Ebook: Assessing Partnership : The Prospects For, And Challenges Of, Modernisation

The politics, institutions and ‘‘‘market’’ for partnership. Partnership working has become synonymous with the contemporary politicalproject of ‘‘modernisation’’. It has underpinned the ideology and rhetoric of theLabour Government and shaped its relations with the institutions of capitaland business representation (White, 2001). This is clearly evident with regardto Labour’s agenda of public sector and welfare reform, whereby futureinvestment is predicated on the involvement of private sector interests throughpublic-private partnership (Institute of Public Policy Research, 2001). Whilethis broader conceptualisation of partnership does not have any explicitconnection with matters of employment and workplace practice, it doesnonetheless act as an ideological frame. Thus, since its first landslide election in1997, the Labour Government has purposely sought to establish the basis for anew accord between capital and labour. In this respect, the modernisation ofemployment relations via partnership is articulated in terms of the need tomove away from adversarialism to cooperation, on the basis of a commoninterest between capital and labour in enterprise performance andcompetitiveness. This agenda of modernisation is, of course, nothing new. Indeed, it has beena periodic feature of British industrial relations history (Whitston, 2001). TheMond-Turner talks in the 1920s with their focus on greater collaboration onmatters of industrial reform, the Donovan Commission in the 1960s and itsattempt to ‘‘formalise industrial relations’’ by constructing consistent companyand workplace bargaining systems, and the Bullock Report in the 1970s withits plan of integrating labour into employer decision-making processes allrepresent attempts to ‘‘modernise’’ and transform industrial relationsbehaviour. The Blair Government’s concerns with stable, orderly and consensualindustrial relations clearly draw, then, from a long tradition. It has sought toadvance its agenda of modernisation through micro-level exhortation and viathe wider role of the state as employer. At the micro-level, its partnershipagenda has been supported by the Department of Trade and IndustryPartnership Fund, which invites project proposals from employers and unionsaimed at modernising and improving employment practices. The fundencourages and finances joint working on matters such as involvement,bullying and the quality of working life. This strategy is aimed at providingconcrete examples and benchmarks of partnership that can then act as pointsof reference for other employers. It represents an attempt to coax social actorsinto new forms of behaviour without directly intervening into the substance ofemployment relations (Taylor, 1998).