collective bargaining. As well as taking over some of the legislative functionof
the state, collective bargaining has been given greater responsibility for imple-
menting legal provisions (i.e. a regulatory function) and has also become an
instrument for handling restructuring (i.e. a flexibility function). In some cases,
it has even involved employees in economic decision making within the com-
pany (i.e. a management function). The overall effect of the wider roles being
assumed by collective bargaining is to bring about a considerable shift of
emphasis in the key assumptions, subjects and processes of industrial relations,
which are increasingly influential at national as well as EU levels. Figure 17.3
endeavours to capture the emphasis of this shift in contrasting caricatures of
the ‘old’ and the ‘new’ industrial relations paradigms.
A reorientation of the bargaining agendaAs collective bargaining assumes a wider range of regulatory functions, common
changes are also taking place in the other dimensions. Most obviously, there is
a widening of the scope. At national level, ‘social pacts’ can cover employment
policy and social protection arrangements as well as issues more traditionally
associated with the employment relationship such as wages and working time.
At company level, PECs can include fundamental changes in work organization
and working time arrangements, the handling of substantial job reductions,
guarantees of employment security and detailed investment plans. Significantly
too such ‘pacts’ typically do not just involve a one-off ‘agreement’. Many make
explicit provision for on-going joint implementation, development and collec-
tive administration through ‘bilateral bodies’ and ‘company-wide action teams’.
From distributive to integrative bargaining?An increase in the subjects and the greater devolution of collective bargaining
is also having an impact on the process involved. In the language of Walton
and McKersie (1965), collective bargaining has traditionally been associated
with distributive bargaining in which there are ‘winners and losers’ in a ‘fixed-
sum’ or ‘zero-sum’ game. Yet many bargaining situations are better understood
in terms of what they term integrative bargaining, involving a ‘positive-sum’
game in which the parties seek to integrate their objectives to some degree and
in which there can be ‘mutual gains’ from arriving at an agreement.
There is a strong element of problem solving and ‘quid pro quo’ bargain-
ing about the process of negotiating ‘social pacts’ and PECs, which is charac-
teristic of integrative bargaining. Significantly, too, many of the mechanisms
of integrative bargaining are to be found, including joint working parties,
third-party facilitation and continuous review of progress.
Especially noticeable, however, is the key role played by management. In
distributive bargaining, it has tended to be the trade union which takes and is
Industrial Relations in Europe 447