industrial relations

industrial relations, the behaviour of workers in organizations in which they earn their living.

Scholars of industrial relations attempt to explain variations in the conditions of work, the degree and nature of worker participation in decision making, the role of labour unions and other forms of worker representation, and the patterns of cooperation and conflict resolution that occur among workers and employers. These patterns of interaction are then related to the outputs of organizations. These outputs span the interests and goals of the parties to the employment relationship, ranging from employee job satisfaction and economic security to the efficiency of the organization and its impact on the community and society.

In classical economics, workers were regarded as commodities that were subject to the natural laws of supply and demand. Although classical economists readily acknowledged that workers are not motivated by money alone, their abstractions were based only on the economic aspects of reality. This led them to consider workers as undifferentiated and passive instruments in the production process.

Karl Marx in the mid-1800s challenged this view of labour. He rejected the notion that workers should bear the costs of market forces and went so far as to argue that all the value of production comes from workers’ input; therefore, he insisted, labour should own the means of production. Since under a capitalist system the means of production are not owned and controlled by workers, the workers would be exploited. Eventually, suggested Marx and his followers, the injustice of this exploitation would lead to a revolutionary overthrow of the capitalist system and its replacement by a socialist state.

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Sidney and Beatrice Webb.

Brown Brothers

Later, around the turn of the century, British political economists Sidney and Beatrice Webb joined this debate by arguing that a combination of worker and community forces would gradually achieve a socialist state. They shared with Marx a belief that workers and employers are separated by class interests and that only by organizing into trade unions would workers amass the bargaining power needed to improve their economic and social conditions. They did not believe, however, that a revolutionary overthrow of the capitalist system was necessary for social progress. Instead, worker, employer, and community interests would eventually be harmonized through union representation, collective bargaining, and legislative protections.

About the same time the Webbs were developing their views in Britain, an American view was taking shape under the work of John R. Commons and his associates at the University of Wisconsin. Unlike classical economists, these institutional economists believed that the laws of supply and demand could be influenced by the policies, values, structures, and processes used to govern employment relationships. Like Marx and the Webbs, Commons rejected the classical school’s “commodity” view of labour and believed that an inherent conflict of interests separates workers and employers. He also believed, however, that these conflicts are a natural and legitimate part of any employment relationship and would not disappear if capitalism were replaced by socialism.

Like Commons, many American scholars and social activists emphasized the importance of legislation designed to protect worker safety and health, to provide unemployment and workers’ compensation insurance, and to guarantee minimum wages and retirement benefits. Because they believed in the value of organized labour and in the need for negotiation and compromise between workers and employers, the institutional economists not only contributed to the development of modern industrial relations—they also provided many of the ideas behind the labour legislation enacted as part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal in the 1930s.

The New Deal changed the face of modern industrial relations. In response to the economic and social crisis of the Great Depression, the U.S. Congress and the Roosevelt administration enacted a series of laws granting workers the right to organize into unions and to engage in collective bargaining with employers. Other New Deal legislation set minimum wages and provided a system of unemployment insurance and social security. In subsequent years unions organized large numbers of workers in the growing manufacturing, transportation, and communications industries. Labour organization reached a high point at the end of World War II, with unions representing nearly one-third of all American workers. By the beginning of the 21st century, however, membership in American unions had undergone significant decline.

As the problems of labour–management relations came to the public’s attention (largely through strikes), a number of American universities formed industrial relations research and teaching programs. The goal of these programs was to draw together the theories and insights of economists, labour and management specialists, and other social scientists to find ways to encourage greater cooperation and improved conflict resolution among workers and employers. Thus, the modern field of industrial relations was born.

While Marx, the Webbs, and Commons focused on the role of labour in the late 1800s and early 1900s, others were developing theories of management. Frederick W. Taylor’s engineering approach, later known as scientific management, was similar to that of the classical economists in regarding workers as passive instruments of production, but it did recognize differentiation among workers, at least insofar as degrees of skill were concerned. Taylor developed methods for time-and-motion studies to identify the elements of particular jobs and to determine how elements should be arranged for the greatest efficiency. He limited his study to the individual worker, however; there was no place in his model for group membership or for the effects of groups upon individual behaviour.

A step further in the recognition of differentiation among workers came with the emergence of industrial psychologists, who are concerned with the measurement of the skills and aptitudes of individuals. At least in the early stages of these developments, workers were viewed as isolated individuals, and no attention was given to group phenomena.