Trade Unions and Networking in the Context of Change: Evaluating the Outcomes of Decentralization in Industrial Relations

This article addresses the fatalistic approach to trade unions in an era of supposedly decentralized production methods and in the context of the new wave of managerial practices in the workplace. An alternative thesis is presented, portraying the responses trade unions are making with regard to these developments in the form of networking. The authors argue that the evolution of these formal and informal networks within the labour movement, and in particular the political orientations of the actors involved in such networks, will ultimately condition managerial initiatives and the eventual outcomes of contemporary developments in the structure of production. The article points to the need to study such points of cooperation in such a way that their organizational dynamics, their political context and their contradictory developments are appreciated.