ABSTRACT
This chapter examines employment trends, industrial relations and labor market policy reform in South Europe in the last two decades. In the first part the challenges that the European welfare states have been facing since the early 1980s are briefly discussed. The emphasis is on how responses – emanating from the national, supranational and local/regional level – to new challenges modify traditional forms of socio-economic regulation. A classificatory framework is developed that can help us to summarize a wide range of policy strategies. Further, the peculiarities of South European social, employment and welfare structures are highlighted. In the third part convergence or divergence in labor market regulation in South European countries is examined in the light of recent debates on alternative policy paradigms.
