Rather than legal enactment and collective bargaining being the main engines of the 'Europeanisation' of industrial relations, benchmarking and 'soft' forms of regulation are increasingly to the fore. This article traces the origins of benchmarking from management tool to regulatory instrument,...

The impact of economic and monetary union on the structures, processes and agenda of collective bargaining at sector and company levels is explored. Drawing on cross-national evidence from two sectors, considerable differences between sectors within national boundaries are identified, but also...

This article draws on past as well as present to offer a systematic overview of co-ordinated bargaining, which many commentators see as a likely vehicle for the "Europeanization" of industrial relations. It argues that co-ordinated bargaining is indeed likely to play a major role within the EU,...

European integration has led to considerable reflection about the trajectory of industrial relations in Europe. In the event, rather than the "two extremes of social union versus a completely deregulated free-for-all", a multi-level system is emerging which is simultaneously prompting both...

Decentralization has been an important international development in large organizations, including those in the public sector, in recent years. The introduction of self-governing trusts in the U.K. National Health Service in the early 1990s serves as a paradigm case of public sector...