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The UK's population is ageing at a time when its oldest workers are leaving the labour market at progressively younger ages. This paradox - of declining economic activity rates among the 50 plus age group and rising longevity - has led to widespread concern over the social and economic consequences . Meanwhile, flexible work has grown in the UK economy and has been promoted as a promising solution to 'the problem' of older workers. Portfolio-type work in particular has been presented as a liberating option for the over 50s. Working for a range of clients, so the argument goes, would allow older workers to bypass barriers to employment in later life (such as company-specific early exit programmes), and would also allow them to negotiate their own transition into retirement. Yet there is a lack of research that examines the realities of portfolio working and its sustainability for people wishing or needing to remain economically active in later life. This study of freelancing among older workers was located in a sector where portfolio-type work was well-established: the media industry. It relied on in-depth, face-to-face interviews with 51 people who were actively engaged in freelance work as employers, individual freelancers and industry experts. The aim was to understand the conflicts, barriers and opportunities to freelance employment for those aged 50 years and over, using two contrasting perspectives, one provided by Nikolas Rose in his 'powers of freedom' thesis and the other by Margaret Archer in her 'morphogenetic' approach to realist social theory. The study found that freelancing did extend working lives and permit a degree of freedom and control in later life. However, it was a form of employment which was insecure, volatile and largely unregulated. The oldest freelancers were vulnerable to diminishing rewards, dwindling networks, dated skills and ageist attitudes. Age was found to be an important mediating factor in the experience of risk in the freelance labour market.

Studies of European Works Councils (EWCs) generally tend to ignore research within local and national structures of employee representation. Therefore, the aim of this thesis is to stress the link between local, national and European levels of interest representation. ~e research makes equally important contributionsjn terms of its theoretical approach and its empirical focus, by integrating both horizontal and vertical structures of representation. As a supranational institution that has been imposed on existing structures, EWCs have an uneasy location in the theoretical framework of industrial relations. Consequently, in this research emphasis is placed on ~e importance of the national and plant levels of representation and the significance of theorising interest representation, information and consultation, job regulation and collective bargaining arrangements. The research is placed in the wider context of European integration and the challenges that globalisatiori places on national and transnational industrial relations. Findings presented emerge from fieldwork undertaken in both Germany and the. UK, involving twelve workplaces in three transnational corporations in the pulp and paper industry, an industry affected by''intense restructuring. The findings suggest that despite some effort to integrate EWCs into the existing structures of employee representation, EWC representatives from the participating companies found it difficult to respond collectively at the transnational (European) level to the process of restructuring. Whilst EWCs are predominately used to exchange information, the regulation of issues emerging from the EWC setting are predominately dealt with at the local and national level ofinterest representation. Secondly, the findings suggest that major differences in the experience, background and rights of German and UK. delegates are crucial in terms of the subsequent action that they' are able to take. Consequently, the experience of EWCs reflects strategic choices made by industrial relations actors influenced by the national industrial relations systems and traditions.

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This thesis explores the detenninants of workers' direct participation in Spain, through a representative survey of Spanish workplaces. Hypotheses are drawn from a wide range of existing theoretical strands of the literature on participation. Therefore, predictions of the detenninants of direct participation deriving from institutionalist industrial relations work, models of human resource management, labour process research, neo-Weberian theory, network theory, systems theory and contingency theory were brought together in a model of detenninants that could be tested through quantitative analysis. The research is also original in that it develops measures used to evaluate the effects of managerial beliefs on the practice of direct participation. The model thus developed is {'lot only of use for the Spanish context, but could serve as a baseline for further comparative'research, as could the scale used to measure the scope and depth of indirect participation workplace practice. The empirical results ofthe research offer limited support, within the Spanish context, for any individual theoretical approach on the detenninants of direct participation considered with the exception of the. institutional industrial relations approach stressing the importance of workers' collective strength. In contrast with previous research on Spain, indirect participation workplace practice is revealed here to be a potentially important positive detenninant of direct participation, challenging existing views of Spanish 'exceptionalism' in this regard. Surprisingly, there is a negative relationship between the complexity ofjobs and direct participation; when combined with the findings that price competition is negatively associated with direct participation, and size positively associated, this leaves us to propose that the ideal-typical participatory workplace in Spain uses direct participation primarily as a means of integration within a broadly neo-Tayloristic approach to labour management. The wider institutional environment of industrial relations and labour management also helps explain further the general overall pattern of low emphasis on direct participation practice in Spain. More specifically, employers' societally-shaped reluctance to extend workers' voice is posited as the main obstacle to the expansion of direct participation in Spain. .These findings point to the need for sensitivity to institutional context within cross-national theorisation and research on participation, and, by extension, to that on other human resource management practices.

