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This study extends previous literature on social exchange by investigating the mediating effects of leader‐member exchange on the relationship between procedural justice, job attitudes and turnover in a unionized setting. Past research has shown that procedural justice and subordinate/supervisor exchanges are related to job attitudes and turnover. These relationships have normally been studied in non‐union settings, in which union contextual variables are not considered. The current study uses hierarchical linear modeling to test theoretical models of these relationships in a unionized setting, where procedures and managerial treatment are more clearly defined and regulated. Results reveal that both procedural justice and leader‐member exchange are related to organizational commitment and job satisfaction and leader‐member exchange is related to actual turnover. Leadermember exchange partially mediates the relationship between procedural justice and these job attitudes after accounting for the effects of union commitment (at the individual level) and union‐management relations (at the store level). From a managerial perspective, our results emphasize the importance of proper selection, training and performance appraisal of supervisors, with treatment and support of employees as a main focus.

The role of labor unions in relation to corporate social responsibility (CSR) remains both ambiguous and crucial for union members and business leaders. Given the complex relationship between labor unions and corporations, this study aims to address whether labor unions keep corporations honest (by monitoring CSR activities) or potentially render CSR initiatives less necessary.

Using data from the MSCI Kinder, Lydenberg, Domini Database for firms in the Russell 1000 Index, this study examines the link between labor unions and CSR in U.S. companies over a six year period. Generalized least squares models were used to test the hypotheses for 3,937 firm-year observations.

The findings show that unionized companies generally pay less attention to CSR compared to nonunionized ones. The presence of labor unions and positive union-management relations both show a significant negative impact on CSR ratings, where positive union-management relations negatively affect CSR ratings more than just the presence of labor unions. Further, when considering the environmental, social and governance aspects of CSR separately, the results are more complex, suggesting that the relationship between labor unions and CSR varies depending on specific ESG dimensions.

CSR, a well-researched area, rarely addresses the companies' relationships with labor unions. Studies in South Korea and the UK have touched on the impact of labor unions on CSR, but in the USA it remains unexplored. This study extends this line of work by examining U.S. companies.

The purpose of this paper is to explore management development in five trade unions. It investigates senior trade union managers' interpretations of management development, in particular, the extent to which they view management development as relevant to trade unions. The article also explores the link between managers' interpretations and the external environment for trade union activity. It considers the potential discord between the unitarist values and assumptions that arguably frame much management development literature and the democratic and pluralist values of trade unionism.

This research takes an interpretive qualitative approach. In‐depth interviews with nine key “elite” individuals representing five trade unions were carried out, in order to elicit their subjective interpretations of management development.

Trade union managers view management development as necessary in the context of environmental uncertainty. Moreover, although management development in trade unions retains some unitarist assumptions, it is also linked to core trade union values of fairness and justice.

The in‐depth qualitative interview design allows for exploration of management development activities in a small number of unions and from a management perspective. Further research is needed to explore the issues in a wider context.

The paper begins to highlight and theorise management development in trade unions.

The article has implications in relation to the role of trade unions as employers.

The article explores and theorises management development in relation to trade union management practices. It explores trade union education from the management development perspective rather than from an industrial relations or political education paradigm.

Asserts that the concept of quality circle autonomy includes the issues of members’ development, relations with middle managers and supervisors, determining time of meetings, evaluating suggestions, selecting discussion topics, applying solutions and electing leaders. Investigates these dimensions in one Japanese and one French subsidiary in Greece. Findings show that in situations of limited autonomy, quality circle members raise no demands for more. On the other hand, when autonomy is ceded to members without their input, not only do they not demand more but, on the contrary, they may wish for the abolition of certain prerogatives requiring responsibility. Contends that quality circles possess practically insignificant bargaining power and that the satisfaction of their demands depends mostly on management benevolence, a fact likely to obstruct members’ claims for, and sustenance of, substantial autonomy. Suggests that future research focuses on the relationship of quality circle autonomy and creativity.

The purpose of this study is to investigate union effects on wages, employment, and productivity in China. The relationships between unionization and these three economic variables are first tested at the national level and then examined in the eastern, central, and western regions, respectively.

Provincial-level panel data from 1994 to 2014 are used in this study, compiled from various Chinese Statistics Year Books, and covering 29 provinces. The Ordinary Least Square is firstly employed to examine union impacts. Then, in view of the endogeneity of unionization, the Two-Stage Least Square estimation with instrument variables is adopted to reexamine union effects. Overidentification tests are conducted, verifying the validity of these instruments.

At the national level, Chinese unions have significantly positive effects on wages but no significant effect on employment and productivity. In the eastern region, unions are significantly related to increased employment. In the western region, union activity not only significantly promotes wages but also improves productivity. In the central region, unionization has no significant impact. These findings suggest that equipping Chinese unions with a collective and cooperative face can generally help them improve workers' interests. Their effectiveness varies across the three economic regions.

Compared with the survey data conducted in certain cities and industries, the provincial-level panel data used in this article have the advantage of capturing the overall effects of unionization. An instrument variable method is used to address the endogeneity issue. After exploring union effects at the national level, this paper focuses on observing the differences in union roles in three economic regions.

