Littérature scientifique sur le sujet « Collective bargaining – Italy »

In recent years, Italian legislation seems to have accomplished a ‘corporatisation’ of collective bargaining in response to employers’ demands, without the filter of national collective bargaining. Article 8 of Law No. 148/2011 made it possible to deviate from legislative provisions and industry-wide collective bargaining on a wide range of topics. The Legislative Decrees implementing the Jobs Act in 2015 have gone even further, allowing the possibility of a different regulation both through different levels of collective bargaining and through individual agreements. Faced with these changes in the balance of power, collective bargaining has been weakened. Nevertheless, a number of national sectoral agreements have provided for ambitious efforts to establish a new relationship between the levels of collective bargaining or the mechanisms of collective agreements, as well as to re-regulate forms of workers’ representation. As these national agreements are based on the voluntary compliance of workers’ organisations and employers’ associations, their implementation and enforcement in order to be effective will need to be accompanied by a re-establishment of the role of collective bargaining.

The paper addresses the endurance of sector collective bargaining despite many announcements of its demise. Bourdieusian social theory is used to interpret collective bargaining as a dominated social field that is distinct and relatively autonomous from other economic, political and transnational fields. Empirically, we trace the trajectories of German and Italian metal sector’s collective bargaining fields. In Germany, field agents contributed to a continuing erosion of collective bargaining, regional differentiation of membership strategies, and a reorientation of dominated employers’ associations towards their members. In Italy, some field agents resisted supranational and national liberalization demands and contributed to the adaptation and innovation of bargaining practices and hence, to the preliminary re-stabilization and re-balancing of collective bargaining between industry and company level.

This article analyses the rules on wage coordination and their effectiveness in the Italian two-tier bargaining system. It seeks to cast light on bargaining coordination by starting from the analysis of collective agreements, rather than focusing exclusively on normative and institutional aspects of wage bargaining. Accordingly, the study examines a dataset of 498 company-level collective agreements concluded between 2012–2015 in three sectors – metalworking, food, banking and finance – to analyse wage developments in company-level bargaining. The study considers the extent to which local wage negotiations are consistent with the rules on wage bargaining coordination laid down in economy-wide agreements and national collective labour agreements. Wage coordination rules are generally respected, though a significant number of company-level agreements still provide fixed-rate pay rises in breach of the rule that wage increases at company level should be linked to productivity and other factors relating to the workers’ and/or the firm’s economic performance. Although the violation of wage bargaining rules between national agreements and company-level collective agreements is in line with the favourability principle, it is argued that local negotiations on fixed-rate pay rises could be regarded as a form of uncoordinated decentralization, diminishing the effectiveness of horizontal coordination policies and the normative role of the social partners.

Decentralisation of collective bargaining has been one of the key trends concerning labour market regulation of the last decades. Most of European countries have developed – with different breath and scope – procedures and reforms to strengthen the company level of bargaining. The Great Recession has stressed this orientation, particularly in those countries which were under financial pressure. This paper focuses on the cases of four Mediterranean countries – France, Italy, Spain, and Portugal – in order to assess how decentralisation has been carried out and, most importantly, what kind of practical results have been achieved. On the base of these outcomes, it highlights how the debate concerning the structure ofcollective bargaining is changing from a black or white perspective to a new one in which mixed models are possible if the whole system is coordinated, taking into consideration the type of collective bargaining model set in the country.

The author reviews evidence that the bargaining structure is becoming more decentralized in Sweden, Australia, the former West Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom, and the United States, although in somewhat different degrees and ways from country to country. He then examines the various hypotheses that have been offered to explain this significant trend. Shifts in bargaining power, as well as the diversification of corporate and worker interests, have played a part in this change, he concludes, but work reorganization has been more influential still. He also explores how the roles of central unions and corporate industrial relations staffs are challenged by bargaining structure decentralization, and discusses the research gaps on this subject that need to be filled.

