Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-09-02Epub Date: 2025-12-03DOI: 10.1111/irel.70016
Geneviève Coderre-LaPalme, Ruth Reaney
{"title":"The Role of Union Legitimacy and Identity in Shaping Strategic Choice","authors":"Geneviève Coderre-LaPalme, Ruth Reaney","doi":"10.1111/irel.70016","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70016","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article explores how union legitimacy and identity shape union strategies. It highlights that while union identity is key to understanding strategic variation, legitimacy also plays a crucial role as unions must continuously earn and maintain it with various constituencies. Using cases from French automobile manufacturing and public healthcare, the article examines how local unions with distinct identities prioritize different forms and sources of legitimacy and, in turn, how this influences strategic choice. The findings show that unions formulate their strategies not only based on their identity, but also according to the need to uphold legitimacy with diverse constituencies.</p>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 4","pages":"452-467"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/irel.70016","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148872108","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-09-02Epub Date: 2025-10-30DOI: 10.1111/irel.70010
Ceri Hughes, Stephen Mustchin, Miguel Martínez Lucio
{"title":"Rebuilding Tripartism and Labor Standards From Below? Legitimation Politics and Risks Around Local Employment Standards","authors":"Ceri Hughes, Stephen Mustchin, Miguel Martínez Lucio","doi":"10.1111/irel.70010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70010","url":null,"abstract":"<p>Establishing voluntary labor standards depends on securing the voluntary engagement of multiple actors with potentially diverging interests. This paper examines the legitimation politics and processes surrounding attempts to develop local labor standards through an empirical study of local employment charters in England. These forms of soft regulation, promoted by local state actors, ask employers to commit to flexible ‘good’ work principles. We argue that legitimation processes are central to debates around new forms of ‘soft regulation’, highlighting how building legitimacy entails compromises and potential legitimacy risks for others.</p>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 4","pages":"440-451"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/irel.70010","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148871887","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-09-02Epub Date: 2025-09-02DOI: 10.1111/irel.70005
Huw Thomas, Vicente Silva
{"title":"Maintaining Legitimacy in Global Labor Governance: Legitimation Politics at the International Labour Organization (ILO)","authors":"Huw Thomas, Vicente Silva","doi":"10.1111/irel.70005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70005","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article analyzes how industrial relations actors maintain legitimacy in global labor governance by investigating the legitimation politics at the International Labour Organization (ILO). Drawing on the concept of legitimacy tests, we identify three strategies that the workers' and employers' groups at the ILO have deployed to maintain their legitimacy: representation, exclusion, and coalitions of convenience. We demonstrate, however, how legitimation-maintenance by the social partners risks delegitimizing the ILO, potentially impacting its role in global labor governance. Our findings contribute to debates on the disputed nature of legitimacy and the role of industrial relations actors in global labor governance.</p>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 4","pages":"414-426"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/irel.70005","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148871974","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-09-02Epub Date: 2025-12-04DOI: 10.1111/irel.70019
Christopher J. McLachlan, Mark Stuart, Robert MacKenzie
{"title":"The Dynamics of Legitimacy in Integrative Bargaining Over Restructuring","authors":"Christopher J. McLachlan, Mark Stuart, Robert MacKenzie","doi":"10.1111/irel.70019","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70019","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This paper demonstrates the dynamics of legitimacy in integrative bargaining over restructuring. Through a case study of SteelCo, we show that cognitive legitimacy is essential to the identification of integrative potential, which interacts with pragmatic and moral legitimacy as bargaining evolves. Our findings also reveal the two-way interrelationship between legitimacy and bargaining: just as legitimacy impacts the bargaining process, the conduct and outcomes of bargaining impact legitimacy. Our analysis highlights the risk integrative bargaining presents for unions, as it can involve not a single act of compromise but a gradual weakening of resources predicated on their moral legitimacy among workers.</p>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 4","pages":"468-481"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/irel.70019","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148872040","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-09-02Epub Date: 2026-01-05DOI: 10.1111/irel.70021
Martijn Boersma, Emmanuel Josserand
{"title":"Integrated Strategies for Union Legitimacy (Re)Building: A Process Model","authors":"Martijn Boersma, Emmanuel Josserand","doi":"10.1111/irel.70021","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70021","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>This study presents a longitudinal analysis examining the process by which the Transport Workers Union (re)established its legitimacy through an integrated strategy encompassing comprehensive campaigns in road transport, aviation, and the gig economy in Australia. We reveal how unions can gain pragmatic legitimacy through power recomposition, moral legitimacy through moral framing, and cognitive legitimacy through the shaping of assumptions. We reveal the systematic transfer of proven strategies to different parts of the industry, adapting to specific conditions and audiences. Our findings provide a framework for unions to revitalize their influence within a dynamic industrial relations landscape.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 4","pages":"482-496"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148872137","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-09-02Epub Date: 2025-09-04DOI: 10.1111/irel.70006
Andrew B. Wolf, Hana R. Shepherd, Janice Fine, Zuhur Ahmed, Sylvie Guezeon, Michael Piore
