Roland Erne - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Roland Erne

Oxford University Press eBooks, Apr 27, 2023

Fino a poco tempo quasi tutti i sindacati irlandesi hanno accettato la massima del "corporat... more Fino a poco tempo quasi tutti i sindacati irlandesi hanno accettato la massima del "corporativismo competitivo": accontentarsi di una fetta minore della torta per ricevere una torta più grande. Tuttavia, quando la bolla della "Tigre Celtica" è scoppiata e la social partnership è collassata, è divenuto evidente come gli anni della social partnership e di una crescita economica rivelatasi insostenibile avessero creato un movimento sindacale privo della sua capacità di agire in maniera indipendente. Il modello della "Tigre Celtica" può essere perciò compreso in maniera migliore se inserito nel contesto di un\u27applicazione pragmatica ed efficace dell\u27agenda neoliberale, nonostante l\u27inclusione dei patti sociali al suo interno sembri contraddire la teoria neoliberista. Until very recently, most Irish trade unions resigned themselves to the "competitive corporatist" maxim of: let\u27s accept a smaller share of the cake in order to get a bigger cake. However, when the "Celtic Tiger" bubble burst and social partnership collapsed, it became clear that years of social partnership and speculative economic growth generated a union movement that lost a lot of its capacity to act independently. The "Celtic Tiger" model is therefore best understood in terms of a pragmatic and effective adaptation of the neoliberal agenda, even if the inclusion of social pacts seems to be contradicting neoliberal theory.Author has checked copyrigh

European Journal of Industrial Relations

In aviation, EU single market rules empowered Ryanair over three decades to defeat all pilot unio... more In aviation, EU single market rules empowered Ryanair over three decades to defeat all pilot unions across Europe, regardless of the notionally strong power resources on which they were relying in their countries. Nonetheless, in December 2017, a transnational group of union-related pilots, the European Employee Representative Committee was critical in forcing Ryanair to finally recognize trade unions. This study shows that multinationals’ ability to circumvent national union power resources does not necessarily undermine transnational collective action. Hence, transnational union strength does not primarily depend on an aggregation of national power resources, but on union activists’ ability to exploit union-friendly peculiarities that the EU governance regime is also providing. We show that the apparently weaker institutional power resources at EU level provides more effective leverage for transnational collective action than apparently stronger power resources embedded within Fre...

Title A new methodology for analysing NEG prescriptions on healthcare. From counting CSRs to mapp... more Title A new methodology for analysing NEG prescriptions on healthcare. From counting CSRs to mapping semantic fields Authors(s) Stan, Sabina; Erne, Roland Publication date 2019-06-19 Series European Unions; Working paper 18-03 Publisher University College Dublin Link to online version https://www.erc-europeanunions.eu/working-papers/ Item record/more information http://hdl.handle.net/10197/11334 Notes Original draft September 2018. The attached item is the June 2019 revision.

