Labor Relations: Striking a Balance, 1st Edition, by John Budd presents labor relations as a system for striking a balance between the employment relationship goals of efficiency, equity, and voice, and between the rights of labor and management. Budd's Labor Relations broadens the narrow process focus of existing labor relations texts by placing the discussion of contemporary U.S. processes into the context of underlying themes - what are the goals of labor relations, are those goals being fulfilled, and are reforms needed. This textbook replaces the tired paradigm of "labor relations equals detailed work rules" with the dynamic paradigm of "labor relations equals balancing workplace goals and rights." Labor law, union organizing, bargaining, dispute resolution, and contract administration are central topics, but these processes are not presented as self-evidently good. These topics are placed in the broader context of the goals of the employment relationship, conflicting rights, and the environment of the 21st Century. This broader context serves to make labor relations more engaging and relevant to students. It also allows instructors to raise important "big picture" ideas while covering the applied business functions and strategies of the existing processes..

This engaging and timely book provides an in-depth analysis of work and labour relations within global platform capitalism with a specific focus on digital platforms that organise labour processes, known as labour platforms. Well-respected contributors thoroughly examine both online and offline platforms, their distinct differences and the important roles they play for both large transnational companies and those with a smaller global reach.

The renowned international labour law scholars contributing to this incomparable volume use the term ‘game changers’ to refer to evolutions, concepts, ideas and challenges that are having, or have had, major impacts on how we must understand and approach labour law in today’s global economy. The volume derives from an international conference organized by the Institute for Labour Law at the University of Leuven, Belgium in November 2017. This initiative is pursued in the spirit and with the methods of the late Emeritus Professor Roger Blanpain (1932–2016), a great reformer who continuously searched for key challenges in the world of work and looked as far as possible into the future, engaging in critical reflection and rethinking the design of labour law. While seeking to identify the main game changers, the authors explore new pathways and answers which may help to understand and shape the future of work. This is the 100th of Kluwer’s Bulletin of Comparative Labour Relations, a series Professor Blanpain launched nearly fifty years ago. The contributors address, and reflect on, such vital issues and topics as the following: – the ‘gig’ economy; – core labour law values; – freedom of association; – non-standard employment; – the rise of the service sector; – employment and self-employment; – the European Pillar of Social Rights; – app-based work; – algorithms as controls in the workplace; – collective bargaining rights and the right to strike; – the role of temporary employment agencies; and – termination of the employment relationship. There are also chapters devoted to specific issues in France, Italy, the United Kingdom, Estonia, China and the United States. Roger Blanpain consistently reminded us that labour relations are power relations. Although this book shows that the power balance is tipped towards employers in today’s world, what is nevertheless very clear is that labour law can play a crucial role in re-enlivening equitable outcomes, fairness, decent work and social justice in our contemporary and future societies, and that academia can help to understand, guide and shape that future. For this reason, this book will be invaluable to professionals in labour relations, whether in the academic, policy or legal communities.

Labor Relations: Development, Structure, Process by John Fossum presents the history and development of labor relations, bargaining structures and issues, and the process of negotiations and contract administration. The 11th edition addresses the increasing importance of health care costs, access, legislation, and regulation. Fossum explores the structure and internal politics of union organizations, union organizing and union avoidance, while reflecting and balancing the viewpoints of both labor and management, including economic, institutional, and behavioral perspectives.

Some of these papers were originally presented at an international conference on Globalization and the New Inequality at Utrecht University, The Netherlands; others were commissioned specifically for this book. Topics include surprising answers to frequently asked questions about globalization (the authors argue that social welfare policies can be followed and that world market forces are not beyond governance); the myth of trade union solidarity; the international restructuring of the media industries; the increasing importance of local labor relations; the impact of globalization on the potash industry; and Australia's historic industrial relations transition. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Labour law has traditionally aimed to protect the employee under a hierarchy built on constitutional provisions, statutory law, collective agreements at various levels, and the employment contract, in that order. However, in employment regulation in recent years, ‘flexibility’ has come to dominate the world of work – a set of policies that reshuffle the relationship among the fundamental pillars of labour law and inevitably lead to degrading the protection of employees. This book, the first-ever to consider the sources of labour law from a comparative perspective, details the ways in which the traditional hierarchy of sources has been altered, presenting an international view on major cross-cutting issues followed by fifteen country reports. The authors’ analysis of the changing hierarchy of labour law sources in the light of recent trends includes such elements as the following: the constitutional dimension of labour rights; the normative intervention by the State; the regulatory function of collective bargaining and agreements; the hierarchical organization of labour law sources and the ‘principle of favour’; the role played by case law in both common law and civil law countries; the impact of the European Economic Governance; decentralization of collective bargaining; employment conditions as key components of global competitive strategies; statutory schemes that allow employees to sign away their rights. National reports – Australia, Brazil, China, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland, Russia, Spain, Sweden, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States – describe the structure of labour law regulations in each legal system with emphasis on the current state of affairs. The authors, all distinguished labour law scholars in their countries, thus collectively provide a thorough and comprehensive commentary on labour law regulation and recent tendencies in national labour laws in various corners of the globe. With its definitive analysis of such crucial matters as the decentralization of collective bargaining and how individual employment contracts can deviate from collective agreements and statutory law, and its comparison of representative national labour law systems, this highly informative book will prove of inestimable value to all professionals concerned with employment relations, labour disputes, or labour market policy, especially in the context of multinational workforces.