TRADE UNION

Changing Role of the Trade Union Movement in the United Kingdom

Table of Contents

Introduction3

HRM Policies And Practices4

Trade Union Movements In Europe7

One or many HRM packages?8

Trade unions and HRM10

Union Quiescence: Manufacturing15

The Emergence Of Responsible Economistic Unionism: Privatized Utilities20

Meeting the challenge of HRM: the Civil Service25

The Challenge To Trade Unions30

With Or Against The Tide Of Welfare State Reform34

Conclusion & Recommendations35

References38

Changing Role of the Trade Union Movement in the United Kingdom

Introduction

In order to examine the role and responsibilities of trade unions now and in the near future, it would be useful to try to identify what is changing in society and the economy and the potential impact of these changes on trade unions. Some aspects of society are changing rapidly, some are not. In order to adapt successfully to the changes, trade unions, like other organizations, need to continuously scan the environment. Currently human resource management (HRM) policies have been taken up by managements in many sectors. Drawing on ideas elaborated these policies have been implemented in various ways, theoretically laying the foundation for changed relations between managers, workers and their trade unions (Storey, 2010: 45). For management, this implementation is part of a view that such approaches provide the basis for more consensual social relations of production and create more malleable and compliant workforces, who identify with the enterprise or employing unit (Tuckman, 2010: 154). Following on from this, the foundation is thus laid for more effective and efficient forms of work and employment, based on the individualization of work relations and the associated social identities (Bacon and Storey, 2010: 235).

Clearly, if the more extreme claims made by the advocates of these policies are realized then the relations of production will be transformed, with the consequent marginalization of trade unions (Storey, 2010, pp. 243, 250-5). In practice, however, such managerial approaches challenge trade unions, which can no longer rely on past established relations and which often confront a narrowing of their access to the resources of collective power (Smith and Morton, 2010, p. 100). Paradoxically, however, these initiatives also provide opportunities for workers and their unions to re-examine the basis of union organization and the scope of bargaining ((Martinez Lucio and Weston, 2010a; Bacon and Storey, 2010, p. 163). To develop the argument, a contrast will be drawn between the public sector and the privatized utilities on the one side and manufacturing on the other. The policies associated with HRM, and particularly Total Quality Management (TQM), have been taken up in the public sector and the privatized utilities in an almost promiscuous fashion, with the encouragement and backing of the State, whereas in manufacturing there has been a more cautious and uneven embrace of these policies. The implication of this variation is that the potential threat to and possibilities for unions in the public sector and the privatized utilities are much greater than is the case in manufacturing.

HRM Policies And Practices

Observes that there has been much discussion about human resource management (HRM) policies and packages and what their implications may ...