Municipal teachers on state wage regulations 1948-2004

Abstract

From 1948 to 2004, teachers' salaries were determined through negotiations between the teachers' organisations and the state, although many teachers had a municipality or a county municipality as their employer. This was a unique position and one that was offered to no other occupational group. This article investigates why the state took the responsibility to bargain wages with the teachers in this period and why the government decided to transfer this part of the employer's responsibility to the municipalities in 2004. The development of the bargaining system in the state sector and the municipality sector is examined together with the merger of the teachers' organisations. School policy shifted in the 1980s, emphasising greater local autonomy for the individual school. This influenced politicians' views on teachers' special bargaining position in the state sector. In 1986, the municipalities were given a new revenue system with greater financial responsibility. Management by objectives became the new ideal. The parliament amended the school legislation, and the special system regarding the independent school board and chief education officer was abolished. This change in municipal governance underpinned the government's 2003 decision to transfer the employer's responsibility for wage bargaining with the teachers' organisations to the municipalities and county municipalities. The article argues that the reason why the bargaining responsibility for teachers was first transferred to the state and then returned to the municipalities can be found both in the shifting school policy goals and the view of the school's role in society, and in the new ideological approach that characterised the political governance system at the turn of the millennium.