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Project

Multinationals in Europe between flexibility and security. A comparative study on the implementation and impact of 'flexicurity' practices at the company level.

In this project the concept of 'flexicurity' is studied empirically at the level of the company. This is an important gap in the current flexicurity literature, which is highly normative and mainly focuses on the macro level. In particular, the project examines the introduction and coordination (if any) of flexibility and security practices and policies at the level of the company in Belgium, Italy and the United Kingdom in a comparative cross-national perspective, while assessing the extent to which macro-level institutional settings have an impact on the implementation of these practices. With this regard, the comparative analysis will take into account the capacity of social actors (management, trade unions and employees representatives) at the company level to be engaged in the creation and coordination of flexicurity practices. Three research questions are investigated: (1) Which flexicurity practices can be observed at the company level? (2) What are the processes enhancing or hindering such implementation and how are they created? (3) What are the consequences for different groups of employees in terms of their working conditions? The questions will be addressed using qualitative case studies and a survey questionnaire among the employees. The cases that are studied are local subsidiaries of multinational companies in Europe.
Date:1 Oct 2010 →  30 Sep 2016
Keywords:Social policy, Labour market segmentation, Trade union strategies, Human resource management, Comparative industrial relations, Flexicurity, Europe, Multinational companies
Disciplines:Sociology of organisations and occupations, Applied sociology, Policy and administration, Social psychology, Social stratification, Social theory and sociological methods, Sociology of life course, family and health, Other sociology and anthropology