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This paper aims to explains how the Dutch unions evolved in the post war period and the reasons why they committed such significant resources to developing strong links and assisting the new democracies of Central and Eastern Europe complete the “Transition Process”.

The author draws on his first‐hand experience as the president of the Dutch graphical union, and for many years president and vice president of the sector's international trade union federations – to give an insight as to the rationale behind international trade union cooperation and solidarity.

The paper suggests that the help and assistance provided by the West European workers organisations, although costly has brought added value to the enlarged European Trade Union movement in so much as it has ensured that the Central and Eastern European trade unions have been able to complete the transition period.

The paper provides a first hand account of the difficulties that trade unions in the former soviet block countries had to deal with during the transition period, and how trade unions in the West had to overcome ideological and historical prejudices in order to provide help and assistance to their sister unions in Central and Eastern Europe.

This paper aims to provide a Norwegian perspective of how trade unions in the former Soviet block countries have dealt with the challenges of the post‐communist period and how the European trade union movement has attempted to assist them as they have adjusted to representing and protecting the interests of workers in a market economy.

This paper considers the point that the experiences of trade union development in the former communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe should not be assumed to have followed some monolithic pattern.

Each of the individual states experienced challenges that were unique to them and which reflected the economic, geographical and social situation they found themselves in when they took the “leap in the dark” at the end of the 1990s. The speed at which they made the transition to a market economy was also quite diverse with some countries such a Czech Republic and Hungary making progress quickly whilst others, for understandable reasons, were much slower off the mark.

One of the main thrusts of this paper is the diversity of experience amongst the former Soviet block countries both prior to and after the 1989 changes. The paper invites researchers to explore this diversity further in terms of causality and the impact of this diversity on the democratisation process of Central and Eastern European Countries.

Provides a timely reminder of the dangers of perceiving trade unions in the former communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe as replicas of their counterparts in the West. The picture he paints of the diversity of the region, the weakness of national trade union headquarters starved of funds to pursue industrial objectives by local trade union organisations who have a “holiday club” mentality and retain the bulk of the income for social and welfare benefits reminds us of the extreme difficulties that face trade unions in CEE countries as the strive to build strong and effective organisations capable of challenging multinational conglomerates.

The paper aims to provide an insight into the psychic of working people in the immediate aftermath of the 1989 changes, especially with regards to their perception of the new free trade unions, how this perception changed and the role that education and training has played in helping them develop free and effective trade unions capable of operating in Market Societies.

The paper has used extensively the archives of the GPMU and UEG to piece together 15 years experience of a international trade union federation's efforts to assist its new affiliates in Central and Eastern Europe adapt to operating in a market economy.

The paper suggests that attitudes, perceptions and aspirations have changed, both amongst the newly democratised trade unions of the CEEC countries, and the trade unions in the West. Trade union education and training over the past 15 years has created confident and capable trade union organisations who now stand on equal terms with their Western European counterparts.

The authors access to the primary materials in the archives of the British Print Union and the European Federation for graphical workers provides a unique insight which demonstrates that the help and assistance given after 1989 was systematic, well planned, adequately funded and has provided tangible outcomes.

Presents 35 abstracts from the 2001 Employment Research Unit Annual conference held at Cardiff Business School in September 2001. Attempts to explore the theme of changing politics of employment relations beyond and within the nation state, against a background of concern in the developed economies at the erosion of relatively advanced conditions of work and social welfare through increasing competition and international agitation for more effective global labour standards. Divides this concept into two areas, addressing the erosion of employment standards through processes of restructuring and examining attempts by governments, trade unions and agencies to re‐create effective systems of regulation. Gives case examples from areas such as India, Wales, London, Ireland, South Africa, Europe and Japan. Covers subjects such as the Disability Discrimination Act, minimum wage, training, contract workers and managing change.

A distinction must be drawn between a dismissal on the one hand, and on the other a repudiation of a contract of employment as a result of a breach of a fundamental term of that contract. When such a repudiation has been accepted by the innocent party then a termination of employment takes place. Such termination does not constitute dismissal (see London v. James Laidlaw & Sons Ltd (1974) IRLR 136 and Gannon v. J. C. Firth (1976) IRLR 415 EAT).

