Summaries
The edifice of union organization, a renovation proposal
A.W.M. Teulings
The decline of trade union power in the 80-ies, as expressed in diminishing union densities, bar gaining outcomes and political effectiveness is particularly evident in the Netherlands. It is ar gued that this is not only a consequence of ex ternal socio-economic change. The internal or ganizational capacity of unions and federations to cope adequately and effectively with environ mental change is equally at stake. In this article it is argued that traditionel forms of union or ganization, differentiation and coordination are falling short in information processing and policy making capacities.
A proposal is formulated to improve these capa cities by developing
— a strategic policy-making level in both peak organizations and federated unions;
— a divisionalized structure to differentiate four core operations: collective bargaining, socio economic policy making, social security ser vices and plant level support;
— a flexible matrix-organization with modular ‘jointly ventured’ administrative units, allow ing a partial integration between unions, with out affecting their over-all autonomy;
— an integrated ‘first-line’ service organization for each union, combining individual and col lective membership support and service at the local and plant level.
Problems of Power Formation in a Hetero geneous Employers’ Organization
The early years o f the Algemene Werkgevers Ver eniging ( General Employers ’ Organization; 1919- 1925) as an example
Frans van Waarden
Heterogeneity among membership is likely to pose problems for pressure groups, which may in
hibit consensus on association policies. The problem is usually greater for employers’ organ izations. They represent organizations rather than individuals and organizations differ in a great many more ways than individuals. This article in vestigates the nature of this problem and how organizations have dealt with it, using the case study method. Object of study is the early history of the AWV, an organization which is extremely heterogeneous. At present it represents about 1600 firms, mainly in the chemical, food proces sing, textile, leather, paper and building mate rials industries, employing about 30% of all in dustrial workers.
The early years were studied because it is then that the organizational solutions to the problem of heterogeneity were created. Heterogeneity was indeed a problem for the organization. It preven ted internal wage agreements (cartel formation on the labour market), lock outs, a generous scheme of mutual financial support during strikes and enduring consensus on the voting system in the organization. The problem was countered by restricting the tasks of the organization (thus limiting the number of issues on which disagree ment was possible), agreeing only on very general rules and by decentralizing the organization through the establishment of rather autonomous sector groups, which were authorized to conduct their own negotiations and set their own binding agreements. Thus the unity and comprehensive ness — the very reason for the formation of a general organization such as the AWV — was gone, almost as soon as the organization was established.
Participation in Flemish and Dutch hospitals
P.L. Meurs, R. Spoelders-Claes, C.J. Lammers and P. Coetsier
In this article the functioning of hospital works councils in the Netherlands and Flanders are dis cussed. It is shown that there are differences: the Dutch works council is more active and has a 94 Tijdschrift voor Arbeidsvraagstukken, ire. 3. 1987/4
rather autonomous position, while the Flemish works council is more concerned with the per sonnel it represents. Flemish workers are there fore more interested in the works council than their Dutch colleages. In Flanders direct and in direct participation go hand in hand. In the Netherlands there is a negative relationship be tween these two forms of participation.
The question is posed how these differences can be explained. Organization structures seem to have no influence. Part of the differences can be ascribed to laws and formal procedures. More important is the fact that in Flanders there is a tradition of trade union influence on the shop- floor. In the Netherlands there is no comparable influence. The Flemish works council is seen as one of the instruments for workers’ participation and is strongly related to union activities. The Dutch works council is seen as the only instru ment for participation and, although it is very active, it functions more or less isolated from the workers it represents.
Works council membership and careers
J. Acampo, P. Kunst and J. Soeters
This article focuses on the (often suggested nega tive) relation between works council membership and careers. First, a brief review of the literature on careers is given. Then the results of research on this topic, done by the authors in 1986, are discussed. For this research 487 questionnaires received from (former) works council members (response rate 78%) were analysed. The most important findings of this research are:
— there is a difference between careers of the en tire working population and those of work council members;
— these differences can be explained by the same factors that are known from research on careers for the entire working population; — the perceived influence of works council mem
bership is linked with perceptions of one’s own job.
The ‘small’ works council in the bread factory
Y. van der Burgh
Since 1982 Dutch enterprises with 35-100 em ployees are obliged by law to have a works coun cil. As a result of a small scale research in nine bakeries a tentative explanation is given for the disappointing growth of the number of works councils.
The article is divided into four parts. First, it is questioned what systematically influences the way employers think about formal workers’ par ticipation. Secondly, the workers’ attitude to wards workers’ participation is dealt with similar ly. Thirdly, the results of the interaction of both attitudes to participation is investigated. The overall conclusion is, that the ‘small’ works coun cil in the bread factory usually has difficulties because of the direct power relations in small firms.
Finally, attention is given to often applied argu ments against works councils in small companies, and some possibilities of the ‘small’ works coun cil are set out for the parties interested.
Occupational winners and losers 1981-’85
A. de Grip
The occupational structure of employment con tinually changes by unequal growth paths of in dustries and technological and organizational changes of production processes. This paper identifies the changes in the occupational struc ture during the years 1981-’85 by showing the greatest occupational winners and losers in this period. In the 12 occupational groups in which employment increases most, employment rises by 232.000, almost seven times as much as the total net employment gain in this period. In con trast with the seventies (see De Grip 1986) the most prominent winners now are the managerial professions. Moreover the medical professions show a considerable increase in employment. Among the losers, the building professions are most important. Just as in the seventies, the edu cational level of the winning occupations is con siderable higher than that of losing professions. However, by means of a ‘shift-share’ analysis, it appears that the increase of the educational level within occupational groups much more effects Tijdschrift voor Arbeidsvraagstukken,jrg. 3, 1987/4 95
the average educational level of the working population than the shifts in the occupational structure.
Personnel management in Flanders: time less Taylorism?
E. Henderickx, S. Demarest and R. Kesteloot This article offers an overview of the most impor tant results of an enquiry into personnel manage ment in Flemish enterprises. In contradiction to the popular statements in modern literature, we had to conclude that there were almost no indica tions of ‘modern’ personnel management which should emphasize aspects as career counselling, organization development, etc. On the contrary, the actual activities of the personnel department only rarely supersede the level of pure personnel administration. As for recruitment and selection of personnel Flemish enterprises show a differen tiated picture with regard to the different groups of employees (workers, white-collars or staff per sonnel).
Reorganisation, Innovation and Internal Labour Markets
J. Warmerdam and J. van de Berg
This article describes some general conclusions from recent empirical research on the functioning of internal labour markets in relation to techno logical and organizational change. The study was conducted in 17 Dutch firms and covered the period from 1981 until 1986. One of the main conclusions is that in this period the internal labour market has changed from a mechanism for coping with scarcity on the external labour mar ket into a mechanism for coping with the nega tive employment-effects of reorganization and innovation. In the course of this process the in ternal markets were further structured and regulated. As a result of recent technological developments, however, in some of the leading organizations this regulation seems to be loos ened. Here, the internal labour market seems to develop from a strongly regulated to what is called a ‘programmed’ market.
