Understanding varieties of flexibility and security in multinationals: Product markets, institutional variation and local bargaining

Abstract

Most studies of flexicurity have focused on formal institutions within distinctive national labour market systems. However, the level and types of flexibility and security in a national labour market are to an important extent influenced by company-level processes, relationships and policies; thus a micro-perspective should be integrated into the study of flexibility and security. This article advances understanding of the influences of decentralized rule-making and its links with the macro level by drawing on case study research in four multinational companies, each with subsidiaries in Germany, Belgium, Italy and the UK. It reveals major differences in terms of flexibility and security between companies operating in the same country, and major similarities between the subsidiaries of the same multinational. Product market characteristics affect local autonomy to define human resource policies; national institutions and local circumstances then affect the capabilities of trade unions and works councils to negotiate local flexibility-security trade-offs.

Labour Demand Adjustment: Does Foreign Ownership Matter?

“…This is consistent with the empirical results of Macher, Mayo and Schiffer () which suggest that MNFs exert some influence on government decisions (at the executive, legislative, ministerial and regulatory agency levels), even after controlling for the influence of a set of country‐, industry‐ and firm‐level characteristics, including firm size. This also confirms the managerial practices in the Belgian subsidiaries documented by Pulignano and Keune (): ‘the threat to relocate production again led local unions to negotiate increased flexibility, allegedly necessary to keep the plant competitive and avoid job losses’. This enables foreign multinationals to transfer their workforce management practices to their subsidiaries.…”

“…By contrast, for a 200‐employee firm, adjustment costs for clerical workers are around half as much for MNFs as for domestic firms. In line with the findings of Pulignano and Keune (), the difference may be the result of stronger bargaining power associated with the potential threat of shifting production abroad, going even as far as plant or firm closure. Domestic firms and MNFs are unequal in this respect.…”

Varieties of workplace dualisation: a study of agency work in the German automotive industry

“…This article demonstrates the value of incorporating workplace dynamics in national‐level accounts of labour market dualisation, thereby further developing the contribution of the industrial relations literature to political economy debates (e.g. Doerflinger and Pulignano, ; Pulignano and Keune, ).…”

Flexibility and Security within European Labor Markets

“…Recent research has gone beyond the national level to highlight sector-and company-level governance mechanisms that also influence the definition of flexible and secure employment (Pulignano and Keune 2015). This research argues that the effectiveness of any flexicurity strategy followed by national governments depends on institutional variation at the sector-and company-level (Crouch and Keune 2012).…”