ABSTRACT
Everywhere one turns, it seems, commentary about the changing nature of work, workers, and the workplace is prevalent in the daily media. Not surprisingly, employee relations as practiced in private and public organizations has had its share of attention. Current changes and their implications for the development of thinking about personnel management was the subject of a provocative essay recently in Public Personnel Management (Newland, 1984). A corresponding assessment of developments in industrial relations appeared at nearly the same time as a symposium in Industrial Relations (1984). Interest is not limited to the United States. In the western democracies (Barkin 1983) similar trends are changing the contours of industrial relations systems.
