The rapid pace of industrial restructuring and the emergence of new employment policies have focused attention on the role of employers in determining the quantity and quality of employment. This book draws on important new data from the ESRC's Social Change and Economic Life Initiative to test, modify, and challenge much of the current academic literature on the determinants of employer policy and how these influence employment structures and individual employment opportunities. The book begins with an authoritative synthesis of the influential debates on labour market segmentation, flexibility, post-Fordism, deskilling, the gendering of work, and the `new' industrial relations. Ten substantive chapters then extend these debates in several directions. The contributors make significant progress on three fronts: BL They suggest that the determinants of employer policy are both complex and strongly related to product market conditions. BL They find that employee attitudes and perceptions are critical to the implementation and effectiveness of employer policy. BL They explore the interdependency between internal employment policies and external labour market conditions and begin to develop an integrated approach to internal and external labour markets. Contributors: Brendan Burchell, Jane Elliott, Duncan Gallie, Anne Gasteen, Bob Morris, Roger Penn, Michael Rose, Jill Rubery, John Sewell, Jim Smyth, Michael White, Frank Wilkinson
Reviews
`a valuable original work, providing clear theoretical analyses and new empirical data; the overall findings are effectively brought together in Rubery and Wilkinson's introduction. Labour market theorists will need to take account of the empirical evidence presented' Work, Employment and Society
An extremely valuable and important piece of empirical research. In themselves, the papers that make up these volumes are excellent. * Sociology *
The volume bears testimony to a need for public discussion of organisational and employment patterns to be based upon solid and sound empirical data rather than upon the speculative and anecdotal assumptions that shape so much of this debate in the media and in Business Schools. * Sociology *
This is a fascinating and most useful book ... One thing that makes this book especially significant is the use of extensive survey material of UK firms ... the volume should become a prominent landmark in the wide literature on these topics. The book clearly demonstrates that in some key respects our thinking has to change, especially concerning fundamental theoretical assumptions ... The volume under review can be regarded as an important contribution to this tradition. It is strongly recommended. * Economic and Industrial Democracy *



Book Information
ISBN 9780198279273
Author Jill Rubery
Format Paperback
Page Count 402
Imprint Oxford University Press
Publisher Oxford University Press
Weight(grams) 554g
Dimensions(mm) 216mm * 140mm * 25mm