- Source: Industrial democracy
- Source: Industrial Democracy
Industrial democracy is an arrangement which involves workers making decisions, sharing responsibility and authority in the workplace. While in participative management organizational designs workers are listened to and take part in the decision-making process, in organizations employing industrial democracy they also have the final decisive power (they decide about organizational design and hierarchy as well).
In company law, the term generally used is co-determination, following the German word Mitbestimmung. In Germany, companies with more than 2000 employees (or more than 1000 employees in the coal and steel industries) have half of their supervisory boards of directors (which elect management) elected by the shareholders and half by the workers.
Although industrial democracy generally refers to the organization model in which workplaces are run directly by the people who work in them in place of private or state ownership of the means of production, there are also representative forms of industrial democracy. Representative industrial democracy includes decision-making structures such as the formation of committees and consultative bodies to facilitate communication between management, unions, and staff.
Rationale
Advocates often point out that industrial democracy increases productivity and service delivery from a more fully engaged and happier workforce. Other benefits include less industrial dispute resulting from better communication in the workplace; improved and inclusive decision-making processes resulting in qualitatively better workplace decisions, decreased stress and increased well-being, an increase in job satisfaction, a reduction in absenteeism and an improved sense of fulfillment. Other authors regard industrial democracy as a consequence of citizenship rights.
Works councils and workers' participation
At the point of production, the introduction of mandatory works councils and voluntary schemes of workers' participation (e.g. semi-autonomous groups) have a long tradition in European countries.
Co-determination
In a number of European countries, employees of a business take part in election of company directors. In Germany, the law is known as the Mitbestimmungsgesetz of 1976. In Britain a 1977 proposal for a similar system was named the Bullock Report.
History
The anarchist thinker Pierre-Joseph Proudhon used the term "industrial democracy" in the 1850s to describe the vision of workplace democracy he had first raised in the 1840s with What is Property? Or, an Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government, (management "must be chosen from the workers by the workers themselves, and must fulfil the conditions of eligibility.") He repeated this call in later works like General Idea of the Revolution.
In late nineteenth century, and at the beginning of the twentieth century, industrial democracy, along with anarcho-syndicalism and new unionism, represented one of the dominant themes in revolutionary socialism and played a prominent role in international labour movements. The term industrial democracy was also used by British socialist reformers Sidney and Beatrice Webb in their 1897 book Industrial Democracy. The Webbs used the term to refer to trade unions and the process of collective bargaining.
While the influence of the movements promoting industrial democracy declined after the defeat of the anarchists in the Spanish Revolution in 1939, several unions and organizations advocating the arrangement continue to exist and are again on the rise internationally.
The Industrial Workers of the World advance an industrial unionism which would organize all the workers, regardless of skill, gender or race, into one big union divided into a series of departments corresponding to different industries. The industrial unions would be the embryonic form of future post-capitalist production. Once sufficiently organized, the industrial unions would overthrow capitalism by means of a general strike, and carry on production through worker run enterprises without bosses or the wage system. Anarcho-syndicalist unions, like the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo, are similar in their means and ends but organize workers into geographically based and federated syndicates rather than industrial unions.
The New Unionism Network also promotes workplace democracy as a means to linking production and economic democracy.
Representative industrial democracy
Modern industrial economies have adopted several aspects of industrial democracy to improve productivity and as reformist measures against industrial disputes. Often referred to as "teamworking", this form of industrial democracy has been practiced in Scandinavia, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK as well as in several Japanese companies such as Toyota, as an effective alternative to Taylorism.
The term is often used synonymously with workplace democracy, in which the traditional master-servant model of employment gives way to a participative, power-sharing model.
