Living up to the European Union concept of employee involvement

Employee involvement in management’s decision making has been a challenge for the European Community (EC) since its beginning. Already in view of the six founding countries the European Economic Community (EEC) was confronted with a significant degree of diversity between the different Member States. This diversity increased with every enlargement, in particular when in 1973 the United Kingdom (UK) and Ireland became members and much later in 2004 when Central and Eastern European (CEE) States together with Malta and Cyprus were included. This diversity in the area of employee involvement in management’s decision‐making is well documented. Therefore, it may be sufficient for the purpose of this paper to only give some broad indications. There are countries, as for example Germany, Austria, the Netherlands or Luxembourg, which have systems with a dual structure where employee involvement in management’s decision‐making institutionally is separated from the trade unions, even if in actual practice the links...