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Europe on Strike**

by Laurent GUERBY Fri Jun 2nd, 2006 at 05:19:49 AM EST

Jerome says:

Why don't we ever hear about strikes in Germany in the news? They seem to be quite massive and varied. What's going on?

Colman posts about Social Europe.

If you want to keep informed on what's going on in other countries with respect to labour negociations, the only site I found is EIRO (european industrial relations observatory on-line).

Now the real question is why even national press doesn't talk about the regular small scale strikes or even successful employer - employee negociations.

For example, according to this interview  Jean-Christophe Le Duigou secretary of the french hard-line trade union CGT says that CGT ends up signing about 80% of all deals, but its (media) image is about always saying no.

**From the front page - whataboutbob


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No RSS feed of course. Grumble. Good find though.
by Colman (colman at eurotrib.com) on Tue May 30th, 2006 at 05:17:06 PM EST
Yes, I never quite found out how to get to past articles from the site navigation, so I try to read it regularly :).

I never tried to contact the webmasters, may be that would do.

by Laurent GUERBY on Tue May 30th, 2006 at 05:35:19 PM EST
[ Parent ]
I wonder how I missed the site map...
by Laurent GUERBY on Tue May 30th, 2006 at 05:36:26 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Also their parent organisation the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions has interesting stuff.
by Laurent GUERBY on Tue May 30th, 2006 at 05:42:20 PM EST
Thanks for this information...maybe we should consider putting this kind of stuff on our blog list, or in the archives. Any thoughts out there?

"Once in awhile we get shown the light, in the strangest of places, if we look at it right" - Hunter/Garcia
by whataboutbob on Wed May 31st, 2006 at 03:55:35 AM EST
All the links to these organisations already exist in the ET Wiki Tools For Action
sextions named:
European Institutions And Resources Links
and
Economic And Social Data Sources

By the way, I've worked in the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions from 2002 to 2004, so if you need information about these agencies, just ask...

"Dieu se rit des hommes qui se plaignent des conséquences alors qu'ils en chérissent les causes" Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet

by Melanchthon on Sun Jun 4th, 2006 at 09:02:59 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Thank you, Laurent, for a great diary. I had heard similar numbers about the CGT before but it is good to see the man himself say it. This is all the more crucial since the perception is that French unions are so stubborn that nothing can be negotiated with them. This is indeed not the case. Perception, as you point out, is the key element.
by STA (sta.blog@gmail.com) on Wed May 31st, 2006 at 08:44:37 AM EST
Even the 80% could be misleading but it's hard as usual to get an accurate picture with a single number (may be should be weighted number of workers impacted by said deals).

The problem in France is that it has a very low trade union membership, and representation is somewhat skewed. But again I remember reading that trade unions mostly agreed on ways to change that a few years ago, but the law isn't changed by government (not 100% sur, can't find links right now).

by Laurent GUERBY on Wed May 31st, 2006 at 09:02:37 AM EST
[ Parent ]


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