Future Of Employee Representation

Future Of Employee Representation



Future Of Employee Representation

Introduction

This paper examines the future of employee interest representation in Britain against the broader European background. An attempt is made to define the character of interest representation in terms of the concepts of autonomy, legitimacy and efficacy. The core section of the paper discusses recent and current developments with a focus on five themes: the level, structure, process, agenda and outcome of representation. A brief conclusion considers alternative scenarios and policy issues for employee representation. Underlying the whole discussion is the question: What future for (British) trade unions? No more than an imprecise and ambiguous answer can be suggested.

Analysis

Prediction is in large measure the art of extrapolation: it requires an assessment of past trends and a judgement of the conditions for their continuation or transformation. Even if performed sensitively and intelligently, it rests on a complex of assumptions concerning the context within which the object of enquiry is embedded. This raises particular problems in the case of trade unions and other mechanisms of employee representation, which above all else are 'secondary organizations' whose existence and operation are conditioned by the employing organizations of those represented. To an important extent, then, a prognosis of employee representation presupposes an analysis of employers. It also requires assumptions about other environmental factors which can be expected to exert a significant influence—for example the labour market, government policies and legislative changes. Hence a question that at first sight may appear relatively narrow and specific is actually dependent on scenarios at quite different levels of analysis (Terry, 2004).

Future Uncertain: Aspects of Employee Representation

When we speak of employee representation, by implication we refer to the representation of interests. We also imply a distinction between representatives and represented. These two simple definitional propositions point however to one of the central problems of interest representation. In one common meaning of the word, to be representative is to share the main characteristics of a broader population; but trade union and other employee representatives are never representative in this sense (if only because they normally require a distinctive set of motivational qualities); and it is unlikely that a 'representative sample' of a work-force would be well suited to the functions of interest representation. Yet do the two meanings of representative ness intersect? It is a familiar problem that skilled, white male workers have traditionally been overrepresented in positions as trade union officials or works councillors and has often proved less than sensitive to the distinctive interests of female, or black, or lower-paid employees. In what respects is it necessary and important that a representative should be demographically representative? This question is likely to be increasingly salient as previous marginalized groups became more assertive, and as unions attempt to expand membership and support in constituencies they have previously neglected (Terry, 1999).

The central issues in interest representation may be specified as autonomy, legitimacy and efficacy. In its most obvious sense, autonomy indicates the independence of a representative mechanism from the employer ...