Towards a European labour market? Trade unions and flexicurity in France and Britain

Abstract

The EU's flexicurity approach to labour market policy promised advantages for trade unions but also posed challenges, given their weak situation in policy formulation at EU level and in many member states. This article explores the potential for union mobilisation on flexicurity and unions' capacity to influence policy debates and outcomes in two member states. In the UK, flexicurity has low political salience and unions' weakened voice has given them little capacity for mobilisation or influence, although they have linked flexicurity to campaigns on agency workers and restructuring. In France, unions have developed alternative proposals on making employment pathways secure and have succeeded in shifting debate towards these proposals rather than the Commission's flexicurity recommendations, although divergence between the positions of unions, employers and the state have limited outcomes to date. Unbalanced or instrumental application of flexicurity measures tends to erode rather than promote trust between social partners, in line with wider developments across member states. EU policies provide only weak leverage since trade unions' ability to influence labour market policy depends on their position within domestic institutions.

Labour market segmentation and mobility as determinants of trade union membership: A study from Denmark

“…It is also well known that the overall level of labour market mobility and level of job shifts are high in Denmark compared to other countries. This has been extensively discussed within the flexicurity literature (Ilsøe, 2012; Jensen, 2011; Jørgensen and Madsen, 2007; Milner, 2012).…”

Fixing France's broken social model? An assessment of employment and labour market policy under the Sarkozy presidency

“…In the context of modernized social dialogue, the EU policy template of 'flexicurity', that is, bargained trade-offs between labour market flexibility (especially numerical flexibility, or freedom to hire and fire) and security (in a broad sense, encompassing skills and adaptability, rather than statutory protection). The EU's specific recommendations for France (reform of labour contracts and modernization of welfare provision) were taken up by the incoming president and appeared initially to have a transformative effect on labour market policy and governance (see Clegg, 2011;Milner, 2012). However, the political executive's capacity to steer reform in a way that decisively influenced outcomes proved weak.…”

The resistible rise of the temporary employment industry in France

“…Successive governments tolerated the widespread use of agency labour beyond legal boundaries (Purcell et al, 2011). This was principally due to the tacit acceptance by the PS and some trade unions of the need for greater labour market flexibility to get young workers into employment, even if under the guise of pursuing labour market flexicurité (Milner, 2012). This growing consensus from the mid-1980s onwards created an environment in which the lobbying and public relations practices of the TEA sector gained an increasingly sympathetic ear at governmental level.…”