Posing larger questions: the British miners’ strike of 1984–85

The miners’ strike was the longest and most significant dispute in modern British industrial history. The conflict provided a vivid case study of the rationales and processes of capitalism and liberal democracy in the closing decades of this century. This article is an assessment of the important issues raised by the dispute.     

The reform of collective bargaining and strike activity in BL cars 1976–1982

Changes at BL after the Ryder Report were intended to assist the company's economic recovery and to help solve the perceived ‘strike problem’. This article argues that one consequence of reform was to change the pattern of conflict at BL into one which more closely resembles that of the industry as a whole.     

Wage claims in the British private sector: 1979–2003

Wage claims have been an important feature of British industrial relations during the postwar period. They help set the boundaries within which wage negotiations take place and provide an insight into the conduct of negotiations, especially during periods of change in industrial relations. Despite this, claims remain an underinvestigated area. This article provides a unique investigation of the dimensions of wage claims over a period of free collective bargaining. The number of wage claims declined along with unionisation but, over a period of economic turbulence, the conduct of British wage setting began to change. We examine data on claims and investigate the influences on changes in those claims over time. We find that external factors (inflation, unemployment and legislative control of unions) were more prominent in shaping the development of claims than changes in the composition of groups who continued to post claims.     

The stationarity of British economic and productivity growth 1856–1913

Characterization of late nineteenth-century British economic performance rests heavily on identifying trends and turning points in GDP and productivity growth. Crafts, Leybourne and Mills (1989) provide the most sophisticated study in this genre, deploying a time-varying parameter model, to severely dent the notion of a climacteric. This paper argues the linear trend approach to assessing the climacteric may be otiose. Investigating the order of integration of the GDP series, and the cointegration of GDP and factor input growth, suggests both GDP and productivity growth tended to revert to a constant mean rate within the period 1856–1913, and undermines the notion of a climacteric.     

The development of skilled work in the British coal mining industry, 1870–1985

Here the trajectory of manual work in the British coal mining industry since the late nineteenth century is examined in relation to five sociological models of development of modern skilled work. Each of the models is examined in the four main phases of the labour process in coal mining.     

Measuring the impact of work reorganization on firm performance: evidence from French manufacturing, 1995–1999

In this paper, we apply the method of selective matching to estimate the causal effect of organizational changes on employment, stock of capital, value added, and factor productivity. Derived from a panel of 2404 French manufacturing firms in 1997, our estimates show that work reorganization improves firm performance overall through a more efficient use of labor and capital, without requiring any increase in the factors of production.     

Class Formation and Localism in an Emerging Bureaucracy: British Bank Workers, 1880–1960

This article uses a case study of the spatial and career mobility of bank workers from Lloyds, a leading British bank, to explore the relationship between class formation and spatial mobility. The article argues against the idea that the large‐scale concentration and bureaucratization of the British banking industry in the early years of the twentieth century saw the emergence of a mobile middle‐class spiralist or cosmopolitan. We use archival data from Lloyds Bank to argue that the emergence of Lloyds as a large‐scale national bank involved a compromise with localized interests rather than a detachment of the bank from local concerns. We use data on the career histories of a representative sample of male bank employees to argue that spatial mobility was organized largely within regions and helped to consolidate the prospects of rural bank workers. We argue that London emerged as a distinctive ‘hub’ for banking careers, with significant amounts of movement to and from London from all regions. We therefore demonstrate how localized and rural cultures were sedimented within a large, national bureaucracy, and that a genuine ‘spiralist’ structure did not emerge. En s’appuyant sur une étude de cas relative à la mobilité géographique et professionnelle du personnel de la Lloyds, l’une des premières banques britanniques, cet article examine le lien entre la formation d’une classe et la mobilité spatiale. Il combat l’idée que la concentration et la bureaucratisation à grande échelle du secteur bancaire britannique au début du XXe siècle a fait na? tre une classe moyenne mobile en spirale ou cosmopolite. Les données d’archives de la Lloyds révèlent que son développement en tant que grande banque nationale s’est accompagné d’un compromis avec les intér? ts locaux plutôt que d’une indifférence à l’égard de ces préoccupations. Les informations sur les carrières d’un échantillon représentatif d’employés de banque masculins permettent d’établir que la mobilité géographique a été organisée largement au plan régional, contribuant à consolider les perspectives des employés en zone rurale. Londres est apparu comme un ‘pôle’ particulier dans les carrières bancaires, avec un nombre considérable de mutations vers et de la capitale à partir de toutes les régions. L’article montre ainsi comment des cultures locales et rurales se sont sédimentées au sein d’une importante bureaucratie nationale et qu’aucune structure ‘en spirale’ pure n’en est issue.     

