This article examines employers’ organisations in the United Kingdom, drawing upon 70 interviews and a new dataset encompassing 447 employers’ organisations. The article’s contribution is to develop a new typology of employers’ organisations capturing their organisational change in the wake of the decline of collective bargaining. It does this by drawing on a conceptualisation of employers’ organisations as intermediary organisations before identifying four organisational types: lobbying, service, negotiating and standard-setting employers’ organisations. The article also identifies and discusses factors that underlie this pattern of differentiation.
AhrneGBrunssonN (2005) Organizations and meta-organizations. Scandinavian Journal of Management21(4): 429–449.
2.
AhrneGBrunssonN (2008) Meta-Organizations. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
3.
ArmstrongEGA (1984) Employers associations in Great Britain. In: WindmullerJPGladstoneA (eds) Employers Associations and Industrial Relations: A Comparative Study. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 44–78.
4.
BarryMWilkinsonA (2011) Reconceptualising employer associations under evolving employment relations: Countervailing power revisited. Work, Employment and Society25(1): 149–162.
BehrensM (2004) New forms of employers’ collective interest representation?Industrielle Beziehungen/The German Journal of Industrial Relations11(1/2): 77–91.
7.
BowkettCHauptmeierMHeeryE (2017) Exploring the role of employer forums – the case of Business in the Community Wales. Employee Relations, forthcoming.
8.
BrandlBLehrA (2016) The strange non-death of employer and business associations: An analysis of their representativeness and activities in Western European countries. Economic and Industrial Democracy. Epub ahead of print. DOI:10.1177/0143831X16669842
9.
BrownWBrysonAForthJ (2009) Competition and the retreat from collective bargaining. In: BrownWBrysonAForthJWhitfieldK (eds) The Evolution of the Modern Workplace. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
CrouchC (1979) The Politics of Industrial Relations. London: Fontana.
13.
DelormeFFortinRGosselinL (1994) L’organisation du monde patronal au Québec: un portrait diversifié. Relations Industrielles/Industrial Relations49(1): 9–40.
14.
DemouginPGoobermanLHauptmeierMHeeryE (2017) A new form of voluntarism – Private regulation through employer forums. Unpublished manuscript, Cardiff.
15.
GoobermanLHauptmeierMHeeryE (2017a) Employer interest representation in the United Kingdom. Work, Employment and Society, forthcoming.
16.
GoobermanLHauptmeierMHeeryE (2017b) Countervailing power and the evolution of employers’ organisations in the United Kingdom. Unpublished manuscript, Cardiff.
17.
GoobermanLHauptmeierMHeeryE (2017c) The decline of employers’ associations in the UK, 1976 to 2014. Unpublished manuscript, Cardiff.
18.
GoobermanLHauptmeierMHeeryE (2017d) The unexpected survival of employer collective action in the UK. Unpublished manuscript, Cardiff.
19.
GreerIHauptmeierM (2015) Marketization and social dumping: Management whipsawing in Europe’s automotive industry. In: BernaciakM (ed.) Market Expansion and Social Dumping in Europe. London: Routledge, pp. 125–139.
20.
GreerIHauptmeierM (2016) Management whipsawing: The staging of labor competition under globalization. ILR Review69(1): 29–52.
21.
HauptmeierM (2011) Reassessing markets and employment relations. In: BlytonPHeeryETurnbullP (eds) Reassessing the Employment Relationship. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 171–194.
22.
IbsenCL (2016) Making sense of employer collectivism: The case of Danish wage bargaining under recession. Journal of Industrial Relations58(5): 669–687.
23.
LanzalacoL (2008) Business interest associations. In: GeoffreyJZeitlinJ (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Business History. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 293–315.
24.
MarchingtonMGrimshawDRuberyJWillmottH (2005) Fragmenting Work: Blurring Organizational Boundaries and Disordering Hierarchies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
25.
MartinCJSwankD (2012) The Political Construction of Business Interests: Coordination, Growth, and Equality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
26.
MorganGHauptmeierM (2014) Varieties of institutional theory in comparative employment relations. In: WilkinsonAWoodGDeegR (eds) Oxford Handbook in Comparative Employment Relations. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 190–221.
OlsonM (1965) The Logic of Collective Action: Public Goods and the Theory of Groups. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
31.
PasterT (2015) Bringing power back in: A review of the literature on the role of business in welfare state politics. MPIfG Discussion Paper15(3): 1–28.
32.
PurcellJ (1995) Ideology and the end of institutional industrial relations: Evidence from the UK. In: CrouchCTraxlerF (eds) Organized Industrial Relations in Europe: What Future?Aldershot: Avebury, pp. 101–119.
33.
SchmitterPStreeckW (1999) The organisation of business interests: Studying the associative action of business in advanced industrial societies. MPIfG Discussion Paper99(1): 1–95.
34.
SheldonPNacamulliRPaolettiFMorganDE (2016) Employer association responses to the effects of bargaining decentralization in Australia and Italy: Seeking explanations from organizational theory. British Journal of Industrial Relations54(1): 160–191.
35.
SissonK (1987) The Management of Collective Bargaining: An International Comparison. Oxford: Blackwell.
36.
StreeckW (1987) The uncertainties of management in the management of uncertainty: Employers, labor relations and industrial adjustment in the 1980s. Work, Employment and Society1(3): 281–309.
37.
TollidaySZeitlinJ (1991) The Power to Manage? Employers and Industrial Relations in Comparative Historical Perspective. London: Routledge.
38.
Trade Association Forum (2015) Directory. Available at: www.taforum.org/Members (accessed 22 September 2016).
39.
TraxlerF (2004) Employer associations, institutions and economic change: A cross-national comparison. Industrielle Beziehungen11(1/2): 42–60.
Van WanrooyBBewleyHBrysonA, et al. (2013) The 2011 Workplace Employment Relations Study First Findings. London: Department for Business, Skills and Innovation.
44.
VidalMHauptmeierM (2014) Comparative political economy and labour process theory: Toward a synthesis. In: HauptmeierMVidalM (eds) Comparative Political Economy of Work. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–32.
45.
WhiteG (2000) The pay review body system: Its development and impact. Historical Studies in Industrial Relations9: 71–100.
46.
WindmullerJPGladstoneA (1984) Employers Associations and Industrial Relations: A Comparative Study. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
47.
ZhuJNylandC (2017) Chinese employer associations, institutional complementarity and countervailing power. Work, Employment and Society31(2): 284–301.
