Institutions and Inequality in Liberalizing Markets

Chiara Benassi, Virginia Doellgast and Katja Sarmiento-Mirwaldt
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Chiara Benassi: Royal Holloway, University of London
Virginia Doellgast: Cornell University
Katja Sarmiento-Mirwaldt: Brunel University London

Politics & Society, 2016, vol. 44, issue 1, 117-142

Abstract: This paper examines cross-national differences in the development of sectoral collective bargaining in the European telecommunications industry following comparable changes in market regulations. The authors seek to explain why centralized, coordinated bargaining institutions were established in Austria and Sweden, both within incumbent telecommunications firms and at the sector level, while Germany and Denmark experienced decentralization and disorganization of bargaining at both levels. The authors argue that these outcomes resulted from differences in institutional loopholes employers were able to exploit to avoid centralized bargaining and past union structures that influenced patterns of interunion cooperation. These two explanatory factors were interrelated: the presence or absence of institutional loopholes affected the basis for cooperation between unions, while labor cooperation was an important power resource unions could draw on to close emerging loopholes. Findings demonstrate the importance of sector-level political dynamics for the construction or erosion of solidaristic bargaining structures under pressure from market liberalization.

Keywords: collective bargaining; restructuring; telecommunications; unions; liberalization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:polsoc:v:44:y:2016:i:1:p:117-142

DOI: 10.1177/0032329215617466

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