This thesis concerns the implications of the clash between formal Western management theories and practices and 'informal' Mrican values, norms and interests, for the employment relationship. The study was carried out within a broad qualitative ethnographic paradigm that focused on the actors' perspectives and the 'social meanings' they attach to them. In that respect, it is about the sociological nature of Industrial relations (IR) and Personnel management (PM) problems in Sub-Saharan Mrica (SSA). An in-depth empirical study of IR and PM at an Mrican port revealed that these problems manifest themselves in consistent patterns of tensions and contradictions between Western management objectives and practices, and Mrican moral values and material interests. The conclusions challenge the unitarist neoliberal perspective as well as the radical, yet materialist analysis of Marxism and postcolonial critiques. It concludes that in the SSA context, broader social and moral issues of the wider community have a decisive influence on the employment relationship. As a result, established Western employment frames of reference are also not entirely suitable for analysing all the relevant social factors. The thesis contributes to existing academic knowledge about IR and PM in three key ways. Methodologically, it points to the need for qualitative ethnographic research in native languages to capture actors' social meaning and probe the informal organisation in SSA. Theoretically, it indicates the need to understand the SSA organisation as part of its wider and specific societal and historical context. Finally, it shows that it is possible to develop pluralist and stakeholder theory to link work, family, and society in an institutional model of IR and PM for SSA.

The key objectives for this research were to: () Provide a database in order to extend the knowledge and understanding of the management and use of overtime across the whole economy; ii) Review and test a range of research questions and hypotheses concerning specific problems and controversies surrounding the use of overtime. The research was structured within three main phases viz. desk-research, fieldwork and analysis. The Initial search for Improved U. K labour market management revealed overtime to be a key factor, equivalent to 1.5 million full time jobs, and apparently little understood. It had been forecast that overtime would fall In the late 1970s and 1980s and that this fall would result from the combined effects of: unemployment, uncompetitive unit labour costs and increasing management scrutiny. In the event overtime Increased considerably and continues to increase, confounding many of the soothsayers. In 1988-89, the cost of overtime to employers was £15,000 million, £5,000 million of which was the premium paid to secure the benefits which management must have considered the overtime would bring to their organisations. A research market gap was found regarding the use and management of overtime across the economy as a whole. Moreover, this knowledge would be needed since change remains an apparent inevitability. It was against this backdrop that overtime was investigated. Desk- research was directed at providing an unbounded literature review, addressing the key issues which surround the use of overtime. This review established that there is a high degree of controversy regarding the use of overtime and it facilitated the detailed design of the research questions and hypotheses. A multi-faceted methodology was developed to Investigate these questions and test the hypotheses. This Involved building on the desk-research, using two mutually supportive fieldwork techniques; firstly, a survey, using a mailed questionnaire, and secondly, a set of semi-ethnographic case studies. The Survey covered all economic sectors, sizes of establishment and regions of the U. K. It yielded 225 usable cases, representing over 40,000 employees and collected a wide range of statistical data regarding the use and management of overtime and structures and perceptions of working time. These results were analysed by reference to a number of structural variables, including: sector; regional location; size of establishment; type of worker and overtime levels. The resulting series formed a basis for standardised comparisons between the structural variables. A range of statistical data and significant associations and differences were established, providing a unique empirical database and thereby satisfying one of the key objectives of the research. Thus the survey produced a skeleton of statistical evidence, whereas the case studies built on this framework to give the detailed explanation and Interpretation needed for a better understanding of the processes involved. The results of both the desk-research and fieldwork were drawn together to help resolve the research questions and test the hypotheses. It was established that overtime detracts from operational flexibility, confounding the majority of managers who claimed flexibility-based reasons such as'unexpected demand' and 'emergency cover' as the prime explanations of their use of overtime. Indeed, about 75% of overtime was found to be systematic, insofar ash was predictable, and therefore operated either by management choice or default. The effects of overtime on employment were more significant than had been indicated in the literature. For example, the substitution of overtime for employment was found to be more widespread than most commentators had predicted, although managers did not readily yield to this fact. Conversely, worker dependency on overtime earnings was found to be much less common than previous research had allowed. In concert with the literature, however, dear and extensive evidence was found to associate overtime with ineffective management. A significant amount of overtime was simply unnecessary from an operational viewpoint, and the majority of the balance was ineffective In that it was less cost-effective than the alternatives. Such unnecessary and ineffective overtime was characterised by phenomena such as: mistaken management understanding of its application, effects and comparative costs; an inappropriate management decision process leading to its use; the improper and inadequate utilisation of management controls; employee control of the overtime and adverse employee welfare associated with its use. Notwithstanding the above conclusions, a minority of overtime was found to be an effective and rational means for management to satisfy demand and to meet corporate objectives.