Italy

Italian industrial relations have undergone profound changes during the postwar period, yet present problems cannot be understood without taking into account the trends in recent history and the contradictions not resolved in the past. The system built immediately after the Second World War, which lasted until the end of the fifties, was strongly influenced by Italian tradition in all its basic features. Collective bargaining and labor union organizations were highly centralized, the most important issues being decided at the industry confederation level, and by means of interconfederation agreements covering a whole sector of the economy (e.g., industry, agriculture, services). Labor unions were organized along the two traditional lines of organization, vertically (i.e., on an industrywide or category basis) and horizontally (cutting across different categories and embracing all workers in various geographical locations), but with a clear dominance of the latter—the confederation at the center, and the chambers of labor at the provincial level being the strong points of the organization.