Shaping the future of industrial relations in the EU: Ideas, paradoxes and drivers of change

Abstract

The author argues that Europe's future industrial relations will be shaped by the resolution of three paradoxes embedded in today's labour markets, unionization dynamics, and EU policy. The first is the increasing individualization of employment relationships versus fictional "individual autonomy" and workers' growing market dependency and vulnerability. The second centres on the deterioration of job quality and precarious workers' growing need for protection versus their low unionization and the failure of unions to reach out to them despite declining membership. The third is the EU's current market-oriented stance, encouraging employment conditions ultimately conducive to a political backlash against the EU itself.