Introduction
The term ‘industrial relations’ was coined in the 18th century and was commonly used in nations like North America and Great Britain. Subsequently the term personnel management came to be applied and then the evolution of human resource management as an internal body of the organization was evolved in 1980s. The above mentioned three terms represent both academic enquiry and practical task. The term industrial relations, in the beginning, was largely associated with public sector and manufacturing organizations and left out large private sector firms. Also the existence of industrial relations and trade unionism were synonymous. This is mainly because in those days, workforce were mainly employed in factories and manufacturing outlets and a body to protect the cause of the manpower had evolved (Edwards, 2003, p. 1 – 2).
Trade unions and human resource department
Trade unions emerged in the 18th century due to quick expansion of the industrial society. The workforce consisted of children, women and immigrants. The pool of semi skilled and unskilled workforce came together and in the later stages trade unions were formed. Trade unions form a number of important roles like a representation function, a service function, a government function, a public administration rule and a regulatory function (Ewing, 2005, p. 4 - 5).
Trade unions were established with the sole purpose to foresee the rights of employees. However, employers associated trade unions with collective bargaining in order to minimise disruption and support stability and order. Employers’ attempts to avoid trade unions caused furore especially as trade unions represented the voice of the workers. Later the management tried to control the workers by means of cooperation which entailed legitimizing trade unions as a workforce representative. However the decline of unionism is also attributed to assertive workforce who opposed the presence of a union in the work place. Such individuals received the support of certain external economic and political forces as there was an anti trade union wave which took place during the 80s and 90s (D’Art & Turner, 2011, p. 159).
In today’s world, trade unions are rarely found and most organizations have an internal human resource department. The human resource department works as per the instructions provided by the management and do not necessarily represent the voice of the manpower as was the case with trade unions. The human resource management performs certain important functions like recruitment and staffing, employee engagement and motivation, making organizational policies and procedures and the like. Workforce planning is conducted by human resource management (Paauwe, 2008, p. 129 - 130). Slowly the trade union machinery for recruiting personnel came to an end and the recruitment process was conducted by the internal body of the management (Lind, 2009, p. 510). This is an internal management function and unlike trade unions they represent the management and try to attain organizational objectives. Also trade unions supported a function by third parties and government which led to a lack of synergy among the departmental plans, performance goals and organizational objectives. Also there was a lack of shared comprehensions about the priorities of human resource management or committed strategies which needed a strategic integration of human resource procedures and policies (Harris, 2005, p. 688).
Previously line managers and workers clashed as there were distinction in thoughts between management and the workforce. Post trade unionism and emergence of human resource management in organizations, found enhanced levels of coordination between workforce and human resource functions. However in order to develop long term stability in organizations, it is important that human resource procedures display a corporate approach. Another issue with trade unions is that in most industrialized nations, not all trade unions support the stances for collective bargaining and campaigning in order to resolve problems with respect to work life balance. In fact, such trade unions may be sleeping bodies as they do not exercise any authority or power to provide better opportunities to the workforce (Gregory & Milner, 2009, p. 122). On the other hand, a human resource department being an internal body of the organization tries to strike a balance between the workforce and the management. Such an internal body strives to provide aspired workforce who may be able to fulfil organizational objectives and drive performance of the organization and at the same time provide a plethora of measures which may help in enhancing employee engagement and motivation. It is the responsibility of the human resource management to frame flexible policies which may help in restoring work-life balance of the workforce. For this purpose, effective human resource departments have started framing flexible working hours to employees in many organizations. Other than this, the human resource department aims to provide a plethora of team building activities which may help in informal engagement and group discussion. This helps in relaxing the tension and stress of office like and at the same time also helps employees to share certain issues they may be facing and providing possible suggestions to make the organization a better place to work.
Neoliberal policies and the decline of trade unions
We are yet to consider the aspect of neoliberalism and the adverse impact it had on trade unions. The impact of neoliberal policies on the British labour movement has led to imposing an anti trade union legislation which has criminalised and restricted trade union practices. In fact, most workplaces have refrained from enacting trade union activities. Especially after Margaret Thatcher became the Prime Minister of Great Britain, trade unionism was further curbed by the government and its activities and practices sharply declined. This has led to a decrease in the number of labour strikes which took place in Britain (Daniels & Mcllroy, 2009, p. 3).
