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11 – 20 of over 7000The Saint Valentine's Decree (1984) and the ensuing hard‐fought referendum (1985), which reduced the automatisms of scala mobile, started a process of redefinition of wage fixing…
Abstract
Purpose
The Saint Valentine's Decree (1984) and the ensuing hard‐fought referendum (1985), which reduced the automatisms of scala mobile, started a process of redefinition of wage fixing in Italy, which culminated with the final abolition of scala mobile (1992) and the approval of Protocollo d'intesa (1993). Since then, following new corporatist principles, a national system of centralised wage bargaining (concertazione) and so‐called “institutional indexation” have governed the determination of wages. Does incomes policy generate greater coordination in the process of wage formation? Does it cause greater co‐movement of wages, prices, labour productivity and unemployment? This paper aims to answer these questions with reference to one of the G8 economies.
Design/methodology/approach
After testing for unit root each component by using the ADF, Phillips and Perron, DF‐GLS and Zivot and Andrews statistics, the paper tests for co‐integration the so‐called WPYE model using different methods. The Engle and Granger approach is used to assess the impact of incomes policy on the speed of adjustment of real wages, productivity (and unemployment) to their equilibrium value, while the Gregory and Hansen procedure serves as a means to endogenously detect the presence of a regime shift. The paper estimates coefficients before and after the structural break.
Findings
Incomes policy based on the 1993 Protocol has caused a regime shift in the process of wage determination. The long‐run estimates of the WPYE model do not generate stationary residuals except when a dummy for 1993 is added. The share of wages over GDP reduces by about ten percentage points in the early 1990s and has stood at about 57 per cent since 1995. The link with productivity is close to one‐to‐one only before the break. The feedback mechanism, as measured by the coefficient of lagged residuals in short‐run estimates, is increased from −0.46 in the pre‐reform to −0.79 in the post‐reform period, suggesting that incomes policy has increased real wage flexibility indeed. In recent years the link between real wages and (very low) labour productivity growth has weakened. In a sense, incomes policy has introduced a new form of (upward) wage rigidity. Last but not least, incomes policy has changed the correlation with the unemployment rate from positive to not statistically significant.
Research limitations/implications
Future developments will focus on disentangling the impact of incomes policy vis‐à‐vis other policy interventions on WPYE and on unemployment.
Practical implications
The analysis calls for a careful revision of the 1993 Protocol aimed at better protecting the purchasing power of real wages without losing control on inflation, and introducing growth‐generating mechanisms.
Originality/value
The paper studies the impact of incomes policy on WPYE and the Phillips curve by means of co‐integration and structural break analysis. It proposes to interpret the effect of incomes policy on the Phillips curve as changing the coefficient of the error correction mechanism that leads real wages to their long‐run equilibrium value.
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Enhua Hu, Maolong Zhang, Hongmei Shan, Long Zhang and Yaqing Yue
The purpose of this paper is to offer empirical evidence on whether and how the work experiences of employees in China influence their union-related attitudes and behaviours.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to offer empirical evidence on whether and how the work experiences of employees in China influence their union-related attitudes and behaviours.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors developed a mediated moderation model to examine how job satisfaction and labour relations climate interactively affect union participation and whether union commitment mediates the interactive effects. A total of 585 employees from enterprises in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangxi and Fujian province of China were surveyed to verify the model.
Findings
Job satisfaction was negatively related to union participation and union commitment. Labour relations climate moderated the relationship between job satisfaction and union participation; the relationship was negative and stronger when employees perceived an adverse, rather than a favourable, labour relations climate. Further, the interactive effect of job satisfaction and labour relations climate on union participation was partly mediated by union commitment.
Originality/value
By empirically examining employees’ attitudes and behaviours towards unions in the Chinese context, this study confirms that unions could provide employees with alternative work resources to cope with job dissatisfaction, even in a country where unions play a “transmission belt” role between employees and employers. This study adds value to the existing base of knowledge on union practice and labour relations construction, both inside and outside of China.
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The purpose of this paper is to look back on 150 years of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) and reflect on the recent challenges to organised labour.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to look back on 150 years of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) and reflect on the recent challenges to organised labour.
Design/methodology/approach
Places unions in their current context and discusses how they have responded to the challenge of declining membership.
Findings
With declining membership levels and the lack of a “silver bullet” solution, unions continue to face many challenges, although there is some light at the end of the organising tunnel.
Originality/value
This paper introduces the special issue which reflects on 150 years of the TUC.
