Stabilisierung des Verbandstarifvertrags: Widersprüchliche Impulse der Rechtsordnung?

The association-level collective agreement is still the primary instrument for regulating working conditions in Germany, but it is steadily losing its importance. The paper outlines the most important reasons for this decline and highlights the role of the legal order in this process. Reasons can be found in the legal possibility of membership in an employer’s organisation without being bound by the collective agreement, and in the liberalisation of temporary agency work in the year 2003. In addition, the introduction of opening clauses in the collective agreements made by the collective bargaining parties and the possibility of having more than one collective agreement in one company. Political support is therefore necessary to preserve and improve the functioning of association-level collective agreements. Instruments towards achieving this goal are, for example, easing the conditions and procedures that declare collective agreements universally applicable, a broader application of the Posting of Workers Act and accompanying measures such as restricting the use of temporary agency work and other forms of multi-employer models. Furthermore solutions may be found in social security law and a general minimum wage.