Managing Modern Capitalism: Industrial Renewal and Workplace Democracy in the United States and Western Europe

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The development of the "welfare state" has been accompanied by greater freedom being granted to workers in industrialised capitalist countries. The themes of this probing volume concern how governments, employers, trade unions, and workers have acted to promote economic growth and accountability with active industrial policies and forms of co-determination, workers' self-management, and/or employee ownership. The book's essays address the key dimensions of economic, social, and political change in five industrial democracies: the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and Sweden. A major focus of the volume as a whole is on economic management and workplace reform in a variety of national settings. "Managing Modern Capitalism" is divided into three sections, covering strategies for industrial renewal, workplace democracy in practice and theory, and future perspectives. In the first section, each of the five countries are compared and contrasted in light of their attempts to stimulate economic growth and reduce unemployment under conditions of international interpendence of capital and markets. Country-by-country profiles highlight the second section, which also examines various forms of employee consultation, participation in managerial decisions, and ownership. The third section and conclusion evaluate prospective economic trends and workplace democracy in the capitalist nations. This book should be of interest to policymakers, scholars, and journalists, as well as to advanced students in political science, economics, history, and sociology.

Author Bio

M. DONALD HANCOCK is Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for European Studies at Vanderbilt University. He authored Sweden: The Politics of Post-Industrial Change (1972), and co-edited Politics in the Post-Welfare State (1972) and West Germany: The Politics of Democratic Corporatism (1989). He has contributed articles to The Wilson Quarterly, Comparative Politics, and Polity. JOHN LOGUE is Professor of Political Science at Kent State University. BERNT SCHILLER is Professor at Roskilde University Center and the University of Gothenburg in Sweden. He has authored several books on Swedish trade unions, employees, and industrial democracy, and articles for the Scandanavian Journal of History.