Unions and Collective Bargaining

Based on Chapter 20 of Human Resource Management (4th Edition) by Alan Price - published by Cengage

Topics

• Collectivization and confrontation
• Employee relations in North America
• Employee relations in the UK
• The European Union
• Employee relations in Australia and New Zealand
• Trends in union membership
• Organizations and employee relations
• Employee relations strategies
• Employee relations as an activity
• Conflict
• Tribunals and arbitration systems
• The negotiating process
• Models of bargaining

Summary

Employee relations is a relatively new term which broadens the study of industrial relations to include wider aspects of the employment relationship, including non-unionized workplaces, personal contracts and socio-emotional, rather than contractual, arangements. This is an area with diverse ideological under-pinnings and political ramifications. Governments have taken an active part in determining its conduct. In Europe, harmonization is leading to the establishment of works councils across the EU, giving a new role for collective representation.

Further reading

Industrial Relations by Mike Salaman (4th edition published by FT/Pitman in 2001), Employee Relations in Context by David Farnham (2nd edition, CIPD 2000) and Employment Relations by Ed Rose (FT Prentice Hall, 2000) all provide good overviews of the field. International and Comparative Industrial Relations edited by Greg Bamber and Russell Lansbury (published by Sage Publications 1998) compares different countries. > Learning in Organizations  >  Conflict