{"title":"Threats to Legitimacy in Local Employment Law Enforcement Regimes Among Immigrant and Racially Marginalized Small Business Owners","authors":"Andrew B. Wolf, Hana R. Shepherd, Janice Fine, Zuhur Ahmed, Sylvie Guezeon, Michael Piore","doi":"10.1111/irel.70006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70006","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>U.S. municipal labor enforcement agencies find they are often inundated with complaints from small, immigrant- or minority-owned firms. This undermines these agencies' efforts to engage in strategic enforcement and raises equity concerns, threatening the legitimacy of the labor standards enforcement regime among some businesses. This paper draws on interviews with small business owners who participated in a pilot study that provided employment law-compliant human resource services for small businesses in Minneapolis to address this issue. We contribute to the theories of employer non-compliance by pointing to the issue of employer capacity and the ways that issues of capacity are shaped by historical legacies of racism and xenophobia.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 4","pages":"427-439"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148872013","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-09-02Epub Date: 2026-08-05DOI: 10.1111/irel.70035
Andy Hodder, Genevieve Coderre-LaPalme, Colm McLaughlin, Ruth Reaney, Chris F. Wright
{"title":"Legitimacy and Employment Relations Research: A Review and Research Agenda","authors":"Andy Hodder, Genevieve Coderre-LaPalme, Colm McLaughlin, Ruth Reaney, Chris F. Wright","doi":"10.1111/irel.70035","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70035","url":null,"abstract":"<p>This article provides a comprehensive review of existing research and develops an agenda for analyzing legitimacy in employment relations. It argues that legitimacy should be understood as a dynamic and contested process through which actors, institutions and policy ideas are legitimated, delegitimated and reworked. The article examines the legitimacy of employment relations ideas, the relationship between legitimacy, power and politics, the legitimacy of employment relations actors and of employment relations as a field of study. It concludes by locating the articles in this special issue within this broad agenda and draws out key insights for legitimacy research in employment relations.</p>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 4","pages":"399-413"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2026-09-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/irel.70035","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148872136","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-06-02Epub Date: 2025-12-05DOI: 10.1111/irel.70015
Kourtney Koebel, Dionne Pohler
{"title":"The Impact of Canada's Working Income Tax Benefit on the Labor Supply of Low-Income Workers","authors":"Kourtney Koebel, Dionne Pohler","doi":"10.1111/irel.70015","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70015","url":null,"abstract":"<p>We use administrative tax data to estimate the effect of the Working Income Tax Benefit (WITB) on the labor supply of single, low-income workers in Canada. Our analytical approach exploits low knowledge of the program, which generates variation in the benefit receipt both between and within eligible tax filers over time. We find that the benefit receipt has a positive effect on the extensive margin of employment, suggesting that the additional income helps workers remain attached to the labor market. Among tax filers who do not receive social assistance, our results suggest that WITB receipt increases labor market attachment by roughly 3%.</p>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 3","pages":"357-377"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2026-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/irel.70015","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148146956","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-06-02Epub Date: 2025-11-05DOI: 10.1111/irel.70012
Takeshi Nishikawa, Andrew Prevost
{"title":"Local Religiosity Culture and Managerial Response to Organized Labor","authors":"Takeshi Nishikawa, Andrew Prevost","doi":"10.1111/irel.70012","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70012","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>We provide evidence that local religiosity affects collective bargaining outcomes between firms and unions. Drawing on social norms theory and social identity theory, we hypothesize that religiosity is negatively associated with industrial action. Our findings support the latter explanation, where we find stronger effects when the likelihood of shared identity is higher. Analyses of negotiated outcomes following union shareholder activism mitigate concerns that employee preferences alone drive these results. Further evidence indicates that higher local religiosity reduces firms' use of strategic mechanisms designed to enhance management's leverage over unions, highlighting the broader role of cultural context in shaping management–labor interactions.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 3","pages":"312-333"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2026-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148147018","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Industrial RelationsPub Date : 2026-06-02Epub Date: 2025-12-08DOI: 10.1111/irel.70017
Piotr Lewandowski, Wojciech Szymczak
{"title":"Automation, Trade Unions and Atypical Employment","authors":"Piotr Lewandowski, Wojciech Szymczak","doi":"10.1111/irel.70017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/irel.70017","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>We study the effect of automation technologies—industrial robots, software and databases—on the incidence of involuntary atypical employment in 13 EU countries between 2006 and 2018. Robots do not affect the total employment rate but significantly increase the involuntary atypical employment share, mainly through fixed-term work. Software and databases increase total employment and are neutral for atypical employment. Higher trade union density mitigates the robots' impact on atypical employment, while employment protection legislation plays no role. Using historical decompositions, we attribute 1–2 percentage points of a 15% average atypical employment share in our sample to automation.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":47700,"journal":{"name":"Industrial Relations","volume":"65 3","pages":"378-396"},"PeriodicalIF":2.6,"publicationDate":"2026-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148146967","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"管理学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}