Considering national varieties in the temporary staffing industry and institutional change:Evidence from the UK and Germany

The temporary staffing industry has experienced significant growth in recent decades across many countries and sectors. The particular characteristics of the temporary staffing industry are influenced by the national institutional context in which they are embedded. This article presents empirical findings to investigate of the concept of a national temporary staffing industry using two case studies, the UK and Germany. Through analysis of two national markets for temporary staffing the article discusses the importance of investigating the wider institutional environment in which an industry is embedded, the interactions and interdependencies between the actors involved, and the relationships and activities through which an industry is co-created and constituted. Theoretically, this seeks to stress the importance of considering how institutional systems change, rather than focusing on characteristics used to categorise socio-economic systems. Empirically, this article reveals the features and developments of two national temporary staffing industries within Europe. This advances of our understanding of changes in the temporary staffing industry in two European settings, but also highlights the importance of considering geographically specific national varieties of economic systems as dynamic institutional ecologies

Transnational regulation of temporary agency work compromised partnership between Private Employment Agencies and Global Union Federations

This article critically assesses the potential for the international regulation of temporary agency work (TAW) through building partnership between the Global Union Federations (GUFs) and major Private Employment Agencies (PrEAs). Given the limits of existing national and international regulation of TAW, particularly in developing countries, and the current deadlock in dialogue through the International Labour Organization, the argument of this article is that Transnational Private Labour Regulation (TPLR) offers a unique opportunity to establish a basis for minimum standards for temporary agency workers. This article goes on to propose three potential TPLR frameworks that, although compromised, are transparent, fair and sufficiently elastic to accommodate the distributive and political risks associated with partnership. They also offer important gains, namely increasing the competitive advantage of the PrEAs involved, minimum standards for agency workers and ‘field enlarging’ strategies for the GUFs and their affiliates

(Re)considering new agents: a review of labour market intermediaries within labour geography

The world of work continues to change. Labour markets in most countries are increasingly shaped by policies of neoliberal deregulation while strategies of flexibility dominate public policy and corporate strategy across an array of sectors. At the forefront of these changes are the myriad labour market intermediaries that are used by workers and employees to enhance their ability to navigate ever more complex and volatile labour markets. For some, mediated employment, recruitment and work practices mean greater career progression and profit making ability, but for many others, it means increased precarity, vulnerability and insecurity. This paper critically reviews existing literature within geography on three types of private labour market intermediary, namely temporary staffing agencies and contract brokers; executive search firms and headhunters; and informal intermediaries such as gangmasters. The final section addresses the future for research in labour geography and, in particular, suggests new ways in which to broaden our understanding of labour market intermediaries and their impact on worker agency

Inclusive Unions in a Dualized Labour Market? The Challenge of Organizing Labour Market Policy and Social Protection for Labour Market Outsiders

Dynamics of labour market dualization have affected most Western European countries over the last two decades, and trade unions have often been seen as conservative actors protecting the interests of their core constituencies and as such contributing to labour market dualization. However, empirical evidence from Italy shows that unions' stance towards atypical workers has been more inclusive than the literature expected, despite the conditions for pro-insider policies being firmly in place. By analyzing unions' strategies towards temporary agency workers in Italy, the article aims to reconcile the empirical observations that conflict with the theoretical expectations. It is argued that unions have indeed put in place inclusive, yet selective, policies towards atypical workers, and that unions' identity is a central explanatory variable to understand unions' selective inclusiveness