ABSTRACT
The representation of employers’ interests at European level has developed in parallel with and as a response to European integration. In Austria, the only exception, collective bargaining is being dealt with both on the employers’ and on the workers’ side jointly by the voluntary organisations and the mandatory structure. In order to coordinate social policy on the employers’ side, Union of Industries of the European Community (UNICE) created the “European Employers’ Network” in 1993. The Maastricht Agreement on Social policy strengthened the role of the social partners at European level considerably. UNICE was opposed to an extension of European legislative competence in the field of social policy. The starting point for UNICE’s considerations about European social policy and industrial relations is the recognition that Europe does not constitute a social tabula rasa, on which any desired policy can be imposed, but that they have to build upon and be compatible with the great variety and heterogeneity of existing national traditions.
