scholarly journals Too Few Indians and Too Many Chiefs. Is This One Reason for Declining Trade Union Membership in Denmark?

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Søren Voxted ◽  
Jens Lind
Keyword(s):  
Welfare State ◽  
Unemployment Insurance ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Union Membership ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Social Regulation ◽  
Insurance System ◽  
Institutional Settings ◽  
Union Decline ◽  
Unemployment Insurance System

The decline in trade union membership in many countries since the 1970s and the consequent weakening of the trade unions is due to a number of reasons, including occupational changes, welfare state and social regulation, liberalism and individualization, and in Denmark (and Sweden and Finland) changes in unemployment insurance legislation and the institutional settings of the unemployment insurance system. All these factors are well known and have been analyzed in the literature. This article sums up all these facts and reasons for trade union decline in Denmark, but the main analysis focuses on a supplementary reason for membership decline among LO (the Danish Confederation of Trade Unions)-affiliated unions: many trade union members leave their unions to become members of unions that organize managers. When workers become managers, some prefer to join an organization expert in servicing managerial staff, while others leave their trade unions because they define themselves as managers without being formally appointed as such and without having formal managerial responsibilities. Reasons for this behavior will be discussed in the article.

scholarly journals Joint Responsibility at its Peak – Searching for a New Nordic Unemployment Model

2012 ◽  
Vol 2 (4) ◽  
pp. 171
Author(s):  
Tora Dahl
Keyword(s):  
Labor Market ◽  
Unemployment Insurance ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Union Membership ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
Nordic Countries ◽  
Faroe Islands ◽  
Insurance System ◽  
Unemployment Insurance System ◽  
Point Of Departure

Earlier research has shown that the Nordic Ghent systems seem to be weakened. The unemployment insurances administered by the unions have experienced a decline in numbers of members, very similar to the drop in trade union membership. This article takes its point of departure in previous research into the decline in the membership densities of unemployment insurances in several Nordic countries. The article examines these tendencies and focuses on a new and rather atypical example of organizing unemployment systems in a Nordic context, namely that of the Faroe Islands. Based on interviews and documentation analysis, the article describes the system extensively and argues conclusively that the Faroese unemployment insurance system is an example of the deeply rooted Nordic negotiation tradition, albeit in a new context in which the labor market parties stand united to ensure the system’s autonomy from political influence.

scholarly journals Unemployment Insurance in Interwar Belgium

1990 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 349-376 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guy Vanthemsche
Keyword(s):  
Unemployment Insurance ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Union Membership ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Social Insurance ◽  
Central Government ◽  
Public Authorities ◽  
Labour Movement ◽  
Wage Formation ◽  
The Government

SUMMARYIn 1900, a special type of unemployment insurance was set up in Belgium: the so-called “Ghent system”, which had some influence on the development of unemployment insurance in many European countries. This particular system was characterized by the important role played by the trade-union unemployment societies. The public authorities (in Belgium, from 1920 onwards, the central government next to the towns and provinces) encouraged the affiliation of the labourers to these societies by granting different sorts of financial support to the unemployed society members and to the societies themselves. During the crisis of the 1930s, this led to an important growth of Belgian trade-union membership. On the other hand, the quantitative growth of the labour movement due to this particular organization of unemployment insurance, led to many negative sideeffects for the trade unions (administrative chaos, financial problems, loss of combativity). Moreover, the employers' organizations strongly opposed this system of unemployment insurance, because they thought it reinforced the labour movement's power in society (strengthening of union membership, influence on wage formation, obstruction of deflation policy). This article examines the heated debates waged in the labour movement itself and between this actor, the employers' organizations and the government, to solve the many important problems posed by this type of social insurance. The Belgian pre-Second World War debate concerning unemployment insurance was of great importance for the shaping of the Welfare State in Belgium, which took its present-day form in 1944.

scholarly journals Voluntary Unemployment Insurance and Trade Union Membership: Investigating the Connections in Denmark and Sweden

2008 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 433-451 ◽  
Author(s):  
JOCHEN CLASEN ◽  
ELKE VIEBROCK
Keyword(s):  
Unemployment Insurance ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Job Search ◽  
Union Membership ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
High Rate ◽  
Insurance Fund ◽  
Insurance Funds ◽  
Current Characteristics ◽  
Country Specific

AbstractThe high rate of trade union membership in Nordic countries is often attributed to the way in which unemployment insurance is organised: that is, as a voluntary scheme which is administered by trade union-linked funds (the so-called Ghent system). However, since trade unions and unemployment insurance funds are formally independent from each other, and alternatives to traditional trade union-linked unemployment funds are available, it is far from clear why the more expensive option of a dual membership in trade union and unemployment insurance is generally favoured. Comparing current characteristics and the operation of the Ghent system in Denmark and Sweden, the article identifies incentives for joining an unemployment insurance fundper seand, secondly, factors which make such a dual membership appealing. It shows that some of these apply to both countries, such as the strong identification with trade unions or the lack of a transparent institutional separation, while others are country-specific, such as job search support in Denmark and access to improved benefit provision in Sweden.

