Central Argument

O’Sullivan and Turner’s article, Facilitators and Inhibitors of Collective Action: A Case Study of a US-Owned Manufacturing Plant discusses the factors contributing to collective action and how sometimes inhibiting factors are dominant over facilitators and therefore deter collective unionization among workers. The central argument of the article can be cited as to “why collective action can fail to materialize despite conditions that might otherwise be expected to generate such action” (O’Sullivan & Turner 2013). In the Nuco Ireland firm, laborers were underpaid, were demanded to work excessive hours in unsuitable conditions and were subject to temporary employment contracts. Although there were derogatory conditions facing them, however, workers in the Irish plant failed to unionize despite insipid attempts by union leaders to recruit members. The article cites several reasons for why the labor force at the American firm, Nuco failed to band together and protest unfair wages and working hours imposed by executive management (O’Sullivan & Turner 2013).

 

Methodology

To determine the impact of facilitator and inhibitors, four different data collection methods were implemented (O’Sullivan & Turner 2013). These included: focus group meetings with leaders of collective action, observation of three ‘town hall’ meetings of employees after imposition of redundancies, in-depth analysis of documentation submitted by employees and management at Nuco to State third parties, regarding employment law claims and interviews with a full-time, regional union officer responsible for organizing employees at the plant (O’Sullivan & Turner 2013).

 

The first series of focus groups consisted of five focus group meetings and were conducted with members A, B, C and D, who were the primary activists. These members were sought, after they appeared in media reports following the announcement of redundancies. The focus group meetings were conducted over a period of 14-months and were used to identify factors inhibiting and facilitating collective action as well as the conditions of employees working at the Nuco plant in Ireland. It is sufficient to assume that these leaders were long-term, permanent employees with Leader A having 10 years of service under his belt.

 

Three ‘town hall’ meetings were also observed and recorded, which consisted of disgruntled workers and the primary activists after the announcement of redundancies. The first two meetings were attended by 700 members, whereas the last meeting only saw a turnout of 250. Alternative actions were discussed, such as employee retraining in the face of redundancies. Also, the meetings revealed that employees were largely unaware of their rights in the organization.

The Committee, composed of the primary activists, leaders A, B, C and D also provided the authors with documentation filed with State third parties regarding employment law claims taken against the company.

The final method of data collection was comprised of two interviews conducted with the full-time regional union official who attempted to organize the plant and garner collective action from the employees.

The authors admit that the abovementioned data collection methods may not be free from bias. However, a significantly large amount of data is collected so as to offset biases in observations and develop a clearer picture.

 

Critical analysis

The authors argue that although certain factors suitable to the implementation of collective action were present in the Nuco Ireland case, employees of the firm failed to mobilize and create a workers’ union. Several factors were cited for this phenomenon and it was thus established that inhibiting factors overruled facilitating factors thereby halting further action. Mobilization theory argues that collective action is a result of three pre-requisites. These include: workers must began to understand that they are being dealt with unjustly, workers must be able to attribute blame to an identifiable, tangible party such as employers and mangers, and finally, workers must believe that collective action will indeed yield favorable results (O’Sullivan & Turner 2013).

 

We can therefore argue that the first two social psychological processes were indeed present among the workers at the Nuco plant in Ireland whereas the last condition may subject to debate. Employees were disgruntled after the redundancies were announced by management and knew that their jobs were in jeopardy. Moreover, the workers were aware that senior management was responsible for implementation of aforementioned policies and could therefore attribute blame to them. However, from the article, it is assumed that significant numbers of employees did not believe that collective action would garner the right response from management at the firm. The reasons for which, will be discussed below.

First and most importantly, the management team at Nuco Ireland had significant prowess and pressured employees against union formation. As is mentioned by Leader D in the primary focus groups, management threatened to withdraw the plant from Ireland which would cause excessive loss of employment. It is thus clear that top management at the Ireland firm were aware of their pressure on the employees and utilized open threats to warn workers against mobilizing in unions. As one ‘town hall’ meeting participant states, “I believe we were being bullied […] I was being bullied (O’Sullivan & Turner 2013).

