European Trade Union Institute (ETUI)

This year's Benchmarking Working Europe report embarks upon a social stocktaking of the reaction to and impact of the financial, economic and social crisis as a means of feeding into the post-crisis and EU2020 debate.

The report provides evidence to question the underlying foundation of the current growth model and its emphasis on deregulation and labour cost cutting. It supports the claim that workers' rights should be rediscovered as a force for productivity and as a way of building a new model of economic progress in which fair wages and good working conditions constitute the basis for growth and employment dynamics.

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(March 2010)

A two-man exhibition about South America is being held in the ETUI Documentation Centre from 25 February until 30 March.
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(February 2010)

This Policy Brief, written by Vera Glassner and Maarten Keune, provides an overview of collective bargaining responses to the crisis in Europe. It shows clearly that collective bargaining has proven to be an effective instrument to maintain employment and to allow companies to find flexible solutions to deal with the steep economic downturn. They note, though, that the increased pressure for the flexibilisation of working time, wage-setting and employment conditions may give rise to a trend towards ‘disorganised’ decentralisation of collective bargaining. Thus, it is vital that trade unions ensure that deviations from collective agreements are applied only temporarily in companies encountering economic difficulties and also that they increase their efforts to coordinate their bargaining policies across borders.
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(February 2010)

The second ETUI Policy Brief on social policy in Europe looks into the social dimension of the recently ratified Lisbon Treaty. Although it was widely expected that the Treaty will strengthen social Europe, the author demonstrates that it only partly lives up to these expectations and is very much lacking in ambition in this respect. Nevertheless, the minor contribution made by the Constitutional Treaty in the social sphere might serve to halt the current tendency to allow the economy to take precedence over social considerations provided that there is a state of permanent mobilisation and deep commitment on the part of the institutional players and social partners.
Available in English, French and German

This Policy Brief has been also reproduced in nr. 245 of Liaisons Sociales Europe.

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(February 2010)

The revelation of the limitations of financial capitalism has opened up a window of opportunity to propose and implement progressive reforms that Europe needs to shift to an equitable and socially and ecologically sustainable growth model. On 13 January 2010, the ETUI brought together prominent academics and researchers to debate with representatives of Brussels-based policymaking institutions, think tanks, academia and civil society actors. Titled ‘After the crisis - towards a sustainable growth model', the ETUI conference brought together over 170 people in the building of the European Economic and Social Committee.
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(January 2010)

The European Trade Union Institute (ETUI) has just launched HesaMag, a new magazine devoted to occupational health and safety. This twice-yearly publication will replace the Newsletter HESA.
"HesaMag aims to show that occupational health is not just a matter for the specialists, it is equally a question of everyday life and a major political issue", explains Laurent Vogel, the director of the ETUI’s Health and Safety department.
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January 2010

This Policy Brief considers the lessons to be drawn from the crisis for both public and private pensions in Europe. The author, Agnes Streissler, points out that both pay-as-you-go and funded systems are dependent on economic growth and are under pressure because of demographic changes. At the same time, private systems are considerably more risky in terms of the entitlements of successive cohorts leaving the labour market.
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(December 2009)