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Approaches to industrial conflict resolution in Canada and Britain are examined. The Canadian policy to regulate industrial conflict through a discrete interventionist formula, as opposed to British government′s “hands‐off” approach in dealing with industrial disputes, would suggest a much greater volume in strike activity and incidence of strikes in Britain than in Canada. But this is not the case; the reverse is true. A “politics of production” approach, concentrating on three key loci of workplace struggle between management and labour in the two countries, is presented, concentrating on areas of discipline, regulation of the internal labour market and job control. It is argued that rather than reducing industrial conflict, the Canadian policy may actually be a major cause.

While it is widely recognized that conflict at work takes various forms, there is much confusion and disagreement among theorists and practitioners as to what constitutes conflict – discontent – and what range of behavioural form it takes. As for behavioural expressions of conflict, only the most visible forms such as strikes, labour turnover and absenteeism have received attention. Other unconventional forms of behaviour such as sabotage, pilferage and disruptive practices have, by and large, been neglected. At present, a comprehensive classification which includes both conventional and unconventional expressions of discontent is difficult to find. Includes a direct response to this vacuum. Offers a behavioural framework which has the potential for not only including the actors involved, but also explaining the behavioural strategies open to people and the reasons for choosing a particular way of expressing their discontent. Concludes that a better understanding of workplace conflict and its effective management requires appreciating the range of behavioural expressions involved; creation of the work environment conducive to the conflict processing and conflict resolution; and understanding the significance of the potential of the people as choice makers, when choosing from among the options open to them for expressing discontent.

Only around 0.01 per cent of all working‐days are lost due to industrial conflict in the average western economy. Nevertheless, conflicts are highly visible phenomena and it was one of the first areas most statistical agencies started covering. Therefore, long conflict series exist for most developed Western economies. These series are of a poor quality compared to most series analysed by economists, but they have, nevertheless, a lot to tell. In a number of papers we have tried to cover different parts of the story — in the present article we shall concentrate on the large shifts (often 5–10 times) in the conflict levels over time and the remarkable differences (often 10–20 times) in conflict levels between countries, even when we look only at developed Western economies.

The purpose of this paper is to develop an analytical framework to categorize the quality of industrial relations in foreign affiliates. Using the case of foreign affiliates in Germany, this paper further explores what factors shape the quality of industrial relations in foreign affiliates.

Given the scarcity of research on industrial relations in foreign affiliates, this paper is based on conceptual work as well as on a comparative case investigation of 21 foreign affiliates in Germany, involving informants from both labor and management.

Industrial relations in foreign affiliates in Germany can take four different qualities, based on the following: social partnership; conflict partnership; latently adversarial; and adversarial relations. While previous literature focused on country-of-origin effects, the authors’ case-based investigation further revealed that both affiliate effects and multinational corporation (MNC) effects have a strong impact on the quality of industrial relations in foreign affiliates in Germany.

This paper provides systematic evidence on the presumption that micro-organizational and MNC-specific factors are necessary to gain a deeper understanding of industrial relations in MNCs. Moreover, this paper contributes to the discussion on the quality of industrial relations in foreign affiliates in Germany, by placing results from both single-case studies and management surveys into perspective.

The librarian and researcher have to be able to uncover specific articles in their areas of interest. This Bibliography is designed to help. Volume IV, like Volume III, contains features to help the reader to retrieve relevant literature from MCB University Press' considerable output. Each entry within has been indexed according to author(s) and the Fifth Edition of the SCIMP/SCAMP Thesaurus. The latter thus provides a full subject index to facilitate rapid retrieval. Each article or book is assigned its own unique number and this is used in both the subject and author index. This Volume indexes 29 journals indicating the depth, coverage and expansion of MCB's portfolio.

This paper develops and tests a new integrative theoretical framework for the study of workplace conflict that links the literatures of such disciplines as organization behavior, industrial relations, management, psychology, sociology, and social movement. It provides testable hypotheses where conflict is structurally blocked by laws, organizational rules, or social norms. It is hypothesized that a blockage of one expression will cause conflict to take on more covert forms of that same expression and to shift to other permitted forms.

In a test of the theory in municipal collective bargaining, the paper found that conflict that was structurally blocked in the form of strikes was redirected to both covert collective actions (sick-outs, slowdowns, etc.), other permitted collective actions (e.g., unfair labor practices) and such individual expressions as grievances.

There would appear to be a promising agenda for future research into the other cases described in the framework. For example, from the nonunion employer where collective actions are prohibited but individual grievances allowed it is hypothesized that such covert conflict as absenteeism, theft, or sabotage will be reduced. On the other hand, these same nonunion firms are predicted to have higher levels of individual conflict than unionized firms where both strikes and grievances are permitted.

Future research that evaluates workplace conflict resolution ought to take into account the complex relationships between conflict expressions suggested in the new framework. The temptation of researchers to study one expression at a time should be resisted.

The Process of Third Party Intervention We cannot of course consider or examine the skills of any role in a vacuum. In the case of a mediator we have little experience to use as a basis as we are to some extent advocating new departures from existing practice. We must therefore consider a wide range of current practices and carefully examine the extension of present experience. Industrial relations mediation has traditionally used only a limited range of skills extensively and thoroughly as an examination of the following conciliation process shows. These are nevertheless basic and integral to the mediation process.

There is no clear evidence that British workplaces are any nearer the achievement of being representative bureaucracies as far as disciplinary rules are concerned as public policy initiatives are to placing the emphasis on a corrective as opposed to a punitive approach to Industrial discipline. The concept of industrial discipline is examined alongside forms of management control. Management aims and objectives and the difficulties management encounters in this sphere are considered. Worker attitudes and sources of complaints are discussed in the context of the type of involvement unions should have in the discipline process. The trend towards formalisation is explored and Its reasons, advantages and disadvantages discussed. Discipline Is still conflict‐prone and the reasons for this and ways to minimise it are examined. The work is based on an extensive review of the literature and an ESRC research project that examined disciplinary practice in eight different workplaces. Findings are based on interviews with personnel, line managers and shop stewards and examination of rule books, procedures and disciplinary records. The project was carried out during 1981–1983.

In a recent article in this journal Geoffrey Stuttard argued that the provisions of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 which provide for union appointed safety representatives have important implications for extending industrial democracy. The essence of this line of argument is that the subject area of workplace health and safety, which has for so long been dominated by unilateral management decision making at the individual workplace and a framework of common and statute law that has taken a highly “paternalistic” attitude towards the issue of employee and union involvement, is to become at least an area of extensive joint discussion, and possible one of joint decision making.

The employment relationship is beset by an incongruous mix of bases for cooperation and conflict. Scholars have attempted to reconcile the simultaneous presence of convergent and divergent interests between capital and labour in several ways and distinctive bodies of theory addressing this matter have emerged. However, to date, attempts to incorporate the role that the passage of time plays in changing the ratio of conflict to cooperation in the employment relationship have mostly been inadequate. This essay presents a theory about this issue based on six tenets. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

A critical review of existing genres of literature addressing conflict and cooperation in the employment relationship and a conceptual contribution to a perceived generic limitation of these bodies of literature.

A new conceptualization of the elements causing conflict and cooperation between employers and their employees. The theory presented is modular and mostly compatible with the work of earlier scholars. It has theoretical and practical application and aids in understanding the strategic management consequences of new employment forms when other pertinent variables are held constant.

The paper offers a fresh perspective on new employment forms in particular

A new conceptualization of the elements causing conflict and cooperation between employers and their employees. The new view is not necessarily incompatible with earlier perspectives but does have potential to create genuinely new research paradigms and reframe certain contemporary debates about non-standard work in particular.