Revisiting voluntarism: private voluntary regulation by employer forums in the United Kingdom

Demougin, Philippe, Gooberman, Leon ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2570-4704, Hauptmeier, Marco ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6755-3089 and Heery, Edmund ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3914-7635 2021. Revisiting voluntarism: private voluntary regulation by employer forums in the United Kingdom. Journal of Industrial Relations 63 (5) , pp. 684-705. 10.1177/00221856211038308

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Abstract

The abstract contributes to the literature by identifying a new form of voluntarism, the employer-led voluntarism of Employer Forums in the United Kingdom. Forums carry out private voluntary regulation to raise labour and social standards within their member firms through introducing codes of conducts and implementing norms through assessments, benchmarking, and certification. The article compares this new form with the traditional approach where unions and employer associations regulate jointly through collective bargaining. While the scope, scale, and impact of new and traditional voluntarism diverge, both are underpinned by the regulation of Employment Relations by non-state actors. Voluntarism is not in secular decline, but instead continues through the emergence of new employer-led forms.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Business (Including Economics)
Publisher:	SAGE
ISSN:	0022-1856
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	20 July 2021
Date of Acceptance:	19 July 2021
Last Modified:	20 Nov 2024 17:15
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/142705

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