The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

From monopoly to voice effects? British workplace unionism and productivity performance into the new millennium

From monopoly to voice effects? British workplace unionism and productivity performance into the new millennium
From monopoly to voice effects? British workplace unionism and productivity performance into the new millennium

Britain has featured prominently in debates about unionism and productivity. This article suggests a recent revolution in the productivity effect of British unionism. A thorough review of extant evidence at various levels of aggregation indicates that whatever the broader cost to employee welfare and well-being, the hollowing and erosion of workplace unionism under Thatcherism delivered a one-off productivity dividend. However, by the turn of the millennium, extant Workplace Employment Relations Survey (WERS) analysis shows that workplace unionism, where it remained, was no longer robustly linked to poorer productivity performance. Our private sector analysis of WERS2011 confirms this, while our analysis of the WERS2004–2011 panel indicates that stronger workplace unionism now positively promotes private sector productivity. A thorough contemplation of the shifting concomitants of modern British unionism suggests a variety of processes which may underlie our striking panel findings, underscoring the suggestion that there has been a revolution in British unionism's productivity implications, but also indicating mechanisms which may underlie positive productivity effects of joint regulation already apparent in other countries.

0007-1080
574-594
Veliziotis, Michail
e43806b3-fdb5-494b-a624-04a5227d2fad
Vernon, Guy
07d124b8-c898-476e-b342-bd2bacc4107d
Veliziotis, Michail
e43806b3-fdb5-494b-a624-04a5227d2fad
Vernon, Guy
07d124b8-c898-476e-b342-bd2bacc4107d

Veliziotis, Michail and Vernon, Guy (2023) From monopoly to voice effects? British workplace unionism and productivity performance into the new millennium. British Journal of Industrial Relations, 61 (3), 574-594. (doi:10.1111/bjir.12726).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Britain has featured prominently in debates about unionism and productivity. This article suggests a recent revolution in the productivity effect of British unionism. A thorough review of extant evidence at various levels of aggregation indicates that whatever the broader cost to employee welfare and well-being, the hollowing and erosion of workplace unionism under Thatcherism delivered a one-off productivity dividend. However, by the turn of the millennium, extant Workplace Employment Relations Survey (WERS) analysis shows that workplace unionism, where it remained, was no longer robustly linked to poorer productivity performance. Our private sector analysis of WERS2011 confirms this, while our analysis of the WERS2004–2011 panel indicates that stronger workplace unionism now positively promotes private sector productivity. A thorough contemplation of the shifting concomitants of modern British unionism suggests a variety of processes which may underlie our striking panel findings, underscoring the suggestion that there has been a revolution in British unionism's productivity implications, but also indicating mechanisms which may underlie positive productivity effects of joint regulation already apparent in other countries.

Text
Main text From monopoly to voice FINAL ACCEPTED - Accepted Manuscript
Restricted to Repository staff only until 15 December 2024.
Request a copy
Text
Brit J Industrial Rel - 2023 - Veliziotis - From monopoly to voice effects British workplace unionism and productivity (1) - Version of Record
Available under License Creative Commons Attribution.
Download (299kB)

More information

Accepted/In Press date: 15 December 2022
e-pub ahead of print date: 5 January 2023
Published date: September 2023
Additional Information: Funding Information: The authors acknowledge the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, the Economic and Social Research Council, the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research, as the originators of the 2004 and 2011 Workplace Employment Relations Survey data, and the Data Archive at the University of Essex as the distributor of the data. They would like to thank the two anonymous reviewers and the Editor for their useful and constructive feedback. The two authors have contributed equally to the article and are listed in alphabetical order. Publisher Copyright: © 2023 The Authors. British Journal of Industrial Relations published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 473625
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/473625
ISSN: 0007-1080
PURE UUID: 4aede983-a5bb-41b8-885f-9c7bea79c0a8
ORCID for Michail Veliziotis: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-2245-587X

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 25 Jan 2023 17:40
Last modified: 06 Jun 2024 01:55

Export record

Altmetrics

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×