中国制造业升级的内部需求制约:制造业消费阶段变化的影响

进入高质量发展的新阶段后,中国制造业的快速升级是支撑经济高质量发展的关键。全球经济复苏依旧乏力、中美贸易摩擦持续存在等外在因素造成中国制造业升级的外部需求条件迅速恶化,因此内部需求成为制造业升级的主要市场保障。然而,制造业消费需求却发生了不利的阶段变化,即制造业消费增速呈现显著回落特征,从而对中国制造业升级构成制约。面对需求结构的较快升级,供给侧结构性改革通过增加有效供给,提升供给质量,以使供给结构调整跟上需求结构升级的步伐,可在一定程度上促进潜在需求转化为现实需求,进而促进制造业消费需求增长。     

Employment impacts of cleaner production – evidence from a German study using case studies and surveys

The study assesses net employment effects of technical progress, which can be expected by the ongoing transition from end‐of‐pipe technologies towards cleaner production. Empirical evidence is presented on the basis of case studies and firm data including a telephone survey from German industry. The main result is that the transition from end‐of‐pipe technologies to cleaner production leads to a net creation of jobs, which is however restricted to a only small number of firms and to the group of highly skilled labour. Eco‐innovations, like other innovations, are non‐neutral. The demand for skilled and highly skilled labour rises while the demand for unskilled labour decreases. Synergies between environmental, labour market and innovation policy are apparent but they are however small and specific. The exploitation of these synergies requires the design of specific policy programmes differentiating between types of eco‐innovation. The promotion of product‐integrated environmental measures should be more successful if new products complement older ones, while process‐integrated environmental measures should be more successful if consumers' demand is more price elastic. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. and ERP Environment     

Platform strategy of video game software in Japan, 1984–1994: theory and evidence

This paper analyzes a model of platform competition in markets of system products composed of hardware and complementary software, with a specific focus on exclusive contracting. When hardware products are strongly differentiated, or when consumers value the marginal benefit of additional software variety highly, we find that, in equilibrium, hardware firms will engage in exclusive contracting of software development. This finding is strongly supported by our empirical results in the Japanese home video game industry, dominated by Nintendo from 1984 to 1994. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Trade unionism and partnership in practice: evidence from the Barclays–Unifi agreement

This article draws on empirical evidence from Barclays Bank PLC to explore the impact of partnership on trade union organisation. It outlines the rationale, development, benefits and pitfalls of the partnership agreement between Barclays and Unifi. Particular attention is paid to the positive impact the agreement has had on systems of workplace representation and on the ways in which the partnership needs to develop to better serve the trade union side. It is argued that unions need to manage the risks of partnership, ensuring their continued legitimacy in the eyes of union members.     

The British merger movement: the importance of the ‘aggressive’ unions

Union mergers in Britain are dominated numerically by transfers of engagements from minor unions to major unions. Just five major or acquiring unions were responsible for absorbing 79% of all transfers to TUC affiliated unions between 1978 and 1994. This study establishes the extent of this domination, examines the characteristics of the five unions’ aggressive merger policies and considers the consequences of the findings for theories of union mergers.     

The fiscal behavior of municipal governments: 1905–1930

This report discusses a new set of annual U. S. municipal expenditure estimates. These estimates deal with the 1905–1930 period. While these expenditures are seen to be influenced by urbanization and price inflation, it is clear that real per capita spending rose substantially during the period. The distribution of municipal spending between current and capital accounts is seen to be associated with relative price change. A model of the structure of budget decisions—emphasizing an incremental budgeting format—is developed. Estimates of the structural parameters suggest that this model adequately represents the data; and that municipal decision makers responded in a regular and rational fashion to shifts in relative prices and nominal sources of funds.