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This paper aims to examine the reaction of a local workforce to global restructuring in a transnational company (TNC), which entailed the closure of a manufacturing plant (La Monroe) in Northern Spain. The article explores the micro-political nature of the corporate decision to close the plant, the workforce reaction to relocation and the discourse legitimizing global restructuring. It also delves into the contra-hegemonic potential of labour as a main stakeholder in TNCs.

The methodological approach is qualitative. The article presents a theoretically informed and analytical case study based on the literature on micro-politics and power relations in TNCs. Fieldwork is based on semi-structured interviews carried out with relevant stakeholders and other external actors to the TNC.

The findings substantiate the dynamic role of micro-politics within TNCs. The article presents and discusses evidence of the formation of a broad multi-level political network of resistance to a plant closure plan.

More case study analysis would further support the findings in the paper and provide for a comparative approach.

The article substantiates the dynamic role of micro-politics and power relations in the reification of social norms and discourses on production relocation. It offers an empirical appraisal of the micro-political approach to global restructuring in TNCs. The article also puts labour strategies at the forefront of the analysis in corporate relocation.

The purpose of this paper is to reconstruct the development of industrial relations (IR) in Spain since the democratic transition and analyses the current dilemmas of its social and political actors in the context of the long-lasting economic downturn.

Combining a political economy, identifying Spain as a particular variety of modern capitalism, and actor-centred historical institutionalism approach, outlining the formation and strategies of the main social actors, the paper draws on the broad range of research on IR in Spain and its theoretical debates, including proper research in the field.

The legacies of the latecomer industrialisation and the semi-peripheral development model still shape the Spanish economy and IR. The impact of the current economic and political-institutional crisis affects the entire institutional IR system and its actors shifting power towards the individual employer thus weakening trade unions, labour rights and collective bargaining. Regarding the theoretical debate on corporatism, the Spanish case provides ambiguous results. The lack of a coherent institutional system and efficient political administration limits the effectiveness of corporatist arrangements and reduces them to contingent concertation strategies. Spain confirms that IR still largely depend on the specific national variety of capitalism that condition economic development and resources for political exchange.

The paper presents an original, theoretical-informed reconstruction of the Spanish IR and allows an understanding of the current institutional transformations and strategic dilemmas in the light of historical legacies. Additionally, the theoretical debates on neo-corporatism and semi-peripheral development are enriched through its application to the Spanish case.

This article aims to develop an original conceptual approach for the research and analysis of European works councils (EWCs) through a critical examination of the theoretical debate on the Europeanization of industrial relations and the main results of the huge body of quantitative and qualitative empirical studies of these transnational bodies for effective worker participation.

Starting from the authors' own experiences in qualitative case‐study research, they summarise the main developments of EWCs as the most advanced institutional piece in the emerging dimension of European industrial relations and discuss the strength and weakness of the different approaches employed in EWC research.

From a perspective of “political economy of European integration” the development of EWCs shows the changing power constellations at the micro‐ and meso‐level of transnational firm complexes. More than 800 EWCs councils with thousands of workers' representatives generate hope for an emergent system of industrial relations, but globalization, economic crisis, intensification of regime competition or the consequences on employment of relocation, restructuring and downsizing are threatening advances in this fundamental piece of the European social project.

The paper offers not only a comprehensive state of the art of theoretical debate and empirical research on EWCs, but develops an original and innovative analytical approach for future research. In a meso‐political perspective, linking together micro‐politics with the interaction of the firm with other collective actors, namely public authorities, trade unions and employers' associations at different levels, transnational industrial relations at company level are best analysed as dynamic networks of actors embedded in the framework of the transnational corporation, conceived as a political complex with different actors struggling for increasing their influence on corporate decision‐making processes.

The purpose of this editorial is to introduce this special issue on “International trade union networks, European works' councils and international labour regimes”.

The editorial provides an overview and introduces the papers which make up the special issue.

These papers allow us to consider the social, political and institutional dimensions of grass roots organising across countries and continents.

The issue adds new insights into the topic in addition to the more typical focus on institutional levels of union engagement.

The purpose of this paper is to examine European Union (EU) industrial relations in their development over time. It describes and analyzes their main constituent parts, which are deployed along four interlinked institutional dimensions: tripartite concertation; cross-industry social dialogue; sectoral social dialogue; and employee representation and negotiation at the transnational company level. The focus lies strictly on the emerging EU layer of industrial relations, which is common to the different Member States and not on comparative European industrial relations.

The paper is conceptual in nature. It considers the differences and mutually interdependent legal and political processes, policies and institutions between EU industrial relations and national industrial relations.

The findings substantiate that EU industrial relations constitute an incomplete but perfectly traceable transnational reality distinct from industrial relations in the Member States. EU industrial relations are not to supersede but to supplement national industrial relations. Neither the EU institutional framework nor the European social partners have the mandate, legitimation or desire to perform a more ambitious role.

More empirically oriented research would further support the findings in the paper.

The paper presents a conceptual review based on a comprehensive and critical reading of the literature on EU industrial relations. It also puts labor strategies at the forefront of the analysis in corporate relocation.