INDUSTRIAL DEVELOPMENT

Industrial Development

Industrial Development

Based on our recent research on the European works councils (EWCs) of southern and eastern Europe and on the European and world works councils (WWCs) of Volkswagen, DaimlerChrysler and Renault, we propose a paper on the evolution of transnational union strategies in the industrial sector. We will focus on the coordination of union action by these works councils and by the European and global union federations EMF and IMF. The industrial sector was chosen because it is very internationalized and confronted to big restructuring problems linked to cost and as well as demand factors. I also presents three of the most advanced trends in the international industrial relations field. The first one concerns the evolutions of the role of EWCs from simple information and consultation rights towards collective bargaining with multinational management to avoid plant closures (cases of southern and eastern europe). The second trend is the enlargement of the mechanisms of worker representation beyond the frontiers of European economic integration with the establishment of World Councils based on the EWC model. The third one is the negotiation of “international framework agreements” on fundamental social rights and industrial relations (in all our five cases), signed by the EWCs or WWCs and, in some cases, also by the IMF or the EMF.

The acknowledgement of European and World Councils by these multinationals is a major achievement since some of them were still strongly opposed to the project of a EWC Directive before it was adopted in 1994. An analysis of the negotiations to set up those councils and of their working practices will show the evolution in the union and management attitudes and strategies which made such results possible as well as the problems in their functioning and their future prospects. We will also try to determine to what extent there was a change in the strategies not only of the of the national, but alos of the European and global union federations which support and coordinate the activities of these councils, including building global networks of unions, worker representatives and experts in this field. Thus, whereas unions are often vulnerable to deregulation, which varies across countries, we will try to show how the structure of unions and their regulatory objectives respond to theses changes, and in particular the challenges of restructuring, europeanization and globalization.

This contribution analyses the emergence of European transnational agreements about restructuring at the company level . It outlines an evolution of the role of European Works Councils (EWCs) from information and consultation towards collective bargaining and the emergence of union strategies of transnational coordination. It is based on our comparative study which also contains an historical analysis of the evolution of union strategies concerning transnational collective bargaining with multinational companies -- since the creation of the world auto councils in the 1960s until the creation of the first World Works Councils in 1999 and the negotiation of international framework agreements. We will here focus on the pioneer agreements on restructuring signed by the ...