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This article examines in what way strategies of new independent trade unions in London – that achieved pioneering, victories to end outsourcing – offer learning opportunities for…
Abstract
Purpose
This article examines in what way strategies of new independent trade unions in London – that achieved pioneering, victories to end outsourcing – offer learning opportunities for more established trade unions. It proposes to (re-)encourage a culture of class struggle trade unionism. The article builds on existing research that outlined the organising practices of these independent trade unions but breaks down the binary analysis of independent versus established trade unions. The author uses the acronym CARE (Collectivising individual grievances, Action, Relations of trust and care, Escalating confrontations) as an analytical framework for exploring class struggle trade unionism, and examines in what ways these strategies have been (re)-learnt by established trade unions through the example of independent trade unions. In doing so, this article contributes to a much wider debate on trade union renewal.
Design/methodology/approach
This article offers an insider perspective of an “academic activist” (Chatterton et al., 2007). The article draws on author’s experiences and reflection as the co-founder of the trade union United Voices of the World (UVW) created in 2014, and previously involvement in the establishment of the Independent Workers of Great Britain (IWGB) in 2012. Findings are based on author’s ethnographic engagement as well as a selection of 29 interviews from a much larger data set on independent trade unions comprising focus groups and interviews.
Findings
This article demonstrates that class struggle trade unionism has in some ways been remembered and hence pioneered by the new independent trade unions, yet they are possible in established trade unions alike.
Originality/value
This is the first time an article systematically explores the strategies that established trade unions can learn – and indeed are learning – from independent trade unions.
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This chapter focuses on how the repression of political ideologies can silence feminist voices. It examines how writings by women working with the U.S. Communist Party in the…
Abstract
Purpose
This chapter focuses on how the repression of political ideologies can silence feminist voices. It examines how writings by women working with the U.S. Communist Party in the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s, and early 1960s have been overlooked even though they presaged important linchpins of U.S. second-wave feminist thought.
Methodology/approach
This study is based on historical and archival research.
Findings
Decades before the rise of second-wave feminism, women in the CPUSA had: (1) produced a political economy of domestic labor; (2) employed an intersectional analysis of the interlocking oppressions of race, gender, class, and nation; and (3) called for a global feminist analysis that linked these multiple oppressions to colonialism and imperialism.
Social implications
This study illustrates the costs of political repression and how the canon of feminist thought can be enhanced by resuscitating subjugated knowledges.
Originality/value
Too little attention has focused on the silencing of women because of their political ideologies. This chapter addresses this lacuna in feminist studies and calls into question the oft-repeated notion that the periods between the waves of U.S. feminism were times of movement stagnation. It shows how theory construction can flourish even when feminist activism wanes.
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The purpose of this paper is to offer a broad practitioner’s overview of recent trade union history in the UK, and to investigate organised labour’s prospects in the decades…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to offer a broad practitioner’s overview of recent trade union history in the UK, and to investigate organised labour’s prospects in the decades ahead.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper is based on a review of relevant literature and trade union documentation from the period 1964 to 2014.
Findings
This paper concludes that the past 50 years has been a period of change and turbulence for the movement, and suggests that this is likely to remain the case in the decades to come. Although external political and economic factors will have a significant bearing on unions’ prospects, the paper argues that unions remain powerful agents of change in their own right and that a revival of organised labour is not beyond question.
Originality/value
The paper is written with unique practitioner insight from the UK’s trade union centre.
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Helen Haugh and Ana Maria Peredo
Purpose – The aim of this chapter is to analyse the discourse associated with, and preceding the establishment of, the community interest company (CIC) legal format in the United…
Abstract
Purpose – The aim of this chapter is to analyse the discourse associated with, and preceding the establishment of, the community interest company (CIC) legal format in the United Kingdom in 2005. The analysis identifies the political, ideological, social and economic meta-narratives that are embedded in five key texts from which the CIC emerges and is codified.
Design, methodology and approach – The approach consists of a discourse analysis of five principal texts produced between 2002 and 2005 in which the idea of a CIC is articulated and refined prior to the launch of the CIC format in 2005.
Findings – Analysis of five key texts elucidates four meta-narratives that contrast political, ideological, social and economic discourse and counter-discourse.
Research implications and limitations – The selection of five key texts excludes other texts that were produced during the articulation and refinement of the CIC format. Further research to examine the diffusion, adoption and translation of the CIC legal format is recommended.
Practical implications – We show how the crafting of policy is embedded in meta-narratives that shape the content and implementation of policy.
Social implications – The CIC protects, in perpetuity, collectively held property rights through an asset lock, and enables capital to be raised from investors and trustees to be paid. These characteristics are beneficial in that community asset ownership can contribute to local development, e.g. by creating new ventures, generating jobs and anchoring wealth in communities; raising capital from investors can facilitate the enterprise to grow and scale up; and the expertise of the board can be enhanced by rewarding trustees financially for their involvement in the governance of the CIC.
Originality – This chapter presents the first critical analysis of the discourse associated with the origins of the idea for, and articulation of, the need for a legal format for social enterprises in the United Kingdom.
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