Title: Can European Works Councils be effective? A study of their contributing factors from an HR Management point of view

Authors: Theodore Koutroukis, Konstantinos Terzidis

Addresses: Business School, Department of Financial and Management Engineering, University of Aegean, 31, Fostini Str., 821 00 Chios, Greece. ' Faculty of Management and Economics, Department of Information Management, Kavala Institute of Technology, Saint Loukas, 654 04 Kavala, Greece

Abstract: According to previous studies, the Greek experience of worker participation indicates that there was considerable reluctance of industrial relations (IR) actors to promote such procedures. That explains the limited number of worker participation schemes which appeared within Greek enterprises in the past decades. Nonetheless, during the last decade some progress in the cases of worker participation has been made within the subsidiaries of multinational companies (MNCs), thanks to a European Works Council (EWC) Directive. This paper examines the factors that contribute to the effectiveness of EWCs by reviewing the pertinent literature and enriching it with new research findings from the human resource (HR) management side. The conclusions indicate that there are some good practices of EWCs, which are linked with certain contributing factors concerning the nature of the MNC as well as the structure of employee representation.

Keywords: European Works Councils; EWC effectiveness; contributing factors; worker participation; human resource management; HRM; employee involvement.

DOI: 10.1504/IJDSRM.2010.037487

International Journal of Decision Sciences, Risk and Management, 2010 Vol.2 No.3/4, pp.276 - 290

Published online: 14 Dec 2010 *

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