See also
Notes
References
Articles
M Poole, 'Theories of Industrial Democracy: the Emerging Synthesis' (1982) 30(2) Sociological Review 181-207
W Müller-Jentsch, Industrial Democracy: Historical Development and Current Challenges' (2007) 19 (4) Management Revue 260–273
E McGaughey, 'Votes at Work in Britain: Shareholder Monopolisation and the ‘Single Channel’' (2018) 47(1) Industrial Law Journal 76
Books
Bank, John, and Jones, Ken, Worker Directors Speak: The British Steel Corporation Employee Directors (Gower Press, Farnborough, 1977)
P Douglas, The Columbia Conserve Company: A Unique Experiment in Industrial Democracy (1925)
P Blumberg, Industrial Democracy: The Sociology of Participation (1969)
K Boyle, The UAW and the Heyday of American Liberalism, 1945-1968 (1995)
M Derber, The American Idea of Industrial Democracy, 1865-1965 (1970)
SM Lipset, M Trow and J Coleman, Union Democracy: The Inside Politics of the International Typographical Union (1977)
JA McCartin, Labor's Great War: The Struggle for Industrial Democracy and the Origins of Modern American Labor Relations, 1912-1921 (1998)
M Poole, Industrial Relations: Origins and Patterns of National Diversity (2008)
M Poole, Workers' Participation in Industry (2nd edn 1978)
BC Roberts (ed), Towards Industrial Democracy: Europe, Japan and the United States (1979)
B Webb and S Webb. Industrial Democracy (1897)
J Witte, Democracy, Authority, and Alienation in Work: Workers’ Participation in an American Corporation (University of Chicago Press, 1980)
External links
Mondragon Corporacion Cooperativa, Spain
Economic and Industrial Democracy: An International Journal
New Unionism Network Archived 2011-01-06 at the Wayback Machine
Industrial Democracy Archived 2010-03-26 at the Wayback Machine A think-tank for the left.
Socialist Industrial Unionism
Industrial Democracy (1st edn 1897; 9th edn 1926) is a book written by British socialist reformers Sidney Webb and Beatrice Webb, concerning the organisation of trade unions and collective bargaining. The book introduced the term industrial democracy to the social sciences, which has since gained a different meaning in modern industrial relations.
Industrial Democracy was published in 1897, three years after the Webbs published History of Trade Unionism, an account of the roots and development of the British trade union movement.
Contents
Industrial Democracy is divided into three parts. The first part concerns the structure of trade unions and concludes that "Trade Unions are democracies; that is to say their internal constitutions are all based on the principle 'government of the people by the people for the people.'" Part II focuses on the function of trade unions and specifically the method of collective bargaining. The third part delves into the theory of trade unions.
= Part I, Trade union structure
=Part I explores how unions are representative institutions, and provide the basis of fair governance of the workplace.
= Part II, Trade union function
=Part II explores how unions developed systems of mutual insurance for minimum standards and collectively bargained for their members.
= Part III, Trade union theory
=Chapter I explains orthodox theories of economists at the time, and their "verdict" against the need for labour regulation. Chapter II sets out a theory of the "Higgling of the Market" where labour has a persistently unequal position. Chapter III explores what trade unions typically do to improve wages and conditions, through a national minimum and collective bargaining.
Chapter IV explores trade unionism and democracy, and looks toward the future of regulation. The imbalance of behaviour between employers and employees was described by the Webbs as follows.
The capitalist is very fond of declaring that labour is a commodity, and the wage contract a bargain of purchase and sale like any other. But he instinctively expects his wage-earners to render him, not only obedience, but also personal deference. If the wage contract is a bargain of purchase and sale like any other, why is the workman expected to tip his hat to his employer, and to say 'sir' to him without reciprocity?
Significance
Industrial Democracy had a profound impact on the British labour movement, and socialism worldwide. It was translated into multiple languages, including a translation into Russian by Vladimir Lenin.
See also
Trade unionism
UK labour law
Notes
References
W. H. Dawson, 'Review' (July 1898) 12 Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 136–143
External links
Industrial Democracy (1902 edition) on archive.org
Industrial Democracy (1920 edition) on archive.org
Kata Kunci Pencarian:
- Demokrasi industri
- Kodeterminasi
- Jepang
- Totaliterisme
- Sosialisme demokratis
- Guns N' Roses
- Perang Dunia II
- Globalisasi
- Selandia Baru
- Francis Fukuyama
- Industrial democracy
- Industrial Democracy
- Types of democracy
- League for Industrial Democracy
- Student League for Industrial Democracy (1946–1959)
- Democracy
- Intercollegiate League for Industrial Democracy
- Student League for Industrial Democracy
- Industrial relations
- Social democracy