 

Secondly, although facilitating factors such as low wages, and drastic working hours were present, the union heads failed to motivate collective action from employees. The union was unsuccessful in recruiting employees because their marketing strategies were not aggressive enough to attract attention from disgruntled employees. The article states that leaflets regarding the union were distributed to employees leaving the plant, only three times during the course of three years. Considering that union workers were long-term employees attempting to recruit temporary, young employees it is evident that the union members were lacking the means to connect with the younger generation. This problem is not central to this organization or even Ireland, it is prevalent across European continent as the “new labor market generation seems to be the most problematic group of workers to unionize” (Vandaele 2012).  To generate interest and motivate collective action, it is imperative that “unions […] adopt the communication technologies used by young people, provide ancillary services where that is appropriate for the particular youth populations […], differentiate by price and service product […] and communicate using language, visuals and messages that resonate with young people” (Bailey, Price & Esders 2009).

 

Another reason for the lack of collective action at the Nuco Ireland plant can be attributed to the short, temporary nature of employee tenures. It is evident that Nuco Ireland used the fickle employment terms to their advantage and was therefore able to manipulate and intimidate those employees who wanted to unionize. In the primary focus groups, Leader B states “workers never organized because they were intimidated. There were so many temporary workers that even the slightest hint of organization and you were gone” (O’Sullivan & Turner 2013). Management can pressure employers from forming unions and may use “sticks and carrots”, that is, harsh punitive methods as well as inherently motivating factors (Kleiner 2001). Harsher methods of deterrence include: “captive-audience speeches by supervisors, harassment of potential unionization leaders, firing of union leaders, and failing to bargain seriously over first contracts” (Kleiner 2001).  It is thus evident that the management team at Nuco Ireland used ‘sticks’ to prevent workers from unionizing in the outsourced production plant. And although management was successful in implementing a revised work schedule, this was accepted grudgingly by employees because they were not consulted beforehand. In this manner, the firm used ‘carrots’ to prevent workers from being inducted into unions.

 

In the Nuco Ireland case, we are given to understand that the company is an American firm operating in Ireland. There have been other cases of American firms which violate labor laws and demand overtime while offering unsafe working conditions. One such example is Foxconn, China, “one of Apple’s most important manufacturers” of consumer electronic products (Hang 2014). During a period of three months, nine employees at Foxconn committed suicide owing to a combination of excessive overtime and unsafe working conditions (Hang 2014). It is thus clear that when multinational firms outsource production to lesser developed countries, the “employers in certain industries face significant incentives to violate labor standards laws” (Habib-Mintz 2009). These incentives thus give the management an upper hand in imposing stringent working conditions and also prevent them from seeking collective action.

 

Conclusion

The American multinational, Nuco, operating in Ireland is a classic case in which inhibiting factors to unionization supersede facilitating factors to do the same. Although the workers were grossly underpaid, subject to unsuitable working conditions and kept on temporary, short-lived contracts the efforts of primary activists to garner collective action was highly unsuccessful. The employers played an active part in preventing workers from unionizing by addressing grievances, individually. The fickle nature of employment terms also gave managers an upper hand as the threat of unemployment was very real for the employees of the firm. The efforts of union workers to recruit employees were also largely ineffective thereby hindering collective action. It is thus evident that even in the presence of multiple grievances, employees fail to unionize.

 

Bibliography

Bailey, J, Price, RA, & Esders, LP, 2009, ‘Marketing unions to young people : recruiting and ‘rusting on’. In: Labour, Capital and Change – Proceedings of the 23rd Conference of the Association of Industrial Relations Academics of Australia and New Zealand, 4 – 6 February, Newcastle, Australia.

Habib Mintz, N 2009, ‘Multinational Corporations’ Role in Improving Labor Standards in Developing Countries’, Journal of International Business and Economy , vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 39-58.

Hang, S 2014, ‘Investing in Human Rights: Using Bilateral Investment Treaties to Hold Multinational Corporations Liable for Labor Rights Violations’, Fordham International Law Journal,vol. 37, issue 4, Article 2.

Kleiner, M 2001, ‘Intensity of Management Resistance: Understanding the Decline of Unionization in the Private Sector.’ Journal of Labor Research, vol. XX11, no. 3.

Vandaele, K 2012, ‘Youth representatives’ opinions on recruiting and representing young workers: A twofold unsatisfied demand?’ European Journal of Industrial Relations, pp. 1-16.