Industrial democracy is an arrangement which involves workers making decisions, sharing responsibility and

authority Authority is commonly understood as the legitimate power of a person or group of other people. In a civil state, ''authority'' may be practiced by legislative, executive, and judicial branches of government,''The New Fontana Dictionary of M ...

in the workplace. While in participative management organizational designs workers are listened to and take part in the

decision-making In psychology, decision-making (also spelled decision making and decisionmaking) is regarded as the Cognition, cognitive process resulting in the selection of a belief or a course of action among several possible alternative options. It could be ...

process, in organizations employing industrial democracy they also have the final decisive power, including in matters of organizational design and

hierarchy A hierarchy (from Ancient Greek, Greek: , from , 'president of sacred rites') is an arrangement of items (objects, names, values, categories, etc.) that are represented as being "above", "below", or "at the same level as" one another. Hierarchy ...

. In company law, the term generally used is co-determination, following the German word ''Mitbestimmung''. In Germany, companies with more than 2000 employees (or more than 1000 employees in the coal and steel industries) have half of their supervisory boards of directors (which elect management) elected by the shareholders and half by the workers. Although industrial democracy generally refers to the organization model in which workplaces are run directly by the people who work in them in place of private or

state ownership State ownership, also called public ownership or government ownership, is the ownership of an Industry (economics), industry, asset, property, or Business, enterprise by the national government of a country or State (polity), state, or a publi ...

of the

means of production In political philosophy, the means of production refers to the generally necessary assets and resources that enable a society to engage in production. While the exact resources encompassed in the term may vary, it is widely agreed to include the ...

, there are also representative forms of industrial democracy. Representative industrial democracy includes decision-making structures such as the formation of

committees A committee or commission is a body of one or more persons subordinate to a deliberative assembly or other form of organization. A committee may not itself be considered to be a form of assembly or a decision-making body. Usually, an assembly o ...

and consultative bodies to facilitate communication between

management Management (or managing) is the administration of organizations, whether businesses, nonprofit organizations, or a Government agency, government bodies through business administration, Nonprofit studies, nonprofit management, or the political s ...

, unions, and staff.

Rationale

Advocates often point out that industrial democracy increases

productivity Productivity is the efficiency of production of goods or services expressed by some measure. Measurements of productivity are often expressed as a ratio of an aggregate output to a single input or an aggregate input used in a production proce ...

and service delivery from a more fully engaged and happier

workforce In macroeconomics, the workforce or labour force is the sum of people either working (i.e., the employed) or looking for work (i.e., the unemployed): \text = \text + \text Those neither working in the marketplace nor looking for work are out ...

. Other benefits include less industrial dispute resulting from better communication in the workplace; improved and inclusive decision-making processes resulting in qualitatively better workplace decisions, decreased stress and increased well-being, an increase in

job satisfaction Job satisfaction, employee satisfaction or work satisfaction is a measure of workers' contentment with their job, whether they like the job or individual aspects or facets of jobs, such as nature of work or supervision. Job satisfaction can be me ...

, a reduction in

absenteeism Absenteeism is a habitual pattern of absence from a duty or obligation without good reason. Generally, absenteeism refers to unplanned absences. Absenteeism has been viewed as an indicator of poor individual performance, as well as a breach of an ...

and an improved sense of fulfillment. Other authors regard industrial democracy as a consequence of citizenship rights.

Works councils and workers' participation

At the point of production, the introduction of mandatory works councils and voluntary schemes of workers' participation (e.g. semi-autonomous groups) have a long tradition in European countries.

Co-determination

In a number of European countries, employees of a business take part in election of company directors. In Germany, the law is known as the ''

Mitbestimmungsgesetz Mitbestimmungsgesetz 1976 or the Codetermination Act 1976 is a German law that requires companies of over 2000 employees to have half the supervisory board of directors as representatives of workers, and just under half the votes. Background Fro ...

of 1976''. In Britain a 1977 proposal for a similar system was named the Bullock Report.

History

The

anarchist Anarchism is a political philosophy and Political movement, movement that seeks to abolish all institutions that perpetuate authority, coercion, or Social hierarchy, hierarchy, primarily targeting the state (polity), state and capitalism. A ...

thinker

Pierre-Joseph Proudhon Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (, ; ; 1809 – 19 January 1865) was a French anarchist, socialist, philosopher, and economist who founded mutualist philosophy and is considered by many to be the "father of anarchism". He was the first person to ca ...

used the term "industrial democracy" in the 1850s to describe the vision of workplace democracy he had first raised in the 1840s with '' What is Property? Or, an Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government'', (management "must be chosen from the workers by the workers themselves, and must fulfil the conditions of eligibility.") He repeated this call in later works like ''General Idea of the Revolution.''
Property is Theft! A Pierre-Joseph Proudhon Anthology
'. Edinburgh/Oakland: AK Press. p. 610, p. 119, pp. 586-7 In late nineteenth century, and at the beginning of the twentieth century, industrial democracy, along with

anarcho-syndicalism Anarcho-syndicalism is an anarchism, anarchist organisational model that centres trade unions as a vehicle for class conflict. Drawing from the theory of libertarian socialism and the practice of syndicalism, anarcho-syndicalism sees trade uni ...

and new unionism, represented one of the dominant themes in

revolutionary socialism Revolutionary socialism is a political philosophy, doctrine, and tradition within socialism that stresses the idea that a social revolution is necessary to bring about structural changes in society. More specifically, it is the view that revo ...

and played a prominent role in international

labour movement The labour movement is the collective organisation of working people to further their shared political and economic interests. It consists of the trade union or labour union movement, as well as political parties of labour. It can be considere ...

s. The term industrial democracy was also used by British socialist reformers Sidney and

Beatrice Webb Martha Beatrice Webb, Baroness Passfield, (née Potter; 22 January 1858 – 30 April 1943) was an English sociology, sociologist, economist, feminism, feminist and reformism (historical), social reformer. She was among the founders of the Lo ...

in their 1897 book '' Industrial Democracy''. The Webbs used the term to refer to trade unions and the process of

collective bargaining Collective bargaining is a process of negotiation between employers and a group of employees aimed at agreements to regulate working salaries, working conditions, benefits, and other aspects of workers' compensation and labour rights, rights for ...

