Abstract
This book reports findings from two large-scale, nationally representative workplace surveys conducted in Britain and France – the 2011/2012 British WERS (Workplace Employment Relations Survey) and the 2010/2011 French REPONSE (Enquête Relations Professionnelles et Négociations d’Entreprises). The 2011 WERS is the sixth in a series dating back to 1980, whereas the 2011 REPONSE is the fourth, dating back to 1992/1993. The comparative study was funded by the Leverhulme Trust (RPG-2013-399). The research teams were based at the National Institute of Economic and Social Research in London, and the Centre d’Etudes de l’Emploi in Paris.
Unlike most other surveys, WERS and REPONSE collect information from both employers and employees at the same workplace. The data have previously been used to produce a wide range of country-specific research, and a more limited body of comparative research, though this study represents the first attempt to provide a comprehensive comparatively informed overview of employment relations, practices and outcomes. To that end, the work achieves considerable success, providing a resource which will prove invaluable for lecturers, researchers, and, of course, policy-makers.
WERS and REPONSE are not identical, though developed ‘loosely in parallel’, but are sensitive to their respective institutional and policy environments. This means that the surveys cover different populations and substantive topics, and include questions which may not be identical.
Consequently, the research team needed to impose the same conditions on both surveys before analysis could start: smaller workplaces and public sector workplaces are excluded and, for the employee data, only employees with over one year of tenure can be included. Despite these restrictions, the data are representative of workplaces which account for nearly three-quarters of private sector employment and 55 per cent of all employment in each economy. For 2011 the achieved sample produced data on 1602 workplaces in Britain and 3947 in France and over 11,000 employee responses for each country.
The differences in design mean that there is no discussion of family-friendly working practices, and nor is there opportunity to comment upon disciplinary and grievance policies and procedures in the two countries. Some readers may be disappointed that such topics could not be covered, though to focus on what is not in the book would constitute a disservice to what the volume does contain – substantive chapters on workplace structure and governance, employee voice and representation, tenure and skills development, work organisation, and HRM and Job Quality. Another chapter focuses on the responses to recession in the two economies, by comparing 2011 data with the previous waves of the surveys (though there are further caveats related to survey design).
The substantive chapters provide more in-depth analysis; multivariate models are presented in addition to simple bivariate associations. Grounding the analyses in relevant academic debates elevates the work and draws out the significance of the findings. The chapters contain a great deal of detail – though, given the breadth of the data, this still represents a fraction of what could be done with the resource. This is not meant to imply criticism, rather to highlight the numerous possibilities for further comparative research.
Through the discussions in the chapters, the book addresses three key areas. First, the study seeks to establish the extent to which employment relations in Britain and France are similar or different. This discussion is well located within the varieties of capitalism debate which suggests key differences between the two economies – the liberal market economy in Britain with its low levels of regulation and protection compared with the hybrid French economy, characterised by both the dualist labour market familiar in southern Europe and the social democratic structures for worker voice and collective bargaining which are more common in northern Europe. The second area which the book addresses is the degree to which the employment relations systems produce different outcomes in terms of both workplace performance and experiences for employees. The third theme, which runs throughout the book, is the question of the role of the workplace – does it really matter where someone works? The combined dataset, which uses the workplace as the unit of analysis, is ideally placed to answer this third theme.
In discussion of the first key area, there is much evidence to support the hypothesis that the ideal types of economy can be recognised in the empirical data. To pick just one example, the greater reliance on both internal labour markets and temporary employment contracts in France is clearly suggestive of the dualist labour market. However, the study also offers fresh insights into the two regimes, which result from the richness of the data at the workplace level. In Britain the study finds both a greater specialisation of HR management – those who are managing the workplace relations are more likely to have specialist qualifications – and also greater autonomy to make decisions over pay and other matters. This contrasts with a more hierarchical model in France which allows less scope for local decision-making. In short, the study confirms differences between the two economies in workplace structures and also in the way in which employment relations are managed, but it also draws attention to other differences which have previously not received as much scrutiny.
To a degree, answering the question of workplace performance is made more difficult by the limited number of comparable indicators in the survey. The authors note that the higher degree of conflict evident in French workplaces sits alongside higher productivity. They speculate that this may be supportive of the Freeman and Medoff (1984) theory of voice versus exit. It is not surprising that the voice model is more entrenched in France, given the role of internal labour markets. In French workplaces, tenure is higher and resignation rates are lower than Britain. Yet, when it comes to comparing what these different systems deliver for their workers, the results are perhaps somewhat surprising. In as far as the data permit comparisons to be made, job quality is marginally higher in Britain. However, the study also finds that, whereas there is no gender differential in non-pecuniary job quality in Britain, in France the story is different with women disadvantaged compared with men – and that finding holds even when comparing by occupational status within the same workplace. Women do not experience the same employment conditions as men.
The importance of the workplace, on a range of indicators, is demonstrated at various points in the text. Most strikingly, this effect is seen in the discussion of job quality and job satisfaction. Workplace fixed effects models are shown to have much greater explanatory power for both countries. The workplace perspective also allows researchers to identify trends not apparent at the national level or at the firm level. This is well illustrated by the variations seen in management practice across Britain, a pattern which is not replicated in France.
In this short review, it has only been possible to give the briefest of overviews of the findings in this extremely rich volume. The study though is about more than the findings in the book, and it would be remiss not to comment on the resources which the research team have made available. Part of the intention of the study, along with presenting some findings and providing empirical evidence of differences between the British and French employment systems, is also to introduce would-be researchers to the data and the potential for further research. Details of how to access the surveys are given in the technical appendix. It also lists various documents and files which are available at the project’s website. These include details of how to access the data and syntax (in Stata) to recreate the analysis in the book. The book and these resources will surely both stimulate and aid further comparative research.