ABSTRACT
Location-based competition among workers rather than a transnational solidarity is predicted by other scholars. However, I have pointed to theories according to which the same structural change, market integration, can lead to an opposite conclusion: that the integration of market can foster cooperation between the trade unions. As the same structural factor was predicted to have contradictory consequences, I proposed a more inductive approach in the research on unexpected examples of transnational solidarity to understand what its bases are. My main argument is that structural factors do not automatically push the trade unions into certain types of behaviour, be it cooperation or competition. In order to make predictions on the future of the integration of the labour movement we should look at the complexity of actors’ choices, including the three types of mechanisms: situational, action formation and transformational. Furthermore, I propose we view the trade unions not only as being embedded in horizontal relations with other trade unions, but embedded in their vertical organizational structures as well. These influence their behaviour and determine the limits and constraints of cooperation. Here I summarize the findings of previous chapters to underline that I do
not derive the actors’ choices from the structural factors, but rather that it is the structural factors that constitute a context for decision making. The link between the individual and the macro level is analytically relevant. External factors have an impact on the actors’ choices and decisions only if they are reflected in their decision making. The opportunities or threats need to be perceived and constructed by the actors. One cannot automatically derive behaviour from the structural factors (McAdam et al. 2001: 47). Therefore, this chapter will also avoid the structural determinist or functionalist predictions that I criticized at the beginning. Tracing the structural factors through the perception of the actors involved when making certain decisions is a way of overcoming the drawbacks of predictions derived merely from structural change. The question is: how do the actors perceive the integration of the market at its different stages and how do they assess their chances of influencing events at the national and European level? Analyzing the choices of the trade unions in a historical perspective makes
it possible to detect the way the complexity of opportunities and threats
shapes their strategies. The cognitive process of assessing the structural factors can be defined as two situational mechanisms: 1) establishing of the common market and transnational competition and 2) the opportunities to protect against its effects at the national and international level. The existence of established institutions that enable the defence of workers’ interests affected by the integration is taken into account. Therefore, one should look at the institutional embedment of the trade unions and not only at the pull (or push) factors provided by European integration. I will mainly concentrate on the reaction of trade unions in the form of coalescing interests and engagement in international cooperation as a way of protecting the interests of their constituencies. Before turning to the trade unions’ reaction, a presentation of a short per-
iodization of European integration will be helpful in following the further parts. One can distinguish three phases of market transformation in the wake of European integration. In the first period (1950s-mid 1970s), market regulation was limited to the mobility of goods and removal of tariffs. The domestic goals were supported by transnational regulation and the national capitalist systems were not affected. The sovereignty of national market regulations was affected in the second phase (1970s-1990s) through the mutual recognition rule. The integration was driven by European actors and its effects were filtered by the institutional structure of different varieties of capitalism. In the third phase (since late 1990s), the integration exhibits a market transformative character towards the Anglo-Saxon model. It has an impact on the national institutions, especially in the coordinated market economies. The market transformation is detached from the political process. Whereas the neo-functionalist mode of integration assumed a pressure from below that of market regulation and institutions at the supranational level, the post-functionalist perspective sees the transformative impact of liberalization on the coordinated capitalist economies and the lack of its legitimacy. The Service Directive is seen as symptomatic for this trend (Höpner and Schäfer 2007: 5-12). Following the development of market integration from being very limited in its effect to one of actually transforming national industrial relations, one can expect a growing interest in cooperation. The differentiation into phases of market integration will structure this chap-
ter: the first and second phases will be described in the first subchapter and the third one in the subsequent subchapter. Reports on cooperation in the 1990s will be based on secondary sources. Whereas the developments within European trade unionism and the conflicts and attitudes from that time are widely described in the literature, less is known about the reaction to recent developments. My study is an empirical contribution towards filling this gap. I will present the change of trade unions’ perceptions and strategies, which I traced through interviews. I will exemplify the perception by focusing on trade unions in two extremely different countries: Sweden and Poland. The stance of German and British trade unions will be briefly presented as well. Tracing the way the trade unions behaved in reaction to the stages of integration highlights the importance of push factors for the intensification of cooperation.
