Employer associations in light of the Great Recession and radical labour market deregulation in Southern Europe: An analysis from the perspective of company membership

Abstract

This article analyses the impact of the Great Recession and radical labour market deregulation on employer associations’ (EAs) membership levels and composition in Southern Europe. It also reviews the literature and advances it in four relevant aspects. First, it verifies a general decrease in membership of EAs in Southern Europe, almost to the point of collapse in Greece. Secondly, it identifies the greater importance of large companies (more than Fordist economic sectors) in the composition of this membership. Thirdly, it confirms that sectoral bargaining (as a major determinant) and union representation (an element weakened by reforms) are strong company-level incentives for membership in EAs. Finally, it re-examines the reasons put forward in the scholarly literature to explain why EAs in Southern Europe have not been in favour of these significant institutional changes.

Why are (financialised) workers becoming more resigned and conformist and less claimants? Empirical evidence for Portugal

“…As a result, labour conditions have been worsening and workers have progressively been losing some labour rights since the 1970s and 1980s, which is clearly visible in the drop of the labour income share and the consequent stagnant (or falling) wages (Kristal, 2010;Dünhaupt, 2011;Stockhammer, 2012Stockhammer, , 2017Karabarbounis and Neiman, 2013;Lin and Tomaskovic-Devey, 2013;Stockhammer and Wildauer, 2016;Barradas and Lagoa, 2017;Barradas, 2019;Alcobia and Barradas, 2023); the rise of top management compensation vis-à-vis the working class and bluecollar workers and the corresponding widening of personal income inequalities (Lakhani and Barradas, 2023); the proliferation of atypical work (e.g., temporary or fixed-term contracts, dispatched contracts, involuntary part-time jobs and multiple job-holding) and the resultant prevalence of non-standard labour contracts (Kalleberg, 2000(Kalleberg, , 2009Chan, 2023;Gouzoulis et al, 2023a); the increase in job insecurity, instability, insufficient social protection, precariousness, higher flexibility, scarcer incentives and lower-paid jobs (Tridico and Pariboni, 2018;; the surge of emotional abuses and/or other threats (e.g., discrimination, bullying, harassment and violence) in the workplace (Buttigieg et al, 2011); the deterioration in work-life balance and the intensification of work pressure (Ayudhya et al, 2019); and the spread of informal work and non-contract workers (Chan, 2023). These stylized facts have been exacerbated by the growth of digital labour platforms and the corresponding emergence of freelancers and gig workers (Chan, 2023), and in the countries that requested international financial assistance (e.g., Southern euro area countries) in the last decade, namely because international organisations (e.g., the International Monetary Fund, the European Commission and the European Central Bank) imposed the adoption of several austerity measures based on internal devaluation and huge wage constraint polices as an excuse to restore external competitiveness and a sustained growth pattern (Lima et al, 2021;Sánchez-Mosquera, 2023). Nonetheless, workers have evidenced higher resignation and conformism and lesser claimant behaviour in order to demand higher wages and better labour conditions, which is observable in the general decreasing trend in strike activity in the last five decades…”