The Importance of Political Systems for Trade Union Membership, Coverage, and Influence: Theory and Comparative Evidence

61 Pages Posted: 26 Jul 2019 Last revised: 8 Jun 2020

See all articles by John W. Budd

John W. Budd

University of Minnesota - Twin Cities - Carlson School of Management

J. Ryan Lamare

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign - School of Labor & Employment Relations

Date Written: June 5, 2020

Abstract

Ideological connections between the state, political systems, and industrial relations have long been important. But the influence of the structural nature of a country’s political system on trade union membership, coverage, and influence has been largely overlooked. We uniquely theorize three channels through which a political system can shape unionization in the workplace independent of ideology: incentives for inclusionary governance, legislative body composition, and policy enactment. Empirically, we use multiple European data sets to test the relationship between political and employee representation using multivariate analyses across more than 25 countries. We find that increased political representativeness, measured by lower disproportionality and the presence of multiparty coalitions, is a statistically significant predictor of a greater likelihood of individual trade union membership, coverage, and influence, while competitive fragmentation, measured by greater numbers of political parties, is associated with weakened collective voice.

Keywords: labor unions, disproportionality, electoral systems

JEL Classification: J50, J51

Suggested Citation

Budd, John W. and Lamare, J. Ryan, The Importance of Political Systems for Trade Union Membership, Coverage, and Influence: Theory and Comparative Evidence (June 5, 2020). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3425452 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3425452

John W. Budd (Contact Author)

University of Minnesota - Twin Cities - Carlson School of Management ( email )

321 19th Avenue South
Center for Human Resources and Labor Studies
Minneapolis, MN 55455
United States
612-624-0357 (Phone)
612-624-8360 (Fax)

HOME PAGE: http://www.johnwbudd.com

J. Ryan Lamare

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign - School of Labor & Employment Relations ( email )

504 East Armory Avenue
Champaign, IL 61820-6297
United States

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