Two general viewpoints on workplace “partnership” as a union strategy are identified: it is seen as either a potentially effective strategy for restoring union influence, or as fatally flawed. Discusses the determinants of robust union‐management partnership relations in order to assist the evaluation of “partnership unionism” as a union strategy. Outlines a definition of workplace partnership based on practice. Although common elements with earlier attempts to promote or implement union‐management cooperation can be discerned, it is argued that contemporary workplace partnership has distinctive characteristics arising from its specific context. Two cases are used to illustrate the internal dynamics of workplace partnership and the nature of interaction with environmental factors. The necessary components of robust partnership relations are thereby isolated. Partnership is found to be not only compatible with, but dependent upon, stronger workplace organisation. Such an understanding is found to be a possible alternative to accounts that stress union incorporation and demobilisation.

The industrial relations climate of a steelworks was investigated through a programme of structured interviews with shop stewards and managers at all levels. Interviewees were asked how often they handled different types of industrial relations issues, how often they interacted with their opposite numbers at different levels to solve those problems, how satisfied they were with the way each of the problems were handled and, how satisfied they were with their opposite numbers' handling of industrial relations problems generally. Results shows that there was union‐management agreement about the nature of the local climate, but that the climate differed across departments in accordance with data from independent sources. The findings also indicated that in this plant the climate was more ‘issue‐centred’ than ‘person‐centred’. It was concluded that the technique could be similarly useful in other settings for the speedy appraisal of industrial relations at plant level, but that more comparative research on industrial relations climate was needed.

The article explains why some Chilean companies have implemented a partnership strategy with trade unions, in a national context broadly described as unfavorable to such approach. Moreover, it discusses the shape and limits of this strategy.

The argument draws on a case study conducted between 2016 and 2018 in three large companies. Human resources managers, line managers and union officers were interviewed in each of these companies, and internal and administrative documentation were analyzed.

The article demonstrates that the management’s partnership strategy in the studied companies has emerged to contain the union revitalization. Additionally, it suggests this strategy has not favored trust-based relationships that guarantee long-term mutual gains for employees and companies. The article identifies some factors that explain this situation: the regulation, the economic uncertainty and the absence of a pluralist management perspective.

The article has the value of providing empirical evidence on union–management partnership, a topic that has gained strategic importance for large Chilean companies but remains unexplored in the mainstream the human resources management literature. The article also contributes to underscore the theoretical relevance of political and cultural variables in explaining management strategies and their results.

El artículo explica por qué surge una política de colaboración empresa-sindicato en un contexto como el chileno, ampliamente descrito como desfavorable a este tipo de enfoque. Asimismo, discute la forma en que se instala esta política y los obstáculos para su desarrollo.

El argumento se basa en un estudio de casos conducido entre el 2016 years el 2018 en tres grandes empresas. En cada una de ellas, se entrevistó a representantes de la dirección y dirigentes sindicales; se revisó documentación interna y administrativa.

El artículo demuestra que la política de colaboración implementada por la dirección en las empresas estudiadas surge para contener la revitalización sindical. Asimismo, sugiere que esta política no ha favorecido en todos los casos relaciones de confianza que garanticen ganancias mutuas para los trabajadores y las empresas a largo plazo. Identifica algunos factores que explican esta situación: la regulación, la incertidumbre económica y la ausencia de un compromiso gerencial con una perspectiva pluralista.

El artículo tiene el valor de proveer evidencia empírica respecto de la colaboración empresa-sindicato, un tema que ha ganado importancia estratégica para las grandes empresas chilenas y que, sin embargo, sigue siendo desatendido por la literatura de GRH. El artículo también contribuye a subrayar la relevancia teórica de las variables políticas y culturales en la explicación de las estrategias gerenciales y sus resultados.

The authors link High-Involvement Work Systems (HIWS) with social network research both theoretically and methodologically by conceiving of these work systems as networks and by using network methods to better understand and evaluate these arrangements. Their approach is to integrate the institutional perspective of industrial relations with the analytical methodology of social network analysis. They use a longitudinal data set collected before and after the introduction of an HIWS in a pharmaceutical company to measure the impact on patterns of employee communication as well as communication between the union and management. Improvements were found in customer satisfaction, and positive effects were seen in the pattern and structure of organizational communication with an increase in the density of lateral and vertical interdepartmental communication, and a decrease in hierarchy. These results were confirmed using survey data on employee perceptions of particular types of communication and interviews with employees at various levels of authority.

In Britain there has long been a general distinction drawnbetween subjects which are considered suitable for joint consultation and those which are considered suitable for negotiation. The former are those where the basic aims of union(s) and management are held to be essentially similar, while the latter are those where there is held to be a fundamental divergence of interests between the two parties. The problem‐solving orientation of joint consultative arrangements, with the possibility of joint gains to union and management (i.e. a varying sum pay off matrix) has been labelled “integrative” bargaining by Walton and McKersie, while the issue orientation of the negotiation process has been labelled “distributive” bargaining.