'Americanization' and the drivers of the establishment and use of works councils in three post-socialist countries

Article

Croucher, R., Gooderham, P. and Sandvik, A. 2022. 'Americanization' and the drivers of the establishment and use of works councils in three post-socialist countries. Human Resource Management Journal. 32 (2), pp. 430-448. https://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12408
TypeArticle
Title'Americanization' and the drivers of the establishment and use of works councils in three post-socialist countries
AuthorsCroucher, R., Gooderham, P. and Sandvik, A.
Abstract

We question notions of the ‘Americanization’ of employment relations in Slovenia, Slovakia and Croatia. First, we examine the roles of unions, the use of US strategic approach to Human Resource Management (SHRM), and management perceptions of their organizations’ innovativeness in the establishment of Works Council (WCs). Second, we employ the same variables in relation to the use of WCs for downward communication in these countries in comparison with what Amable (2003) terms the Continental European Coordinated Market Economy (CECME) of Austria, adding the CECMEs Germany and Norway as control variables. Union influence drives the adoption of WCs and their use for management downward communication. Hence, on our measures the three countries share features of the CECME category and have not been “Americanized”.

Keywordscomparative HRM; downward communication; institutional theory; unions; Works Councils
PublisherWiley
JournalHuman Resource Management Journal
ISSN0954-5395
Electronic1748-8583
Publication dates
Online25 Sep 2021
Print14 Apr 2022
Publication process dates
Deposited25 Aug 2021
Accepted23 Aug 2021
Submitted26 Oct 2020
Output statusPublished
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Open
Accepted author manuscript
File Access Level
Restricted
Copyright Statement

© 2021 The Authors. Human Resource Management Journal published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)https://doi.org/10.1111/1748-8583.12408
LanguageEnglish
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