The above mentioned adverse impacts of trade unionism were not experienced by Great Britain, but by most nations in the globe. Due to this, trade union practices were discouraged equally by the government as well as employers. Especially mass scale workforce strikes led to organizations and the overall nation to face huge losses and this was another critical reason for the downfall of trade unionism.
The human resource department, being an internal department in an organization helps in binding employees and thereby prevent the occurrence of workplace strikes and disturbances. In fact, one of the significant responsibilities of the human resource department is to cater for employee growth and benefit and accordingly draw a balance between organizational welfare and employee welfare. Also during the neoliberal period unions significantly declined and till date have not garnered enough success mainly due to its inability to take concrete decisions or even influence the decisions taken by the employer. The human resource department is an internal body of the organization and is in no way involved in critical decision making which goes against the interests of the employer. Also in the wake of economic downturn and the adverse spiralling of the labour market trade union practices and activities have registered further decline. Even during small gaps when the labour market revitalized the trade union could not regain its position despite higher levels of economic growth and increased levels of employment.
This may also be attributed to the fact, that there has been a significant decline in factory outlets as was the case around three decades ago. There was an increased trend of employment opportunities in finance and business as compared with the manufacturing sector. Also augmented levels of employment have been registered in education, public administration and healthcare services. The rise of new sectors like education and healthcare services helped in the rise of the corporate class and human resource department (Jordan, 2012, p. 294). Also the new organizations decided to go for a human resource department instead of allowing the establishment of trade unionism. The primary means for establishing a human resource department was to represent the workers and the interests of the management. However, the department established would be vested with primary functioning of recruiting manpower in the organization. The human resource management evolved from the elementary activities and practices in the 90s to performing complex tasks in today’s market in order to help augment motivation and employee engagement for successful organizational performance.
History has witnessed that the neoliberal era had diverse countries handle trade unionism in diverse ways. However, the outcome was similar and trade unionism declined in most countries across the globe. Take the example of Great Britain, Mexico and Turkey. The United Kingdom was economically stronger than the other two nations. However, Mexico and Turkey can be portrayed to reflect almost similar patterns of growth and despite this the political situations in both nations led to separate reasons for curbing trade unionism. The rise and fall of trade unions may be attributed to certain political and economic factors. This is one reason for trade unions to be volatile and since government legislations are not in favour of trade union bodies they have since declined (Lucio & Perrett, 2009, p. 324). On the other hand, the human resource department in an organization is comparatively more stable and does not get impacted by certain political and economic factors. It serves as a mediator between the management and the employees and is established by the management and for the management. The main priority of the human resource department is to cater to organizational goals and welfare and then the welfare of the workforce. The neoliberal reforms levied by the governments of varied nations were aimed to pursue a common goal to satiate the social resistance to all the neoliberal policies imposed by the governments by formulating and implementing varied strategies (Kus & Ozel, 2010).
As a third party, the trade unions were extremely dependent on government and other external forces. This is a main reason for the collapse of the trade union as a representative body for workers. Another main reason for the collapse of trade unions was active restriction from the employers’ factions to curb the presence of organized labour. In this case, the neoliberal policies imposed by various governments led to restructuring of the trade union bodies leading to outright attack on the militant trade union bodies. The consequences of curbing the trade unions led to mass redistribution of wealth and income to the affluent class and widespread unemployment in the labour class. The neoliberal policies of decline in the wage levels, reduction in public sector services, wealth redistribution has led to the labour force to act as mere puppets in the hands of a stronger force – the employers (Eckel & Egger, 2009, p. 208).
Conclusion
The neoliberal policies imposed by the governments in diverse nations have curbed trade unionism and has made a stronger force of human resource. This department is internally managed by the employer and reflects the aspirations of the employer. At the same time, it is extremely essential to woo high performance workers. This has led to extensive competition in the labour market with firms wooing to take in younger and energetic labour force and paying them high wages so that they garnered excellent performance for the organizations. Widespread capitalist approach has led to the decline of a welfare state with distribution in income levels becoming more and more skewed between the employer and the labour class. Despite this, a body is not able to thrive under third party forces due to the dominance of certain political and economic scenarios which may be externally controlled. On the other hand, the main reason for human resource department to survive is the fact that it does not depend on third parties and is a part of the organization. The volatile nature of the market conditions in today’s scenario makes it more sense for the human resource department to survive and thrive.
Reference
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