What conclusions can be drawn from the trajectory of collective bargaining in Ireland over the pa... more What conclusions can be drawn from the trajectory of collective bargaining in Ireland over the past 20 years or so? The most important institutional change brought by the recession is undoubtedly the end of social partnership, which had dominated the Irish industrial relations scene since 1987. The picture is now one in which national bipartite agreements take place, but only in the public sector and with significantly less scope than in the past. In addition, the government has shown a willingness to impose unilateral legislation when bipartite agreements have been rejected by a majority of union members. In the unionized private sector, bargaining has been decentralized to the firm level, but until 2017 collective agreements could perhaps be described as a variant of ‘pattern bargaining’, due to the coordinated pay strategy of some of the larger Irish unions. Despite relatively strong economic growth, a return to centralized tripartite bargaining in the form of the social partnership seems unlikely, as the ruling centre-right Fine Gael government has consistently ruled it out, and IBEC have reduced the industrial relations function of their organization. Given the ‘Faustian’ character of social partnership agreements and the potential for increased members’ involvement outside centralized bargaining, even for the unions a return to social partnership may not be the most favourable option. Despite the voluntarist tradition of Irish industrial relations, the role played by state regulation throughout the past fifteen years has been significant. First, several pieces of legislation aimed at increasing individual workers’ rights have been introduced, mostly in response to EU directives. Second, a statutory minimum wage has been enacted and some sectoral wage-setting mechanisms have been reintroduced. Third, the Industrial Relations Act 2015 attempted to address the problem of union recognition, after the Supreme Court’s judgment in 2007 made the previous legislation dealing with the issue ineffective. Finally, the Workplace Relations Act 2015 attempted to simplify the dispute resolution system. These developments suggest a continuation of the shift towards a rights-based system, in which the roles of collective bargaining and collective labour law are reduced in favour of legally binding and individual dispute resolution mechanisms. The most worrying aspect for Irish trade unions is the sharp decline in union density, which had started during the 1990s and continued into the 2000s. Union density remains significantly higher in the public than in the private sector, and is declining in key sectors dominated by MNCs, which are adopting union avoidance practices, although some important manufacturers, such as Apple, are unionized. Other explanations for the fall in unionization include changing attitudes and public opinion toward unions; the lack of an enforceable legal framework for union recognition; the increase in individual employment rights ‘displacing’ the role of unions; and the passive attitude of some trade unions towards recruitment during the years of social partnership. To this should be added structural factors, such as the relatively higher growth of employment in sectors and occupations that are generally associated with lower unionization rates. Since the crisis, and subsequent adjustment, unions have aimed at institutional renewal, setting up organizing departments and increasing workplace action, both in the service and manufacturing sectors. Examples of this include a successful campaign in the cleaning sector to re-establish the sectoral wage agreement, as well as the coordinated bargaining strategy that started in the manufacturing sector, and was then extended to service sectors, such as retail and banking. An important recent development involved Ryanair, where pilots organized through the Irish Airline Pilots’ Association forced the company to pledge to recognize the union thanks to a transnationally coordinated campaign. As this chapter has argued throughout, especially after the end of social partnership, union density matters in the Irish context, as state support for collective bargaining institutions is low. Whether these initiatives will be able to reverse the trend of union density and collective bargaining coverage as it has developed over the past 20 years is the key challenge for Irish trade unions.European Commission Horizon 2020Irish Research CouncilEC - Education Audiovisual & Culture Executive Agency (EACEA)2019-08-14 JG: replaced with published version (freely available) at author\u27s reques

La fin d’un monde? Salariat, syndicats et politiques du travail face aux réformes libérales, Paris, France, 6-7 September 2018, Sep 7, 2018

Socio-Economic Review

After the 2008 financial crisis, the European Union (EU) introduced a New Economic Governance (NE... more After the 2008 financial crisis, the European Union (EU) introduced a New Economic Governance (NEG) regime, which enabled much more coercive interventions of EU executives in social policy areas hitherto shielded from them. This study assesses the policy orientation of their NEG prescriptions in healthcare for Germany, Ireland, Italy, and Romania from 2009 to 2019 and the potential for countervailing actions of labour movements. Acknowledging organized labour’s contribution to the making of decommodified healthcare systems after 1945, we ask if the NEG prescriptions were informed by an overarching healthcare commodification script, as this is a necessary (albeit not sufficient) condition for transnational counter-movements. Our analysis reveals that the country-specific NEG prescriptions of the European Commission and the Council followed an overarching commodification script, which especially targeted the countries that lagged behind in health service commodification. NEG thus repr...

Until recently, European elites firmly rejected the need for any coordination in the field of wag... more Until recently, European elites firmly rejected the need for any coordination in the field of wage bargaining, because the market would automatically lead to the desired (downward) convergence of wages across Europe. In 2011, however, Commission President Barroso announced 'a silent revolution' (EUobserver, 16.03.2011) that led to the adoption of the 'six-pack' on European economic governance by the European Parliament and the Council. As a result, the Commission not only obtained effective tools in order to control member states' budgets and economic policies, but also the right to issue enforceable maximum national labour cost increase benchmarks.Author has checked copyrigh

Labor Studies Journal

In the literature on cross-border labor action, labor education is seen as an important factor to... more In the literature on cross-border labor action, labor education is seen as an important factor to improving it. This article therefore first reconstructs an innovative pedagogic concept, transformative Transnational Competence, to advance transnational labor education and action. Although initially developed for multinational firms and international organizations, this pedagogical concept is promising for labor, as it also focuses on emotional issues that are central to collective action. Subsequently, we use our reconstructed concept as a yardstick to assess labor education programs of public and private sector unions in Ireland and Germany. Our study shows that all unions face similar difficulties leading to rather little attention to transnational labor education, regardless of the very different labor relations landscapes in which they are operating. Hence, unions’ difficulties in relation to transnational labor education and action cannot be due to distinct national or sectoria...

