Why is union-management cooperation so difficult in Australian workplaces?

Zoom link

Abstract

Cooperation in employment relations is relatively rare across workplaces in the English-speaking countries, especially what we call ‘collaborative pluralist’ or ‘union-management’ versions. This is especially problematic in Australia, where new Labor governments at both federal and state levels claim to be promoting greater cooperation. This paper explores why cooperation is so difficult. This task reverses the common approach of many previous studies: rather than focusing on why the rare instances of union-management cooperation have been successful, it aims to explain why they mostly fail. The paper draws on extensive empirical data gained through multiple studies of workplace cooperation in Australia, but the ‘institutional’ explanation offered has broad implications. Theoretically, it raises propositions worthy of testing beyond our specific data. Prescriptively, it potentially informs public policy designed to promote union-management cooperation.

Speaker

Mark Bray is Emeritus Professor at the University of Newcastle and, as of 1 August, Honorary Professor in Work & Organisational Studies at the University of Sydney. He was awarded his first degree [BEc (Hons)] at the University of Sydney in 1977 and he was employed there as Lecturer/Senior Lecturer/Associate Professor from 1987 to 1996. Since 2012, he has undertaken (mostly with Professor Johanna Macneil from RMIT) much case study research on workplace cooperation, selected outputs of which are listed below. He has also been lead author of five editions of Australia’s leading university textbook (ie. Employment Relations: Theory and Practice, published by McGraw-Hill) and he has published on a wide range of other topics in Industrial relations and employment relations in the automotive industry.

Some relevant publications

Bray, M. & Macneil, J. (2023, forthcoming) “When may the interests of labour and capital align?” in Gall, G. (ed.) Handbook of Labour Unions, Agenda Publishing, Newcastle, UK.

M. Bray, J. Budd & J. Macneil (2020) ‘The Many Meanings of Cooperation in the Employment Relationship and their Implications’, British Journal of Industrial Relations, 58 (1), March, pp. 114–141.

M. Bray, J. Macneil & A. Stewart (2017) Cooperation at Work: How Tribunals Can Help to Transform Workplaces, (Federation Press, Sydney).

A. Stewart, M. Bray, J. Macneil & S. Oxenbridge (2014) ‘”Promoting cooperative and productive workplace relations”: Exploring the Fair Work Commission’s new role’, Australian Journal of Labour Law, Vol. 27, December, pp. 20-49.