IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/brjirl/v52y2014i1p1-31.html

History of the British Industrial Relations Field Reconsidered: Getting from the Webbs to the New Employment Relations Paradigm

Author

Listed:
  • Bruce E. Kaufman

Abstract

Sidney and Beatrice Webb are commonly cited as the founders of the British field of industrial relations. Are they, however, if the field is centred not on study of unions and collective bargaining but rather on the entire employment relationship? A ‘qualified yes’ answer is given; however, getting there involves major revision to the conventional historiography of the field. To illustrate, the article presents a traditional and revised family tree of British industrial relations. Numerous insights and implications follow.

Suggested Citation

  • Bruce E. Kaufman, 2014. "History of the British Industrial Relations Field Reconsidered: Getting from the Webbs to the New Employment Relations Paradigm," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 52(1), pages 1-31, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:brjirl:v:52:y:2014:i:1:p:1-31
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1111/j.1467-8543.2012.00907.x
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to

    for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Roderick Martin, 1998. "The British Tradition of Industrial Relations Research: The Contribution of W.E.J. (Lord) McCarthy," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 36(1), pages 83-97, March.
    2. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2008. "Paradigms in Industrial Relations: Original, Modern and Versions In‐between," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 46(2), pages 314-339, June.
    3. Peter Ackers, 2007. "Collective Bargaining as Industrial Democracy: Hugh Clegg and the Political Foundations of British Industrial Relations Pluralism," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 45(1), pages 77-101, March.
    4. Marsden, David, 1999. "A Theory of Employment Systems: Micro-Foundations of Societal Diversity," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780198294221.
    5. William McCarthy, 1994. "The Involvement of Academics in British Industrial Relations," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 32(2), pages 201-217, June.
    6. Jerry Evensky, 2005. "“Chicago Smith†versus “Kirkaldy Smithâ€," History of Political Economy, Duke University Press, vol. 37(2), pages 197-203, Summer.
    7. Clarkson, Jesse D., 1953. "The Background of Fabian Theory," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 13(4), pages 462-471, October.
    8. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2010. "The Theoretical Foundation of Industrial Relations and its Implications for Labor Economics and Human Resource Management," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 64(1), pages 74-108, October.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2016. "Experience with Company Unions and their Treatment under the Wagner Act: A Four Frames of Reference Analysis," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(1), pages 3-39, January.
    2. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2013. "Sidney and Beatrice Webb's Institutional Theory of Labor Markets and Wage Determination," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(3), pages 765-791, July.
    3. Ian Kessler & Sidney Kessler, 2015. "Engaging with management," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(1), pages 20-26, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Peter Ackers, 2011. "The Changing Systems of British Industrial Relations, 1954–1979: Hugh Clegg and the Warwick Sociological Turn," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 49(2), pages 306-330, June.
    2. Ian Kessler & Sidney Kessler, 2015. "Engaging with management," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 46(1), pages 20-26, January.
    3. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2012. "An Institutional Economic Analysis of Labor Unions," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51, pages 438-471, April.
    4. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2013. "Sidney and Beatrice Webb's Institutional Theory of Labor Markets and Wage Determination," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(3), pages 765-791, July.
    5. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2010. "The Theoretical Foundation of Industrial Relations and its Implications for Labor Economics and Human Resource Management," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 64(1), pages 74-108, October.
    6. Martin Behrens & Andreas Pekarek, 2023. "Delivering the goods? German industrial relations institutions during the COVID‐19 crisis," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 62(2), pages 126-144, April.
    7. Bruce Kaufman, 2014. "Explaining Breadth and Depth of Employee Voice across Firms: A Voice Factor Demand Model," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 35(3), pages 296-319, September.
    8. Chiara Benassi, 2016. "Liberalization Only at the Margins? Analysing the Growth of Temporary Work in German Core Manufacturing Sectors," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 54(3), pages 597-622, September.
    9. Neeraj Kumari & Rajnish Ratna, 2014. "Study of Factories Act Provisions and Industrial Relations in Manufacturing Sector," Journal of Public Policy & Governance, Research Academy of Social Sciences, vol. 1(1), pages 45-50.
    10. Philippe Askenazy & Clément Brébion & Pierre Courtioux & Christine Erhel & Malo Mofakhami, 2023. "HRM Strategies in Response to the First Covid Lockdown: a Typology of French Workplaces," Working Papers hal-03953817, HAL.
    11. Giovanni Costa & Arnaldo Camuffo, 2014. "The evolution of human resource management in Italy: a historical-institutional perspective," Chapters, in: Bruce E. Kaufman (ed.), The Development of Human Resource Management Across Nations, chapter 11, pages 269-299, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    12. Krzywdzinski, Martin, 2017. "Accounting for Cross-Country Differences in Employee Involvement Practices: Comparative Case Studies in Germany, Brazil and China," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 55(2), pages 321-346.
    13. Editors : & David Marsden & Hugh Stephenson, 2001. "Labour Law and Social Insurance in the New Economy: A Debate on the Supiot Report," CEP Discussion Papers dp0500, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    14. Michael Storper & Lena Levinas & Alejandro Mercado-Celis, 2007. "Society, Community, and Development: A Tale of Two Regions," Post-Print hal-01053957, HAL.
    15. Alex Bryson & Ryo Kambayashi & Susumu Kuwahara & Akie Nakamura & Jacques Wels, 2025. "What is Happening to Unionization in Japan?," RFBerlin Discussion Paper Series 2529, ROCKWOOL Foundation Berlin (RFBerlin).
    16. Papakitsos, Evangelos C., 2016. "Systemic modelling for relating labour market to vocational education," International Journal for Research in Vocational Education and Training (IJRVET), European Research Network in Vocational Education and Training (VETNET), European Educational Research Association, vol. 3(3), pages 166-184.
    17. Hiroatsu Nohara, 2007. "The Evolution of Employment Structure in France and Japan: a comparison of national trajectories 1992-2002 in a societal perspective," Post-Print halshs-02928933, HAL.
    18. Naoki Shintoyo, 2025. "Collective versus segmentalist training system with a technology choice," International Economics and Economic Policy, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 1-22, February.
    19. Ian Kessler & Paul Heron & Sue Dopson, 2013. "Indeterminacy and the Regulation of Task Allocation: The Shape of Support Roles in Healthcare," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 51(2), pages 310-332, June.
    20. Snower, Dennis J., 2025. "Labor Markets as Human Ecosystems: The Insider-Outsider Theory Reconsidered," IZA Discussion Papers 18202, IZA Network @ LISER.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:brjirl:v:52:y:2014:i:1:p:1-31. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.