Labor dispute is a socio-economic phenomenon which arises during the establishment, change and termination of industrial relations. Together with the development of market economy in Vietnam, labor dispute in general and collective labor dispute in particular have become more complicated. Almost strikes which have occurred in Vietnam so far are spontaneous and unlawful. Main reasons for this may come from the impractical and low enforcement of legislation on collective labor dispute resolution. This thesis aims to study theoretical issues and current status of Vietnam’s legislation on collective labor dispute resolution taking the Italy’s model in comparison to find the gaps and provide recommendations for the improvement of Vietnamese respective system. To obtain such target, different methodologies have been used during the research process, which include: Desk review, Comparison, Analysis & Proofing and Synthesis methods. The thesis consists of three chapters in addition to the Introduction and Conclusion parts. The Introduction part describes the necessity, research objectives, objects, scope, methodologies and structure of the thesis as well as the literature review component. Chapter 1 is sub-divided into three parts: Part 1 elaborates concepts of labor dispute, collective labor dispute, categories of collective labor disputes and characteristics of collective labor disputes; Part 2 describes the concepts of legislation on collective labor dispute resolution, principles and methods of collective labor dispute resolution. In the latter section, each method was elaborated with its definition of the International Labor Organization (ILO) and applied definitions in some countries including Italy and Vietnam, its strengths and limitations. Also in this part, the ILO’s recommended model of collective labor dispute resolution was introduced; Part 3 presents the ILO’s point of view in resolving collective labor disputes and its Legal Framework on collective labor dispute resolution. Chapter 2 focuses on analyzing legal regulations, practices, similarities and differences in the application of dispute resolution methods of the two countries. The chapter consists of three main parts. Part 1 discusses the legislation on collective labor dispute resolution of Vietnam where relevant legal documents, characteristics, procedures, competence, organization and duration of each method resolution are presented. Strike procedures and resolution are also elaborated in this part; Part 2 investigates the legislation on collective labor dispute resolution of Italy. Unlike Vietnam where a comprehensive legal system on collective labor dispute resolution exists, there is not a formal legal framework for this in Italy. Legislation on collective labor dispute resolution of Italy is mainly about the implementation of the right to strike in essential public services. This part elaborates procedures of collective labor dispute resolution practically applied in Italy. Key findings and discussion on the collective labor dispute resolution systems of the two countries are provided in Part 3 in a comparative manner, which mainly focuses on the similarities, differences, strengths, limitations and a subjective evaluation of effectiveness of various approaches to resolve collective labor disputes applied under the legal contexts of Vietnam and Italy. The final Chapter is subdivided into two parts, of which the first one describes the necessity of the improvement of Vietnamese legislation on collective labor dispute resolution while the second one suggests changes to be made for such improvement with a number of specific recommendations withdrawn from the Italy’s lessons and practices as well as from the analysis of the ILO’s framework on collective labor dispute resolution. This implicates the successful achievement of the research targets.
La controversia di lavoro è un fenomeno socioeconomico che si manifesta durante l'instaurazione, il cambiamento e la cessazione delle relazioni industriali. Insieme allo sviluppo dell'economia di mercato in Vietnam, le controversie sul lavoro in generale e le controversie collettive sul lavoro in particolare sono diventate più complicate. Quasi gli scioperi che si sono verificati finora in Vietnam sono spontanei e illegali. Le ragioni principali di ciò possono derivare dall'impraticabilità e dalla scarsa applicazione della legislazione sulla risoluzione delle controversie di lavoro collettive. Questa tesi si propone di analizzare le principali questioni teoriche relative alla normativa in materia di risoluzione delle controversie collettive di lavoro nonché lo stato dell’attuale legislazione vietnamita comparata alla relativa legislazione italiana al fine di farne emergere le eventuali lacune e fornire raccomandazioni per il miglioramento della legislazione vietnamita sulla risoluzione delle controversie collettive di lavoro. Per ottenere questo obiettivo, Nello sviluppo della ricerca sono state utilizzate differenti metodologie, tra cui: l’esame documentale, la comparazione, l’analisi e messa alla prova e la sintesi.La tesi è composta da tre capitoli oltre all’Introduzione e alle Conclusioni. Il Capitolo 1 è suddiviso a sua volta in tre parti. Nella Parte I vengono sviluppati i concetti di controversia di lavoro, le categorie di controversia collettiva e le caratteristiche delle controversie di lavoro; Nella Parte II sono illustrati i concetti di legislazione in materia di risoluzione delle controversie/vertenze collettive di lavoro nonché i relativi principi e metodi di risoluzione. Nell’ultima sezione, ciascun metodo di risoluzione è stato analizzato sulla base (elaborato) delle relative definizioni fornite dall’OIL nonché applicate in taluni ordinamenti nazionali tra cui quelli italiano e vietnamita, con i loro punti di forza e di debolezza. In questa sezione è stato altresì introdotto il modello di risoluzione collettiva delle controversie/vertenze di lavoro raccomandato dall’OIL. La parte III presenta il quadro giuridico dell'ILO sulla risoluzione delle controversie di lavoro collettive. Il Capitolo 2 si focalizza sull’analisi della disciplina, delle pratiche, delle somiglianze e delle differenze in relazione all’applicazione dei metodi di risoluzione delle controversie dei due stati. Il capitolo si divide in tre parti principali. Nella Parte I viene esaminata la normativa vietnamita sulla risoluzione delle controversie collettive di lavoro. A tal riguardo, vengono presentati i rilevanti atti normativi, le caratteristiche, le procedure, la competenza, l’organizzazione e la durata relative a ciascun metodo di risoluzione delle controversie collettive. In questa parte vengono altresì sviluppati i temi della procedura e risoluzione in materia di sciopero. Nella Parte II vengono illustrate le procedure di risoluzione delle controversie collettive di lavoro applicate in concreto nell’ordinamento italiano. I risultati chiave e la discussione sui sistemi di risoluzione delle controversie collettive di lavoro dei due paesi sono forniti nella Parte 3 in modo comparativo, che si concentra principalmente sulle somiglianze, le differenze, i punti di forza, i limiti e una valutazione soggettiva dell'efficacia dei vari approcci per risolvere le controversie collettive di lavoro applicati nei contesti legali del Vietnam e dell'Italia. Il Capitolo finale è suddiviso in due parti, di cui la prima descrive la necessità del miglioramento della legislazione vietnamita sulla risoluzione delle controversie collettive di lavoro mentre la seconda suggerisce le modifiche da apportare per tale miglioramento con un numero di raccomandazioni specifiche ritirate dalle lezioni e dalle esperienze dell'Italia, nonché dall'analisi del quadro dell'ILO sulla risoluzione delle controversie di lavoro collettive.

