The automotive industry is navigating a significant transformation, marked by the integration of Industry 4.0 paradigm and a strategic move towards battery electric vehicles (BEVs). This evolution is prompting original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to reassess their cost structure and improve manufacturing processes. For trade unions, it raises concerns about potential declines in the quantity and quality of “decent” jobs, and exacerbating labor market inequalities particularly across different segments of workforce. Extant research on labor market dualism often highlights the impact of national/workplace institutions and union strategies on workforce segmentation. Yet these approaches fall short in explaining the reasons behind changes in union strategies toward dualism despite institutional stability. Also, they tend to view unions as monolithic actors, neglecting the internal dynamics within themselves that could account for temporal variations in union strategies.

This study explores the "micropolitics"—the interplay not just between unions and management, but also within unions themselves. Drawing on more than 100 interviews with corporate executives, managers, union officials and labor activists in South Korea, I examine how these intra-organizational dynamics collectively shape the employment landscape within the Korean BEV industry, which is particularly significant due to the role of S. Korea as a major player in the global market, with conglomerates like Hyundai Motor Group (HMG) leading innovations and setting industry standards.  The focus is primarily on key players within the HMG, including OEMs (Hyundai and Kia) and affiliated suppliers within the corporate network (Mobis and Wia). The study further addresses the unique obstacles encountered by "independent" suppliers and discusses the potential role of the state and industrial and employment policies. This project aims to contribute to the ongoing discussions regarding the impact of technological advancements on the structure of the labor market.

This paper investigates worker voice as a dimension of job quality and examines its link with job-related outcomes. We refine and test a multi-measure concept of the “voice gap” to capture how much influence workers expect to have compared to what they actually have on a set of work-related issues. Analyzing a survey of 1307 American workers, we find that workers distinguish between a voice gap on issues related to their own interests (“worker-issues voice gap”) and those related to their employing organization’s interests (“organizational-strategy voice gap”). Even after controlling for other dimensions of job quality, a larger voice gap is statistically associated with lower job satisfaction and well-being, as well as higher levels of burnout and turnover intention. Additionally, we find that worker-issues voice gap has a stronger and more significant effect than a organizational-strategy voice gap. Based on these results, we recommend incorporating the voice gap measure in future worker voice research and as a practical tool for evaluating voice as a dimension of job quality. 

Reducing human-made greenhouse gas emissions is crucially important for life on earth, but it requires restructuring industries in ways that could disrupt millions of workers’ lives globally. Whether this transition is “just” from the perspective of workers depends on the magnitude of job losses, the quality of new jobs, and the transitions workers experience from their current jobs to new ones. Using the example of the German automotive industry, where the shift to electric vehicle production has recently accelerated, the authors identify recommendations for unions and policymakers in North America and beyond. This article provides an overview of the tools for workers and trade unions in Germany to steer the transition and shows how analogous tools could be strengthened or created elsewhere.

The US labor movement faces a potentially transformative moment, as workers have won breakthrough union organizing victories at various high-profile, private sector employers. While winning an election is essential to establishing collective bargaining, unions then need to secure a first contract with employers to make tangible improvements in working conditions. Drawing on a sample of 126 responses about post-certification collective bargaining, we find that both employer and union tactics have significant impacts on first contract achievement. Employers continue to impede first contract achievement by committing unfair labor practices, but unions can improve their chances at establishing an agreement by utilizing tactics that engage the public.  

This study examines the impact of multi-employer bargaining on non-regular workers across different unions and types of non-regular employment. Using national representative survey data from South Korea, I find that multi-employer bargaining increases the likelihood that a workplace union would address a pay increase for non-regular workers when the union was affiliated with a confederation espousing class-based as opposed to business-unionism. However, such a relationship was weaker for temporary agency workers and subcontractors than for direct-hire fixed-term workers. This mechanism is further illustrated through a second round of data collection and analysis, namely in-depth interviews. I identify two factors that characterize the class-based confederation: (1) centralized pressure from the union and (2) activists and their identity work. Altogether, these results further an understanding of how the identities of national union confederations can influ- ence local representatives’ approach to representing non-regular workers and how those influences are manifested through workplace-level collective bargaining.