Strained Compromises? Danish Flexicurity During Crisis

Ibsen, Christian Lyhne

doi:10.19154/njwls.v1i1.2335

Cited by 11 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…Four general points can be made about the Danish economic recession of 2008-2014(Goul Andersen, 2014Ibsen, 2011). First, Denmark was in a very favourable economic situation at the outset of the crisis with very low levels of unemployment which put wage moderation to the test.…”

Section: Employers' Sensemaking During the Recessionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Making sense of employer collectivism – The case of Danish wage bargaining under recession

Ibsen

2016

Journal of Industrial Relations

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This conceptual paper argues that preferences of employers for collective action cannot be reduced to rational actors making decisions based on market structures or institutional logics. Both markets and institutions are inherently ambiguous and employers therefore have to settle for plausiblerather than accuraterational strategies among many alternatives through so-called sensemaking. Sensemaking refers to the process by which employers continuously make sense of their competitive environment by building causal stories of competitive advantages. The paper therefore tries to provide a better understanding of how preferences for collectivism are formed, sustained and potentially changed by identifying dominant and competing stories that either reinforce or challenge preferences for collectivism. Hereby, the paper fills a theoretical, empirical and methodological void in studies that allude to the ambiguous role of markets and institutions but do not study how actors deal with this ambiguity. The sensemaking concept is illustrated with an analysis of wage bargaining in Denmark during the recent recession when Danish labour cost competitiveness was in a deplorable state. However, unlike countries in similar situations e.g. Finland and Sweden, Danish employers retained coordinated industry-level bargaining system, which makes it an interesting paradox to study from the vantage point of sensemaking.

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Section: Employers' Sensemaking During the Recessionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Making sense of employer collectivism – The case of Danish wage bargaining under recession

Ibsen

2016

Journal of Industrial Relations

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“…In Norway, until the crisis lay-offs were restricted to 30 weeks within 18 months, while work-sharing in Denmark could be used for up to 26 weeks within 12 months (Ibsen, 2011;Jørgensen, 2011b).…”

Section: Pre-crisis Schemes For Temporary Lay-offs and Work Sharingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Stress testing the Nordic models: Manufacturing labour adjustments during crisis

Svalund

Casinowsky

Dølvik

et al. 2013

European Journal of Industrial Relations

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“…Declining income security and the changes to unemployment benefits resulted in the social partners’ successful push for severance pay for blue-collar workers. Furthermore, the crisis stimulated additional contestations at local level, where management and shop stewards came together to negotiate concessions on employment (Ibsen, 2011). While individually minor, in time such incremental changes in these systems in flux may alter the balance between flexibility and security.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Yet this description is not compatible with the Danish interpretation, which, the authors observe, is concerned with the entire labour market, rather than just its most vulnerable participants. Hence, the authors identify another definition that captures the state of the labour market, where various forms of flexibility and security are continuously adjusted (Ibsen, 2011).…”

Section: Flexicuritymentioning

confidence: 99%

Flexicurity and the dynamics of the welfare state adjustments

Bubak

2018

Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research

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The disruptions of the recent global financial crisis intensified a number of industrial and economic challenges and brought forward a set of often contradictory solutions. Here, we focus on two alternative views on how to (re)establish economic competitiveness and enable growth – flexicurity and austerity. There is much to be learned about the future of these conflicting recipes across changing political economies, particularly considering the importance of the social partners in the development of flexicurity, and their differential ability to influence welfare state outcomes more broadly. Two questions emerge. Attentive to the role and capacity of the social partners, what can we learn about the dynamics of the ongoing welfare state adjustments? How do we make sense of labour market politics in this paradoxical environment? In order to help answer these, we visit the United Kingdom and Denmark – one state offering modest social and employment security, the other a paragon of flexicurity – and find their divergent philosophies, institutional development, and organisational interactions explain not only their respective choices in the aftermath of the crisis, but also their prospects for socially oriented labour policies.

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Strained Compromises? Danish Flexicurity During Crisis

Abstract: The

Cited by 11 publications

References 6 publications

Making sense of employer collectivism – The case of Danish wage bargaining under recession

Making sense of employer collectivism – The case of Danish wage bargaining under recession

Stress testing the Nordic models: Manufacturing labour adjustments during crisis

Flexicurity and the dynamics of the welfare state adjustments

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