Comparisons in Decentralised Bargaining. Final Report CODEBAR-project

This academic report addresses from an interdisciplinary and multi-level governance perspective, the social partners' responses to downward pressures on the locus of collective bargaining. The report analyses the backgrounds, practices and effects of decentralised bargaining at the company level in eight EU Member States: France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain and Sweden.
Besides the risks of decentralisation regarding lower collective bargaining coverage and giving to much concession towards the employers' agenda in deregulation and flexibility, case studies give good news. Decentralised bargaining offer opportunities for both employers and trade unions in making tailor made agreements in specific company conditions with better trade unions' visibility and representation of the needs of workers at the workplace level. Best practices have been found firstly in the context of 'organised decentalisation' with support of structures at the central levels (providing safety nets in terms and conditions of employment wages/standards and norms for company bargaining) and collective bargaining at the company and workplace levels. Such kind of cases have been found in the manufacturing companies in Sweden, Germany, France and Italy.
Secondly in the context of trade unions' innovative actions in re-engaging with workplaces and workers within companies without the support of central collective bargaining structure, especially found in Ireland.
The report explores beneficial factors for well-balanced decentralised bargaining, and barriers as well. Important factors are institutional and organisation power resources of trade unions. Institutional power resources include national and sectoral supportive regulations and coordination through bargaining rights at the company level and safety nets in minimum levels of terms and conditions of employment. Organisational resources include unions' membership levels among the workers and capacities and skills of local negotiators. Further, employers' associations commitments in regulating decentralisation and companies' acceptance of trade unions as important negotiation partners in decentralised bargaining are essential. Besides national varieties in these factors, sectoral and company size varieties play a role as well.