Political attitudes and trade union membership in the Nordic countries

2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 381-395 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carsten Strøby Jensen
Keyword(s):  
Survey Data ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Union Membership ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Political Attitudes ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Nordic Countries ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
The Impact

Do political attitudes influence the likelihood of employees being members of a trade union, and to what extent is this the case in the Nordic countries with their high aggregate levels of membership? In this article, I address these questions using European Social Survey data from 2012. The results show that left-wing political attitudes have the most impact on the likelihood of trade union membership in Sweden and to a lesser extent in Denmark. In Norway and Finland, there is no statistically significant impact. I argue that the impact of left-wing political attitudes on unionization in Sweden and Denmark reflects a conception among employees that trade unions are normative organizations.

Een halve eeuw vakbondslidmaatschap : Een verkennende longitudinale studie naar enkele cyclische determinanten voor de ledenontwikkeling van de Belgische vakbonden, 1946-1995

Res Publica ◽  
2004 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 6-32
Author(s):  
Kurt Vandaele
Keyword(s):  
Trade Union ◽  
Union Membership ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Econometric Model ◽  
Positive Impact ◽  
Union Density ◽  
Free Riding ◽  
Structural Variable ◽  
Explanatory Variables ◽  
The Impact

This article explains the ebb and flow in Belgian trade union membership from 1946 to 1995 by replicating the econometric model by Bain and Elsheikhn in which changes in macro-economic variables are highly significant. Since the automatic indexation of wages and the extension of collective labour agreements invite free riding, the relevance of the change in inflation and real wage is quite striking. However, the free riding-effect is slowed down by the institutionalised presence of the trade unions on the work floor. The Ghent system explains the positive impact of the unemployment rate . The model is furthermore improved by the trade union density as a structural variable. The linear form reflects the enforcement effect, while the quadratic form mirrors the saturation effect on the trade union membership. Mainly due to the 'Allgemeinkoalitionsfähighkeit' of the Belgian government system, the impact of left parties on union growth and decline is not significant in a quantitative framework. With only four explanatory variables the model clarifies more than 75% of the fluctuations in Belgian trade union membership.

Purging the Trade Unions

2020 ◽  
pp. 343-373
Author(s):  
Ewing Mahoney
Keyword(s):  
Public Sector ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Union Membership ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Industrial Relations ◽  
Legal Regulation ◽  
Service Trade ◽  
Public Sector Employment ◽  
Legal Foundations ◽  
Legal Position

This chapter looks at government attempts to ban trade unions, considering the steps that were taken in lieu of an outright ban on trade union membership. Consistently with other measures taken at the time under the cover of security, government intervention to deal with the alleged menace of Communist infiltration of the civil service trade unions did not take the form of legislation. The legal position reflected both the lack of legal regulation of industrial relations generally and the lack of legal regulation of public-sector employment in particular. In practice, governments rarely needed to reveal or justify the legal foundations for their actions. The benefit for government is that although security policies might well be announced and made public, there would be little accountability thereafter if operated unobtrusively.

From looking backwards to forwards: unemployment insurance, France, 2000

2019 ◽  
pp. 65-90
Author(s):  
Magnus Paulsen Hansen
Keyword(s):  
Unemployment Insurance ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Reform Process ◽  
Job Seeking ◽  
Job Offers ◽  
Unemployment Insurance System ◽  
Training Courses ◽  
The Unemployed ◽  
Intense Debate

Chapter 4 presents the reform process of the so-called PARE (‘aid plan for the return to employment’) of the French unemployment insurance system in 2000. The instruments of PARE included an individual contract that would oblige the unemployed to engage in ‘personalised’ job seeking activities while getting access to support such as training courses. Further, PARE strengthened requirements to accept job offers from the job exchange service as well as sanctions upon refusals and contractual infringements. The trade unions were divided in their stance towards this, causing intense debate, especially on the use of sanctions. The reform illustrates how the addition of a rather simple instrument radically changed the moral status of the unemployed.

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