Blackwell Reference Online

Extract

The study of labor–management relations (LMR) refers to the rules and policies which govern and organize employment, how these are established and implemented, and how they affect the needs and interests of employees and employers. LMR has implications for the organization of work as well as economic policy. Focus gradually has broadened from the formation and operation of national and local institutions and collective bargaining to strategic human resource policies. Most recently a multi-level agenda has formed, following new needs for regulation in world trade, in the extended European Union, and in former communist and newly industrialized countries. The freedom of collective bargaining is an important instrument of citizenship in a democracy, as expressed by the UN Declaration of Human Rights and the International Labor Organization's statement of core labor standards. Based on a norm of accommodation of interests, LMR eases the burden placed on parliamentary institutions. Respect for the freedom of association for all workers is generally seen as a prerequisite for a sustainable system of free trade. To sociology, LMR is a momentous arena in which a political order intersects with the market system, which affects social differentiation, the distribution of social and economic welfare, and numerous other social dimensions in which sociologists take great interest. The field ... log in or subscribe to read full text