New European Industrial Releations (NEIRE): Mediation system effectiveness for collective organization conflicts: a comparative study (NEIRE 3)

Basic data for this project

Type of project: EU-project hosted outside University of Münster
Duration: 01/05/2016 - 30/04/2018

Description

Social dialogue is an essential instrument within the EC to prevent and regulate relations between employers and employees. Within the EC conflicts at organizational level regularly escalate at high costs, and therefore member states offer different third party interventions and mediation services to solve these conflicts. The EC promotes mediation and other forms of non-judicial conflict resolution. However, there is a lack of knowledge about a) the actual functioning of these services; b) the conditions to promote the use of mediation; c) the antecedents of effective mediation interventions. Especially for collective labor conflicts, the structuring of third party support and mediation services in itself are important elements of social dialogue. Partners feel the need to innovate social dialogue. One of the components for innovation is supporting social partners at organizational level, especially when negotiations are stuck, agreements cannot be reached, or rights are not respected, and conflict escalation might occur. Different member states have different traditions in providing such mediation assistance. However, actual knowledge on how this functions and how to further develop lacks. Are the structures adequate, accessible, and acceptable to conflicting parties in collective organizational conflicts? How do the formal structures relate to the use of independent consultants offering facilitation and mediation services? What are limitations to the use of mediation, and how can ‘preventive mediation’ be used to de-escalate in an early stage conflicts within organizations between management and labor? These questions are at the heart of further development of social dialogue in Europe, and this study aims to compare the experiences in different member states, in a search for good practices, inspiring social partners and governments of member states to promote mediation, both as prevention and conflict intervention. The overall goal of this project is to evaluate the effectiveness of mediation as a tool for collective labour conflict resolution and strengthening of social dialogue, by assessing the effectiveness of mediation from a double perspective: structural and functional.

Keywords: Psychologie; Arbeitspsychologie