The Role of the State in Central and Eastern European Industrial Relations: The Case of Minimum Wages
Governments in Central and Eastern Europe are dominant players in the field of industrial relations, acting in a liberalization dilemma between the needs of further state regulation to compensate the shortcomings of autonomous self-regulation by social actors and the demands of liberalized markets in the enlarged EU. Compared with the different types of industrial relation systems in Western Europe, a transitional model with specific etatist features has emerged. This becomes particularly evident when analyzing the decision-making process in Tripartite Councils and its function in determining national minimum wages. The article underlines the recent trends of differentiation and convergence of such pay principles as well as urgent tasks of the state to regulate the unsolved problems of poverty, labor markets and labor standards.
The Trojan Horse for the Americanization of Europe? Polish Industrial Relations towards the EU
This article discusses the implications of EU enlargement eastward for the so-called `European social model' and the `Europeanization' of industrial relations. After considering the standpoints of EU bodies, it supports an alternative `agency-based' perspective. A deeper analysis of the Polish case reveals that not only has enlargement an impact on industrial relations, but conversely industrial relations has a considerable impact on enlargement. A particular asymmetry is detected. In the West, employers strongly promote enlargement and unions (especially in some countries) are increasingly sceptical; in the East, the opposite is the case. This asymmetry increases the risks of American-style fragmentation of European industrial relations.
Complexity, Network-Decisions And Alternative Risk Premia: Some New Theories Of Structural Change And Portfolio Decisions.
Structural Change is the basis for many decisions such as government fiscal and monetary policies, government interventions, corporate-expenditure decisions, corporate strategic decisions, portfolio management decisions in finance; household allocation decisions, etc.. Structural change in industries and national economies is increasingly more difficult to detect partly because of the growth and dominance of Complex Systems and “Networks” in modern industries and economies – such Networks and Complex Systems include GVCs (global value chains), retail store networks; franchising networks; internet networks; services networks; credit-chains in industries; online social networks; etc.. The relationship between Complexity and Structural Change is well established in the physics, applied math and economic dynamics literatures. Traditional definitions and modeling of structural change have erroneously focused on changes in labor, technological progress, market share, and or capital – which are grossly inadequate in the new economy and post- global financial crisis (as confirmed by changes in the global retailing and housing industries and other industries). Also the modeling of structural change seems to be constrained by the availability of data, and often omits the relationship between structural change on one hand, and globalization, financial stability and international financial contagion. This article: i) introduces the Operations Strategy Model of structural change, explains how it differs from the Lewis Model of Structural Change; and explains the often omitted relationship between operations strategy (of companies and government agencies) and structural change; ii) introduces other new Complexity-based models/theories of Structural Change in industries; iii) reviews the relationships among Operations Research, Complexity and Structural Change; iv) explains the symbiotic relationship between structural change on one hand, and economic growth, financial stability, financial contagion and globalization; v) discusses the significant gap between academic research and practice and explains some issues and factors that should be considered in the development and testing of structural change models; vi) explains how alternative risk premia can be generated from new models of Structural Change.