• Work

• Feedback Cycles

• Reconciling stakeholder interests

There is a general contention that work has become increasingly precarious across Europe since the 1970s. However, conclusions about this trend are based on a fragmented body of literature which has lacked a multidimensional, longitudinal, comparative perspective of precarious employment. As a result, nuances of the trend and the empirical ground on which the conclusions are based remain unclear. Additionally, the role of collective bargaining has lacked attention. Existing bodies of literature interpret aspects of collective bargaining both as a dimension of precarious employment and as an explanatory factor for precarisation, underlining their interdependence. But longitudinal inquiry into their interdependence is scarce, despite the deterioration of collective bargaining in the past decades. This is needed to identify whether trends seem to evolve independently or parallel, suggesting reinforcing cycli. Therefore, this study describes the development of six dimensions of precarious employment (low wages, temporariness, disempowerment, unfavourable working time arrangements, lack of training, and lack of rights) across Europe, and investigates how aspects of the collective bargaining system have affected these trends. Using a hierarchical cluster analysis, we identify different trends in indicators of precarious employment across Europe. Preliminary results show we cannot identify a general trend of precarisation across dimensions of precarious employment, rather, trends vary depending on the dimension and country cluster. In a next step, we will perform an exploratory analysis to assess the association between collective bargaining aspects, such as bargaining coverage, and the different dimensions of precarious employment and whether these associations changed over time.

How did the dimensions of precarious employment develop over time across Europe, and what is their relationship with structural indicators of collective bargaining?

• External data

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• Structured

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