Industrial Relations--A Contemporary Approach, (3rd Edition).
Kumar, Neeraj
Industrial Relations--A Contemporary Approach, (3rd Edition), Mark
Bray, Stephen Deery, Janet Walsh and Peter Waring, Tata McGraw Hill
Education Private Limited, New Delhi, 2011, Pages 424.
Industrial Relations, the world over have undergone significant
changes in the last two decades or so. The actors of IR, the legal
framework, the industry structure, nature of employment relations have
all undergone changes. While there are underlying similarities in the
nature of changes across different countries and regions, there are
country specific differences too. It is in this context that
'Industrial Relations--A Contemporary Approach', while
capturing the similarities in theoretical underpinnings of the current
state of Industrial Relations as a subject, also brings out the ways in
which the employment relationship, role of the parties and the processes
of IR are different in Australia.
The book has 10 chapters, structured in 3 parts. The structure
makes sense in as much as the first part dwells upon the approaches to
studying industrial relations and the changing nature of work and
employment which is not country specific.
While explaining the main approaches to the study of industrial
relations namely unitarism, pluralism and radicalism, the authors have
made it clear that they have followed 'pluralism' as an
approach and 'neoinstitutionalism' as tool for analyses. This
makes the treatment of other topics in the later chapters conceptually
clearer and contextually relevant. The chapter has focus only on the
approaches and tools that are relevant today, with just enough reference
to the classical approaches and theories. 'The Changing Nature of
Work and Employment', describes global trends like increase in
part-time and casual employment, outsourcing and subcontracting,
downsizing and delayering, earning inequalities etc. The first two
chapters taken together provide a good launching pad wherein current
trends have been described against a conceptual backdrop.
Parts 2 and 3 thereafter take you to the specifics of the
Industrial Relations in Australia with part 2 dwelling upon the various
parties to IR namely the State, the Management and the employees
(represented by Trade Unions or otherwise and the part 3 on processes
such as collective bargaining and workplace HRM.
Feature like 'Final Observation' at the end of each
chapter is a welcome addition where the state of the art on the subject
is summarized. The cases at the end of the chapter are detailed,
contemporary and factual. A feel and that is rich in resources, both for
teachers and students.
Neeraj Kumar
Associate Professor, FORE School of Management.