The main aim of this tesis is the analysis of the collective bargaining process which should be helping the employees to reach better working conditions. The collective contracts from the CR will be explored to see if it this is true. Other aims are : 1. Description of the evolution of the Trade Unions in the Czech republic, Greece and Italy. 2. Description of the legal frame work and today situation of the Trade Unions in these countries. 3. Consideration of the influence of the financial crises on the collective bargaining. The tesis explores on the base of the data from the years 2008 and 2009 the influence of the financial crises on the collective bargaining in the Czech republic and explores if the salaries have economical containt and how the union members'demands change according to the general economic situation. As for the main target it tries to prove the success and necessity or its opposite of the collective bargaining in the reality of the Czech republic.

The author reviews evidence that the bargaining structure is becoming more decentralized in the hospitality industry for bars, cafés and restaurants, although in somewhat different degrees and ways for small, medium and large companies. He then examines the various hypotheses that have been offered from the last century untill now. Despite undeniable trends towards the decentralisation of collective bargaining structures in Italy, the hospitality industry sector very centralised. Collective bargaining takes place predominantly at a national or regional level. The importance of sectoral collective agreements – and, thus, multi-employer collective bargaining – is indicated by the fact that these agreements are used for a large share of employees as well as companies. At the same time, the tendency towards a company-based approach to collective bargaining cannot be ignored. Indeed, the author also talks about the obstacles of the decentralisation of collective bargaining and explores, at the same time, new possibilities for company-level deviations (from norms set under national-sectoral agreements). He emphasises the need for more decentralisation, especially for wage setting, in order to satisfy companies’ competitive needs, or to allow companies to overcome temporary economic difficulties, thus permitting companies to cope better with global competition and unstable markets.