Author has checked copyrightDG 30/10/201

"La Citoyenneté européenne", rapport-proposition sur la citoyenneté européenne. Partici... more "La Citoyenneté européenne", rapport-proposition sur la citoyenneté européenne. Participation, droits sociaux et civiques émanant de l'Association Eurocités-Comité du Bien-être social (Mairie de Barcelone).Held in the Historical Archives of the European Union, European University Institute, PVD/DOC-5

Il n'existe aujourd'hui guère de déclaration - ni officielle, ni citoyenne - concernant l... more Il n'existe aujourd'hui guère de déclaration - ni officielle, ni citoyenne - concernant l'actuelle Conférence Intergouvernementale de l'Union européenne qui ne réclame pas une Europe plus proche des citoyens. Pourtant, au-delà de ces discours nobles pour une "Europe des Citoyens", on constate un manque criant de propositions concrètes qui ne se limitent pas à des petites modifications institutionnelles. En effet, la question d'une citoyenneté européenne dépasse largement le cadre juridique du problème. Elle met en jeu le fondement politique et social de la construction européenne. Ainsi, la citoyenneté européenne restera une fiction du droit communautaire, tant qu'elle ne trouvera pas ses racines dans un contrat social adopté par les citoyennes et citoyens des États européens. Ce constat nous amène à la problématique de cette étude : existe-t-il des tendances essentielles dans la politique communautaire et dans les sociétés (civiles) européennes qui seraient constitutives d'une citoyenneté européenne vécue comme telle? Une telle problématique nécessite évidemment une analyse bien plus profonde, qu'il me sera possible d'assurer dans cette petite étude. Néanmoins, cette démarche semble fructueuse, dans la mesure où elle peut ouvrir des perspectives de recherche intéressantes. Concrètement, il paraît judicieux de procéder en trois temps : Tout d'abord, décrire les raisons de l'actuelle utilisation fréquente des termes "citoyen" et "citoyenneté" dans la politique et les sciences sociales, et, souligner les diverses connotations contenues dans le terme-même de "citoyenneté", qui sera ensuite analysé comme concept. Dans un deuxième temps, analyser l'Europe des citoyens et la citoyenneté européenne en termes de politique publique, c'est-à-dire dans une perspective de haut en bas. Enfin, suivre une perspective de bas en haut, c'est-à-dire répondre à la question suivante : de quelles manières peut-on considérer la citoyenneté européenne comme un concept soutenu à la fois par des conceptualisations contemporaines et, des expériences transnationales répandues aussi bien au niveau des individus qu'au niveau des groupes de la société civile, en l'occurrence des réseaux, comme les "CONFERENCES INTER CITOYENNES" ? Autrement dit, quels sont les apports issus de la société civile qui favorisent ou défavorisent une citoyenneté européenne vécue par les citoyens

European Trade Union Institute eBooks, 2021

This chapter describes the features and fortunes of the Irish union movement over the last thirty... more This chapter describes the features and fortunes of the Irish union movement over the last thirty years, highlighting the issues it faced and the strategic responses it adopted. Whereas the collapse of social partnership agreements and the unilateral imposition of wage cuts after the financial crisis put unions very much on the defensive, it would be wrong to write off the Irish union movement.European Commission Horizon 2020European Research CouncilEmbargo until published - ACCheck for published version - AC --https://www.etui.org/listing/publicatio

Le premier débat en France traitant des élections européennes du 26 mai 2019 – qui a réuni 12 can... more Le premier débat en France traitant des élections européennes du 26 mai 2019 – qui a réuni 12 candidates et candidats têtes de listes le 4 avril – a surtout marqué le public par sa longueur et sa cacophonie.EC - Education Audiovisual & Culture Executive Agency (EACEA