ABSTRACT
Since the 1980s there has been sustained interest in reforming public service employment relations across Europe. The pressure for reform has arisen from concerns about high levels of public expenditure and their potentially detrimental effects on national competitiveness in a more global economy. These macro-economic constraints were reinforced by the Maastricht convergence criteria for membership of Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) and the provisions of the 1997 growth and stability pact, maintaining the pressure on national governments’ fiscal policies. To these macro-economic pressures can be added the microeconomic scepticism that traditional patterns of public service employment relations can ensure the recruitment, retention and satisfactory performance of public service workers in responding to increased citizen expectations about service quality and efficiency. In most countries the characteristic features of public service employment relations, including intricate systems of administrative and legal regulation, centralized systems of pay determination, rudimentary forms of human resource management, and entrenched union influence, have all been subject to increasing critical scrutiny.
