Industrial relations

Under industrial relations refers to the relationship between a company's management and its employees as well as the relations between employers and trade unions.

The concept

The term is a calque of the English term Industrial relations. On the concept of criticism is that industry is in English (in the sense of " commercial " ) more fully understood as the German term " industry". Synonymous with the term industrial relations is needed.

From the perspective of system theory industrial relations constitute a sub-system of modern capitalist society (see Dunlop, Wood et al., Rogowski ).

Industrial relations are an area of ​​research in business management, industry and business sociology and economic sociology. The starting point is that the following facts: there the labor market contracted economic exchange of pay for performance leads to social cooperation and conflict relations between management and workers / works or between employers' association and trade union in a company or an industry ( industry ) in a state or a transnational economic area such as the EU ( relations between the umbrella organizations of employers and workers ).

In the historical course of industrialization were the first by unregulated industrial relations and social conflict in radical political repression (down to the "Machine storm "). Only in the 20th century, negotiation arenas formed at different levels - company, industry, nation-state, European Economic Area - out. In them by the respective " collective actors " ( such as management and the works council, employers 'and workers' organizations as well as government institutions ) completed contracts and agreements about the conditions of work and employment conditions of workers. The participating organizations can also apply social pressure such as strikes and lock it.

Pioneers in the study of industrial relations in Britain were Sidney and Beatrice Webb, in Germany Lujo Brentano and the USA John R. Commons.

In the professional scientific discussion, the German system of industrial relations is also referred to as the "dual system " of interest representation, because the workers' interests are represented on the one hand by the council, on the other hand, by the union over the collective agreement. In a broader sense, the relations of employer and employee organizations are with their key state institutions (eg in the labor, social and economic policy ) in both the nation-state as in the European framework for this area of ​​research. In addition, the State assumes regulatory functions by the industrial relations a legal framework sets (eg with the Works Constitution Act, Collective Agreements Act, Co-determination Act ). With the EU Directive on European Works Councils ( 1994), a legal framework for transnational institution of the Industrial Relations was created for the first time.

Theories

The interdisciplinary research field knows a variety of theoretical approaches to the analysis and explanation of complex systems, thematic complexes or even single phenomena of national and transnational industrial relations. Specifically, these are:

• Systems theory ( Dunlop, Luhmann)
• Marxism ( Political Economy / regulation theory / Labour Process Analysis)
• Institutionalism ( historical and evolutionary, control theory, new sociological, actor- centered )
• Theory of action ( micro-politics / labor policy / Negotiation of Order / Strategic Choice )
• Structuration theory ( Giddens )
• Economic approaches ( rational choice / transaction cost approach )