A Political Bargaining Theory of Co-determination — An Empirical Test for the Dutch System of Organizational Democracy

Abstract

Works Council influence in strategic managerial decisions is based upon the formal legal capacity to interrupt the process of decision-making at some point before its implementation, i.e. to halt the labour process of management. This equals the capacity to halt the operational labour process by means of a work stoppage in traditional collective bargaining. An empirical study of Works Council politics, comparing two samples (336 firms in 1980 and 63 firms in 1984) shows a strong but complex inter-relationship between the use of legal interventions and of legitimate non-statutory means of power. Influential, leading Works Councils follow a 'rational political' or a 'radical' strategy. The economic crisis increases the gap between this vanguard of inter-related Works Councils and a majority of isolated Councils abstaining from action or accommodating by bureaucratic ritualism.