Industrial Relations in Small Companies

Reference is often made to small companies, but little is known about them, especially regarding industrial relations. How can small companies be defined? Is their small size a sufficient feature for them to be considered the same? If they are different from each other, what makes them so? Is the distinction between them and other companies - big ones - relevant? In what way is life organised in such units, where employer and employees are in very close contact with each other? In order to answer these questions, the authors of this innovative book carried out surveys together in France, Sweden and Germany. They met employers, employees, union members and industrial relations specialists. Comparisons of these three national cases show that small companies do have common features that transcend frontiers. They do, however, also have national characteristics. They, therefore, warrant being analysed and understood in something other than merely negative terms. It thus appears that small companies are not so far off resembling big ones...

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The Authors: Christian Dufour, sociologist, is deputy director of IRES (Institute for Economic and Social Research, France) and a specialist in French and international industrial relations. He is scientific coordinator of La Revue de l'IRES.
Adelheid Hege, sociologist, is a researcher at IRES (France) and specialises in international comparative industrial relations. She is responsible for the Chronique internationale de l'IRES.
Sofia Murhem, economist and historian, is a researcher at the Department of Economic History, Uppsala University, Sweden.
Wolfgang Rudolph is a researcher at the Office for Social Research (Büro für Sozialforschung, Kassel, Germany). His main areas of research concern the development of works councils, employee representation in small companies and regional development.
Wolfram Wassermann, sociologist, is a researcher at the Office for Social Research (Germany). His research concerns codetermination, the sociology of small companies and the trade unions.