Nigeria is experiencing an expanding variety of what is termed collective bargaining, which is being propelled by socio-economic challenges and the emerging political dispensation that had long eluded the country, albeit the numerous contours needing some pragmatic approaches from the state, employers of labour and the trade unions at the local and national levels. Therefore, this study represents an attempt to illustrate the rising collective bargaining pattern in Nigeria.

This study drew on employee and employer sectoral associations examples together with labour union structures of the state to assess what underlined collective bargaining developments from the broad context of collective bargaining and the industrial relations implications. Content analysis was employed to analyse the secondary data (found in relevant company handbooks, policies, collective agreements, etc.) and primary data obtained through unstructured interviews.

A form of collective bargaining is emerging where the trade unions are embracing symbiotic agreements at plant levels to improve conditions of employment and thus weakening the hold of the national union from collective bargaining – a move that may challenge the conceptual framework of collective bargaining as conceived by many states in developing economies.

This is an investigative paper, carefully trailing the framework of collective bargaining from direct contacts with all stakeholders in the labour corridors of Nigeria – such as the Nigeria Labour Congress, Nigeria Employers’ Consultative Association, Chemical and Non-Metallic Products Employer's Federation, Metal Products Workers Union of Nigeria and Personnel Practitioners, cutting across all the segments of the political and economic development of the country.

The purpose of this paper is to explain why, in spite having a relatively powerful labour movement at the start of the economic transformation, Romania ended up with a highly deregulated system of industrial relations in the aftermath of the global economic crisis of 2009 and with trade unions which seem incapable to defend their interests.

The authors trace the changing role that Romanian trade unions had in national policy making and show that the beginning of 2000s represents a critical point for the power loss sustained by organised labour.

The authors argue that a key element for explaining labour’s decline is the growing pressure exercised by various international organisations for the adoption of deregulatory labour market reforms. While during the 1990s this pressure was circumvented by successive governments which peddled back and forth between union wage pressure and fiscal austerity measures, beginning with 2000s, EU accession conditionalities coupled with IMF and World Bank policy recommendations enabled the international deregulation agenda to be implemented without much opposition.

The paper brings new evidence on the impact of international actors on the Romanian collective bargaining and labour market institutions.

The new economic-policy regime in Sweden in the 1990s included deregulation, central-bank independence, inflation targets and fiscal rules but also active labour market policy and voluntary incomes policy. This chapter describes the content, determinants and performance of the new economic policy in Sweden in a comparative, mainly Nordic, perspective. The new economic-policy regime is explained by the deep recession and budget crisis in the early 1990s, new economic ideas and the power of economic experts. In the 1998–2007 period, Sweden displayed relatively low inflation and high productivity growth, but unemployment was high, especially by national standards. The restrictive monetary policy was responsible for the low inflation, and the dynamic (ICT) sector was decisive for the productivity miracle. Furthermore, productivity increases in the ICT sector largely explains why the Central Bank undershot its inflation target in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The new economic-policy regime in Sweden performed well during the global financial crisis. However, as in other OECD countries, the moderate increase in unemployment was largely attributed to labour hoarding. And the rapid recovery of the Baltic countries made it possible for Sweden to avoid a bank crisis.

The purpose of this editorial is to examine the implementations of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling in December 2007 on the Laval case in Sweden for trade unions.

The editorial outlines the ECJ decision and then examines the response of the European Trade Union Confederation and the social partners and governments in Sweden and Denmark.

The ECJ upholds in European Union (EU) law the right to strike as a fundamental right and the right of a union to undertake industrial action against wage dumping. The judgement, however, restraints these rights to ensuring that foreign service providers are complying with the minimum employment standards as laid down in the host country legislation. Trade unions in the host county cannot undertake industrial action to force a foreign service provider to provide better terms and conditions of employment than that provided by the laws of the host country. The judgement implies that trade unions cannot in host countries by means of collective action, demand more than the legal minimum rate of pay from a company coming from a different EU member state.

The editorial offers insights into EU law and its implementations for preventing wage dumping between EU member states.

This article examines the impact of the 1997‐2001 Labour Government’s public policy on British trade unions. First, the ideologies of New Labour and New Unionism are considered; second, the TUC’s relationship with the Government is discussed, by reference, one, to procedural and, two, to substantive interests; and, last, the value of the relationship to the trade unions will be assessed, by examining two of the four problem areas identified by Minkin as determining the unity of the Labour Movement, i.e. ideological compatibility and satisfaction of unions’ interests.