The Euro-company dimensionAs the next chapter by Paul Marginson describes in greater detail, there have
also been significant developments at Euro-company level. According to the
European Trade Union Institute, by the end of 2001 around 650 MNCs had
reached agreements with representatives of their employees to establish trans-
national machinery for information and consultation under the 1993 European
Works Council (EWC) Directive. Moreover, the increasing importance of man-
agement benchmarking, above all in sectors such as automotive, is encouraging
greater harmonization regardless of the activities of trade unions.
3 NATIONAL INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS SYSTEMS: A CASE
OF ‘RENATIONALIZATION’ AND‘EUROPEANIZATION’?
Less obvious, but fundamentally important in the emergence of a multi-level
system of industrial relations, have been developments within national sys-
tems. National industrial relations systems have always been multi-level to
some degree, with national, sector, company and workplace levels interacting
with one another. Making the difference is the international dimension that
the EU brings. As Richard Hyman’s chapter discusses in greater detail, national
systems everywhere are under pressure. Arguably, this is especially so in the
case of EU countries, as policy makers and practitioners have sought to grapple
with the implications of globalization in general and EMU in particular. One
result, however, is some striking parallels in the developing patterns of regula-
tion between national systems, reflecting a great deal of ‘hybridization’ and
‘cross-fertilization’ – Europe is learning from Europe, in Teague’s words (2001:
54). Thus, as well as a rise in company bargaining, there has also been strength-
ening of the national level through the negotiation of ‘social pacts’. Seemingly
contradictory – the one involving decentralization, the other centralization –
they represent two dimensions of the same problem: the need for policy makers
and practitioners to meet the challenge of the ‘regime competition’ that
European integration is helping to promote.
Centralization anddecentralizationMost EU countries, the exception being the UK, have been characterized by an
inclusive structure of multi-employer collective bargaining at national and/or
sector level. Indeed, such structures could be said to form a cornerstone of their
industrial relations systems. In the face of growing international competition,
however, there has been a widespread trend towards more decentralized
444 International Human Resource Management