EconPapers    
Economics at your fingertips  
 

Digitalization and employment relations in the retail sector. Examining the role of trade unions in Italy and Spain

Arianna Marcolin and Stefano Gasparri

European Journal of Industrial Relations, 2024, vol. 30, issue 2, 151-178

Abstract: This article investigates trade union responses to in-store digitalization in retail in Italy and Spain. It considers critical issues often associated with the digital transformation of work including excessive work flexibility, high levels of monitoring and skills mismatch. It goes on to discuss two alternative employment relations developments: a ‘low road’, along which digitalization enhances market regulation and employers’ ability to control the workforce unilaterally; or a ‘high road’, where digitalization allows for better working conditions as well as business productivity. Drawing on documentary analysis, semi-structured interviews with trade union leaders, and content analysis of collective agreements signed at the sector, territorial and company level, findings report how Italian and Spanish trade unions attempt to use in-store digitalization to increase their leverage and aim for the high road. Overall, this work confirms the challenges of deterring the retail sector from pursuing the low road while highlighting some institutional factors and trade union strategies that can make the difference.

Keywords: Digitalization; employment relations; retail; trade unions; Italy; Spain (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/09596801231213809 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:eurjou:v:30:y:2024:i:2:p:151-178

DOI: 10.1177/09596801231213809

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in European Journal of Industrial Relations
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications (sagediscovery@sagepub.com).

 
Page updated 2024-12-29
Handle: RePEc:sae:eurjou:v:30:y:2024:i:2:p:151-178