. While the influence of the movements promoting industrial democracy declined after the defeat of the anarchists in the Spanish Revolution in 1939, several unions and organizations advocating the arrangement continue to exist and are again on the rise internationally. The

Industrial Workers of the World The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), whose members are nicknamed "Wobblies", is an international labor union founded in Chicago, United States in 1905. The nickname's origin is uncertain. Its ideology combines general unionism with indu ...

advance an

industrial unionism Industrial unionism is a trade union organising method through which all workers in the same industry are organized into the same union, regardless of skill or trade, thus giving workers in one industry, or in all industries, more leverage in b ...

which would organize all the workers, regardless of skill, gender or race, into one big union divided into a series of departments corresponding to different industries. The industrial unions would be the embryonic form of future post-capitalist production. Once sufficiently organized, the industrial unions would overthrow capitalism by means of a

general strike A general strike is a strike action in which participants cease all economic activity, such as working, to strengthen the bargaining position of a trade union or achieve a common social or political goal. They are organised by large coalitions ...

, and carry on production through worker run enterprises without bosses or the wage system.

Anarcho-syndicalist Anarcho-syndicalism is an anarchist organisational model that centres trade unions as a vehicle for class conflict. Drawing from the theory of libertarian socialism and the practice of syndicalism, anarcho-syndicalism sees trade unions as both ...

unions, like the ''

Confederación Nacional del Trabajo The (CNT; ) is a Spanish anarcho-syndicalist national trade union center, trade union confederation. Founded in 1910 in Barcelona from groups brought together by the trade union ''Solidaridad Obrera (historical union), Solidaridad Obrera'', ...

'', are similar in their means and ends but organize workers into geographically based and federated syndicates rather than industrial unions. The New Unionism Network also promotes

workplace democracy Workplace democracy is the application of democracy in various forms to the workplace, such as voting systems, consensus, debates, democratic structuring, due process, adversarial process, and systems of appeal. It can be implemented in a ...

as a means to linking production and

economic democracy Economic democracy (sometimes called a democratic economy) is a socioeconomic philosophy that proposes to shift ownership and decision-making power from corporate shareholders and corporate managers (such as a board of directors) to a larger ...

Representative industrial democracy

Modern industrial economies have adopted several aspects of industrial democracy to improve productivity and as reformist measures against industrial disputes. Often referred to as "teamworking", this form of industrial democracy has been practiced in Scandinavia, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK as well as in several Japanese companies such as

Toyota is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational Automotive industry, automotive manufacturer headquartered in Toyota City, Aichi, Japan. It was founded by Kiichiro Toyoda and incorporated on August 28, 1937. Toyota is the List of manuf ...

, as an effective alternative to

Taylorism Scientific management is a theory of management that analyzes and synthesizes workflows. Its main objective is improving economic efficiency, especially labor productivity. It was one of the earliest attempts to apply science to the engineer ...

. The term is often used synonymously with

, in which the traditional master-servant model of

employment Employment is a relationship between two party (law), parties Regulation, regulating the provision of paid Labour (human activity), labour services. Usually based on a employment contract, contract, one party, the employer, which might be a cor ...

gives way to a participative, power-sharing model.

Notes

References

;Articles * M Poole, 'Theories of Industrial Democracy: the Emerging Synthesis' (1982) 30(2) Sociological Review 181-207 * W Müller-Jentsch, Industrial Democracy: Historical Development and Current Challenges' (2007) 19 (4) Management Revue 260–273 *E McGaughey, 'Votes at Work in Britain: Shareholder Monopolisation and the ‘Single Channel’' (2018
47(1) Industrial Law Journal 76
;Books
Bank, John, and Jones, Ken, ''Worker Directors Speak: The British Steel Corporation Employee Directors'' (Gower Press, Farnborough, 1977)
* P Douglas,
The Columbia Conserve Company: A Unique Experiment in Industrial Democracy
' (1925) * P Blumberg, ''Industrial Democracy: The Sociology of Participation'' (1969) * K Boyle, ''The UAW and the Heyday of American Liberalism, 1945-1968'' (1995) * M Derber, ''The American Idea of Industrial Democracy, 1865-1965'' (1970) * SM Lipset, M Trow and J Coleman, ''Union Democracy: The Inside Politics of the International Typographical Union'' (1977) * JA McCartin, ''Labor's Great War: The Struggle for Industrial Democracy and the Origins of Modern American Labor Relations, 1912-1921'' (1998) * M Poole, ''Industrial Relations: Origins and Patterns of National Diversity'' (2008) * M Poole, ''Workers' Participation in Industry'' (2nd edn 1978) * BC Roberts (ed), ''Towards Industrial Democracy: Europe, Japan and the United States'' (1979) * B Webb and S Webb. ''Industrial Democracy'' (1897) * J Witte, ''Democracy, Authority, and Alienation in Work: Workers’ Participation in an American Corporation'' (University of Chicago Press, 1980)

External links

Mondragon Corporacion Cooperativa, Spain

Economic and Industrial Democracy: An International Journal

New Unionism Network
* A think-tank for the left.
Socialist Industrial Unionism
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