L’objet de cette thèse est une comparaison entre les dispositifs de gestion du personnel des administrations publiques françaises et italiennes, afin d’explorer leur efficacité et d’identifier les principaux problèmes qui émergent à la suite de leur application. La loi italienne assimile le dirigeant à l’employeur privé. Il est donc le titulaire formel et substantiel des prérogatives de l’employeur public. En ce qui concerne les relations de travail, à l’exception de normes spéciales de droit public qui sont à l’intérieur du Texte unique de l’emploi public, le législateur renvoie à la négociation collective et aux mêmes règles qui régissent la relation de travail au sein de l’entreprise privée. Dans la fonction publique française le droit du travail est inapplicable . Toutefois, on remarque l’influence réciproque de celui-ci et du droit de la fonction publique. Il n’y a pas de place pour la négociation : le fonctionnaire doit accepter le régime juridique imposé par l’employeur public. En dépit des apparences et malgré deux différents régimes juridiques, les deux systèmes en évoluant montrent toujours davantage de ressemblances, notamment en ce qui concerne les outils de gestion du personnel, le recours aux contractuels et le rôle de la négociation collective. Il se trouve que la souplesse dans la gestion des ressources humaines n’est pas nécessairement liée à la forme juridique de la relation de travail des fonctionnaires. Le choix unilatéralisme/négociation, régime de droit public ou de droit privé est mal posé. Même le statut constitue un cadre souple, ce sont plutôt certaines pratiques politiques et administratives qui causent des dysfonctionnements. Pour gagner en efficacité, il ne s’agit pas, pour l’Italie, de supprimer la privatisation de l’emploi public, et non plus pour la France de supprimer le régime statutaire. Il se trouve que les deux administrations publiques n’utilisent pas toutes les possibilités offertes par les normes. Il faut investir sur les ressources humaines afin que les hauts fonctionnaires deviennent de vrais managers, plutôt que de continuer à envisager sans cesse des réformes radicales
This research consists in a comparison between the legal instruments of human resource management in the French and Italian public service sector. The objective is to evaluate their efficacy and uncover the main problems linked to their implementation. In the Italian public service sector, the manager is assimilated to the employer found in private firms. The link between the public servant and the administration is first regulated by a specific law, then by collective bargaining and labour law. In the French system, labour law isn’t applied to the public service sector. However, labour law has an influence on it, and vice versa. Collective bargaining doesn't have any formal rule because the civil servant must accept conditions imposed by the administration. Despite appearances, throughout their evolution the two systems seem to increasingly resemble each other, particularly in the realm of human resource management legal instruments, the use of temporary jobs and the rule of collective bargaining. It seems that flexibility in human resource management isn’t necessarily associated to the nature – public, private or mixed - of the link between the public servant and the administration. The choice between unilateralism and negotiation, administrative law and labour law doesn’t matter so much. Though French statute law is flexible, there are some political and administrative customs which are damaging. In both Italy and France, public administrations do not need to ignore - respectively - privatisation and statute law in order to become more effective. It seems that public administrations do not use all the possibilities offered by existing laws. They have to invest in human resources in order to transform office directors into real managers, rather than to continuously work on useless or damaging radical reforms

Sulla scorta del metodo comparato, la tesi analizza le recenti modifiche alla disciplina del contratto collettivo aziendale in Italia, Francia e Spagna, introdotte dalla legge e dagli accordi interconfederali; l'obiettivo è dimostrare un tendenziale avvicinamento degli stati europei analizzati al sistema nord-americano di relazioni industriali, in cui il rapporto di lavoro è regolato non tanto dalla legge o dall'accordo di categoria, ma dal contratto aziendale.Vengono inoltre analizzati i recenti accordi collettivi firmati alla Fiat ed alla Chrysler a partire dal processo di integrazione iniziato nel 2009.
According to the comparative method, the thesis analyses the recent changes to the discipline of the collective agreement at plant and company level in Italy, France and Spain, introduced by the law and the bargaining process; the work is aimed to demonstrate that these countries nowadays have an industrial relations system more closed to the north-american one, where the employment relationship is basicly regulated by the plant or company agreement, and not by the law or the multi-employer bargaining pratice.Finally,in order to demonstrate this common trend, the author focuses on the recent agreements signed at Fiat and Chrysler after the merger.

