Fecha :

Nombre completo :____________________________ DNI : _______________________________

UNIVERSIDAD DE BUENOS AIRES -FACULTAD DE CIENCIAS SOCIALES

INGLÉS – NIVEL III - EXAMEN LIBRE

(CÁTEDRA DR. RAÚL NARVAEZ /ERIC SALCEEK )

COVID's Impacts on the Field of Labour and Employment Relations

Adrienne Eaton ,Charles Heckscher

The field of labour and employment relations covers work and employment from the
perspective of workers, as distinct from the management-oriented field of HR. The
COVID-19 crisis that spread across the globe in the early months of 2020 deeply affected
employment and work in almost all sectors of the global economy. Already, many
academic publishers in the field are demanding that articles and book manuscripts address
it. More fundamentally, these developments pose challenges to some core assumptions of
our field.

Collective Bargaining and Post-War Employment Relations Systems

Our field focuses on collective action by workers as a central means of improving work.
The current situation shows its continued importance but raises fundamental questions
about its nature and future. The legal frameworks for work regulation and collective
bargaining have long been under attack across the advanced industrial democracies from
changes in the economic and political environments.

Traditionally the field has been locked into economic-heavy models of bargaining power
which suggests that workers will have little power in a period of extreme unemployment.
This crisis seems likely to provide new challenges to that approach. New directions may
be more rooted in symbolic/moral power (Chun, 2011) and associational or relational
power resultant from coalitions with a wider array of social justice and activist groups –
such as the recent campaign for a $15 minimum wage (Hannah, 2016).

The workplace has been the traditional site for organizing workers and exercising power,
as well as the basis for solidarity. COVID has accelerated a growing dispersal of work
that threatens this model. Some have explored more ‘transient’ types of solidarity
(Heckscher and McCarthy, 2014), but there is as yet little clarity on whether these can
sustain collective action and commitment over time.

Some worker activism has continued to involve traditional in-person demonstrations even
during the pandemic; but attention has swung towards tools of online organizing and
protest that have been developing over the past decade. Unions have often been slow to
incorporate these tools in their existing structures, but the COVID crisis raises the stakes.

Labour-management cooperation has been an important theme of Employment Relations

for over a century (Kochan and Rubinstein, 2000). Cooperative institutions are more
established in Northern Europe than in the USA, yet everywhere they have been side-
lined or ignored in initial unilateral responses by companies. But there have been
exceptions. In the USA, some healthcare partnerships have mobilized around safety
issues, redeployment, and process improvement. Evidence emerged from K-12 schools
in New Jersey that districts with mature collaborative relations responded to the crisis
with remarkable flexibility, creativity, and cooperation in adjusting to the crisis. Such
cases will be a rich trove for future research.

Government has always had a crucial role in shaping labour relations. Governments in
the EU and the USA have taken divergent paths in dealing with the economic disruption
of COVID. Europe has generally tried to protect existing jobs through short-term work,
while the USA has tolerated much more job loss, cushioned by extension of
unemployment benefits (Atlantic Council, 2020). The current crisis will provide
opportunities to develop the debates between classical economists, who generally argue
that the former approach will allow the economy to adapt more quickly to change, and
those in our field who counter that maintaining stable employment relations is not only
more humane but will enable companies and workers to rebound more quickly from the
crisis.

Research questions

What models of employment relations at the firm or country level did a better job at
protecting the health of healthcare and other essential workers and the incomes and living
standards of low wage workers? Have unions or other forms of worker voice improved
outcomes for workers in this moment? Have new forms of solidarity developed in this
moment of physical isolation? Will the pandemic increase worker interest in collective
action and organization and if so, in what forms? Are the new forms of digital organizing
and mobilization more or less successful than older forms?

The Structure of Work

The increase in flexible (‘contingent’) work – its extent and consequences – has spawned
running discussions in our field for some decades (International Labour
Organization, 2016). The traditional labour approach was to protect existing jobs under
collective bargaining contracts, which tends to leave gaps among short-term, migratory,
or part-time workers. COVID has again raised the stakes: these same groups have largely
been left out of the protections negotiated in Europe as well as in the USA

‘Gig’ workers, a relatively new category of contingent workers, lack access to the basic
social safety net even in most developed countries. Some countries – including,
surprisingly, the USA – adjusted their unemployment systems to expand coverage to gig
or other self-employed workers. Policy variations in the coverage of non-traditional
workers in the types, amounts and duration of unemployment insurance and other forms
of social support create opportunities to evaluate the impact on these expansions and their
sustainability.

Huge percentages of the workforce are now working from home and may well continue
to do so even once the acute danger of the virus passes. Popular media are already
discussing the impact of this on the way workers are managed and the need for more
coherent work/family policies either from the employer or the state. These work family
conflicts are likely to be particularly acute for women workers and differ by class and
possibly by race as well. It will also be important to examine the impact of the broken
wall between work and home life that many white collar workers are reporting. Home
work is also challenging to regulate within established legal frameworks.

The use of computer technology has reached a take-off point in many companies. COVID
has accelerated and emphasized some aspects of that shift: factories operating largely
with robots; dispersed workforces online working under close electronic supervision; a
spurt in collaborative tools enabling flexible teaming. An intense debate is under way
over the potentials and the dangers of AI and robotics; a growing view suggests that these
technologies have a bifurcating effect, deskilling or eliminating some jobs while
increasing skills and potential in others. There will be much need for further research in
the near future.

The COVID crisis has shone a spotlight on health care systems around the world. There
are immediate questions about the role of front-line health workers in reopening and
restructuring work. For the longer run, our field needs more attention to the special
problems of workers in care work, including elder and child care and education, and
exploration of policies by governments and employers around older or disabled workers
who are at special risk from the virus.

1.- Lee el siguiente texto :

2.- Responde las siguientes preguntas :
1.- ¿ En qué se enfoca el campo de relaciones del trabajo y qué cuestiones fundamentales
surgen en la situación actual?
2.- Explica brevemente ( máximo 100 palabras) en qué se basaba el poder tradicionalmente y
cómo la actual crisis en el campo de las relaciones de trabajo puede proveer nuevos desafíos.

3.- El lugar de trabajo, ¿ha sido únicamente el sitio tradicional para organizar a los
trabajadores y ejercer el poder? (SI/NO)

4.- ¿ Qué ocurre con los sindicatos y el uso de herramientas virtuales?

5.- ¿ Dónde están más establecidas las instituciones cooperativas y dónde han sido marginadas
por las empresas?

6.- Explica brevemente cómo se diferencian los gobiernos de la Unión Europea y los Estados
Unidos respecto de las medidas que han tomado ante la crisis económica generada por la
pandemia de COVID . ( máximo 100 palabras)

7.- ¿ Qué pregunta de investigación se plantean los autores respecto a los trabajadores
esenciales y aquellos con bajos salarios ?

8.- ¿ Qué ocurre habitualmente con los trabajadores temporarios y que ocurrió con ellos en
varios países debido a la crisis generada por la pandemia?

9.- ¿ A quiénes afectan más los conflictos de familia y trabajo generados por el trabajo desde
el hogar ?

10.- ¿ Qué debate provoca el uso de Inteligencia artificial y robótica en el trabajo y qué efecto
tiene según una postura creciente?

11.- La crisis de COVID, ¿ centra la atención pública en los sistemas de salud sólo en el corto
plazo? (SI/NO)
12.- ¿ Para quiénes deben los gobiernos y empleadores explorar políticas?