of unions and from a case study of Unison organization within a local authority, the paper identifies two crucial problems with such an approach. First, it is argued that the substantial difficulties that the unions have experienced recently have been caused by a process of decollectivization in employment relations, and not one of individualization. Second, an indication of the complexity of the relationship between individualism and collectivism within trade unionism is given, something that is entirely ignored by proponents of the thesis that unions should concentrate solely on appealing to individuals.     

A Typology of Japanese Enterprise Unions

Are Japanese enterprise unions similar, or are there substantial variations among these unions in relation to their dependence on management and their structures for member involvement? Using a survey of unions conducted in 1991 and detailed interviews with union officials in 1993, a typology of enterprise unionism is developed. A preliminary assessment of the model is then made with reference to a range of industrial relations practices and behaviour.     

The Influence of Leadership and Member Attitudes in Understanding the Nature of Union Participation

There has been a growth of interest among industrial relations scholars in the functions of union leadership at both national and local levels. This paper presents a survey-based analysis of the impact of union leaders on member participation in Cypriot public-sector trade unions. It indicates that active leaders promote participation both directly and indirectly, through their influence on members' attitudes towards the union. The study emphasizes the importance of leadership in facilitating further understanding of member participation in trade unions.     

Experience with Company Unions and their Treatment under the Wagner Act: A Four Frames of Reference Analysis

This paper reexamines American experience with company unions (also known as nonunion employee representation plans) before they were banned by the Wagner Act (1935). For the half‐century following the passage of the act, labor historians and industrial relations scholars painted a bleak portrait of company unions as anti‐union sham organizations. Since the 1980s, additional research has documented a more positive side; similarly, concern has grown that the Wagner Act's ban is stifling legitimate employee participation programs. This paper brings new theoretical and empirical evidence to both historical and legal parts of this debate, including examination of company unions through individualist, unitarist, pluralist, and radical frames; demonstration that the pluralists’ view of company unions was more diverse and positive than conventionally portrayed; presentation of new historical evidence and testimony on the company union experience; and a substantially revisionist assessment of the merits of the Wagner Act's ban. In particular, the conclusion is that, given any reasonable weighting of the four frames, the company union ban is overly restrictive and should be modified so companies can implement the positive side of nonunion employee committees but not the negative. The paper ends by noting that the unbalanced and narrowly critical treatment of company unions in the mainline industrial relations tradition is a case study of the field's perhaps fatal post–World War II core intellectual‐normative contradiction—professed inclusiveness of all frames of employment relations but, in practice, attention to and preference for a narrow union‐centric version of one frame.     

Justice and Union Participation: An Extension and Test of Mobilization Theory

Heeding John Kelly's call to reorient the field of industrial relations towards the study of injustice, we employ mobilization, social exchange and organizational justice theories to specify and test a model of union participation. Using individual‐level survey data from public‐sector union members to test our model, we find that differences in worker perceptions of workplace injustice and union justice explain slightly more variation in members’ union participation than more traditional measures of job satisfaction and union instrumentality perceptions. The implications of our analysis for researchers and union practitioners are also discussed.     

Union–Member Relations and Satisfaction with Unions in South Korea

This paper uses a large sample of South Korean union members working in different industries and occupations to test a model of union satisfaction. The results suggest that union–member relations — member representation and union leader effectiveness — are more important than the economic results that unions provide to members. These findings are in line with our general argument that, where unions rely on decentralized collective bargaining as the prime method of employment regulation, they depend heavily on internal union relations for their effectiveness. We contend that, if unions are to limit the decline in their influence, assessing and changing internal union relations should be a priority.     

Industrial Relations in Transition Economies: Emergent Industrial Relations Institutions in Bulgaria

East European societies currently in transition to market economies are creating new structures for industrial relations. Transition has ambiguous effects upon the relations between industrial relations institutions and the state. On the one hand, economic pluralism implies separation between state and economy and 'depoliticization'. On the other, economic crises and threats to social order require co-operation between state and unions. The influence of the state is greater because of the embryonic form of employer organization and enterprise-level management. This paper examines the political and economic contexts of industrial relations in Bulgaria, as an example of one type of 'constrained' collective bargaining system. The paper emphasizes continuities between the communist and post-communist period, and the central role of trade unions in the transition process.     

MAPs: Labor-Based Peer Assistance in the Workplace

An offshoot of management-based Employee Assistance Programs, Member Assistance Programs (MAPs) are peer-based programs designed to help union members suffering from substance abuse and other personal problems. Although a relatively recent phenomenon, MAPs are rooted in traditional union principles of voluntarism and mutual aid. This article examines the emergence and growing popularity of MAPs, differences in MAP structure and orientation across unions, and the potential significance of MAPs to unions and industrial relations.     

Annual Review Article 1991

This paper reviews a number of themes or subject areas in British industrial relations which attained a particular level of prominence in 1991. The leading themes covered are wage determination in the context of recession, public-sector industrial relations, union recognition and derecognition developments, training, HRM competitive strategy and international joint ventures. Among the personal observations and comments made are that derecognition is far from being the most important indicator of management opposition to unions, that some criticisms of HRM are rather misplaced, and that the growth of international joint ventures warrants more attention from industrial relations researchers.     

Unionism in the United States and Other Advanced OECD Countries

In this paper we compare the changing pattern of unionization in OECD countries, reviewing existing evidence and presenting new information on union-nonunion differentials in labor market outcomes in these countries. Our principal source of information are the micro data files of the International Social Survey Programme cross-country surveys of 1985–87. Our analysis shows that U.S. unions have a larger effect on wages than on other outcomes than unions in other OECD countries, and we argue that the high union premium in the United States has contributed to the decline in union density and divergence of the US. industrial relations system