Defence date: 13 December 2004
Examining board: Prof. Gøsta Esping-Andersen (Universidad Pompeu Fabra) ; Prof. Marino Regini (Università di Milano) ; Prof. Colin Crouch (European University Institute) ; Prof. Martin Rhodes (European University Institute, Supervisor)
PDF of thesis uploaded from the Library digitised archive of EUI PhD theses completed between 2013 and 2017

This chapter investigates the diverging trajectories in collective bargaining outcomes on agency work in the German and Italian metal sector. It finds that bargaining outcomes have improved in Germany in regard to working conditions, prospects for being hired, and limitations to the use of agency work (2003–15), while they have progressively worsened in Italy (1998–2015). The explanation suggests that in both cases the deregulation of agency work allowed employers to exploit labour divides, preventing worker representatives from forming a united front in order to negotiate effectively. However, the campaign for agency workers by the German metal union shows that divides can be overcome and a united labour movement can successfully regulate precarious work.

The weakening of collective bargaining systems has been one of the top priorities within the so-called “new economic governance” at EU level over the past decade. Based on the Stability and Growth Pact and its tightening in the course of the Euro zone crisis, decentralisation and fragmentation of collective bargaining geared to promote labour cost-based competitiveness has become common standard in the “country-specific recommendations” within the “European Semester”. This approach has been pushed forward most vigorously in Southern Europe. Quite surprisingly, however, the outcomes of these attacks differ substantially across countries. The paper describes the different dynamics of collective bargaining systems in Spain, Italy and Greece over recent years and gives some tentative explanations for these differences, pointing primarily at contrasting trade union approaches. Further, the paper addresses the potentials of the state at national and EU levels to act as a stabilizer, rather than a driver of weakening collective bargaining systems. Given the stark contrasts in industrial relations practices across EU countries, it suggests practical steps to be taken towards a turnaround in EU policy approaches to collective bargaining within the framework of the “European Semester”, following the logic of an enabling state aimed at fostering social equity.

The chapter analyses the main legal issues that make the application of the rules on posted workers in the Italian legal system problematic. Indeed, the Italian labour market is still exposed to dumping by companies based in other countries. The protective regime of the worker posted in Italy, while emerging strengthened by the 2020 reform, continues to suffer from the effects of a pathologically unregulated collective bargaining system and the weakness of the inspection activity.

This chapter, based on a field research conducted in three countries, focuses on gig workers (in particular on and off-platform), who are facing specific social costs such as precarization and instability, induced by emerging new technologies. Our main concern is whether institutions have changed in a way that would enable them to reduce the burden of these costs and, if so, to explore these changes. Historically, trade unions have been the main actor working to defend and extend workers’ rights and to protect and improve working conditions. Several other quasi-collective actors have emerged as self-employment spread, which were not always coordinated with unions, particularly in the field of social and mutual aid cooperatives and of professional associations. These emerging actors have made the overall landscape of representation much more complex. Scholars have studied these new organizations of representation and aggregation for self-employed workers predominantly by framing them as external to the traditional system of industrial relations or as bottom-up initiatives with a limited power of action. Our main argument is that the relations between old and new institutional actors are crucial, and the possibility of developing adaptation or innovative strategies also depends on them. With this perspective, it is necessary to pay the utmost attention to the state, which can play a no less important role with new organizations for the self-employed than it has had in fostering collective bargaining in the classical system of industrial relations. Moreover, evidence from fieldwork suggests that these relationships have the character of ‘institutional bricolage’, as old and new institutional actors attempt to perform new functions to adapt configurations of rules and practices to new conditions.