A broad-ranging introduction to the changing nature and context of industrial relations in contemporary Europe is offered in this textbook. Through a coordinated analysis of industrial relations in specific European nations, the book gives a representative, up-to-date and dynamic understanding of the subject. Across the individual national case studies, a range of common elements is examined. These include: the differing roles of governments, business and labour as actors in the industrial relations system, and their mutual relationships; the dynamics of collective bargaining, conflict, consultation and worker participation; and the overall performance of industrial relations in economic, social and political terms.
These issues are addressed within the wider context of changes affecting industrial relations in Europe in the 1990s: European unification; the globalization of production and markets, the information revolution; the destabilization of labour markets; the fragmentation of societies in the post-industrial era; and the crisis of welfare states.