Labour Relations In Transition

This collection analyses the contribution of industrial relations to social science understanding.

Labour Relations in Transitionprovides a unique insight into the realities of Russian industrial enterprises in the transition period as it affects workers on the shop floor. Based on a unique collaborative programme of ethnographic and case study research, this volume includes original work by Western and Russian scholars focusing on the restructuring of wages, employment and industrial relations, and how workers have responded to these changes. As well as presenting pioneering analysis of trade unions and industrial conflict, Labour Relations in Transitionaddresses changing status hierarchies within the workforce, the position of women in production, the process of bankruptcy, and insider and outsider control. This is the third volume in the series Management and Industry in Russiaand will be welcomed by sociologists and Russian specialists for addressing contemporary Labour-Management relations within the context of the changing significance of work and work relations in the lives of Russian workers.

Many commentators expected the Russian trade unions to collapse along with the system of which they were an integral part, but the trade unions survived the storms of the Yeltsin era by adopting a strategy of 'social partnership'. This book, based on case-study and survey research in eight Russian regions, provides a detailed account of the development of trade unionism in Russia since the collapse of the soviet system. Against the background of the role of the trade unions in the soviet system, the book reviews the political role, structure and functions of the trade unions, development of social partnership at federal and regional levels, and provides a detailed account of the activity of the trade unions at the level of enterprise. The book concludes with a critical assessment of the Russian unions' strategy of 'social partnership' and locates it in comparative perspective.

Examines the transformation of the employment relationship in governmental agencies, with particular emphasis on human resources policies and workplace practices.

Examines the Workplace Industrial Relations Survey (WIRS), a study designed to contribute to the debate on the reform of British industrial relations by making available large scale systematic evidence about a broad range of industrial relations and employment practices in the economy.

The successful 1997 strike by the Teamsters against UPS, and the overwhelming support the American public gave the strikers highlighted the impact of contingent work--an umbrella term for a variety of tenuous and insecure employment arrangements. This book examines the consequences of working contingently for the individual, family, and community.