Transnational business agreements: Dialogue, rights, early restructuring and participants
Conference Centre Complex, Lyons
© Nicolas Robin
- from: 13.11.2008
- to: 14.11.2008
- In: Lyon, Centre international des congrès
Under the French Presidency of the Council of the European Union, the European Commission and the French Ministry of Labour are organising a conference dedicated to the issue of transnational social dialogue in Lyons on 13 and 14 November, 2008.
This conference will be an opportunity to examine the development of transnational business agreements throughout the EU.
The purpose of the conference, to be divided into five sessions, will be to analyse this new form of social dialogue on European and worldwide levels, together with the roles played by participants, the procedures they apply, their intervention in restructuring and their contribution to creating new regulation types. The entire conference will be based on work of the European Commission, surveys carried out in these fields and the experiences of participants invited to speak at the debates.
It will bring together representatives from the Member States, experts, researchers, European and national trade unions and employers' organizations, transnational business representatives and their representative bodies.
Transnational company negotiations first began in the 1960s in a context of company internationalisation, where companies were faced with tackling the consequences of the globalisation of industrial relations and the organisation of regulations at a supranational level. The subject grew importance in the 1970s and 1980s with the emergence of the first transnational employee representation structures in the form of worldwide works councils and the first ever European-wide negotiations. The creation of European works councils under the Directive 94/45/EC of 22 September 1994 contributed to the development of a genuine "culture" of negotiation on European and transnational levels, a practice now framed by a number of legislative texts. European social dialogue, instituted by the Treaty establishing the European Community (articles 138 and 139), therefore occurs on interprofessional and sectoral levels, and derived law organises company procedures.
Today, transnational business agreements focus on various topics including the promotion of human rights, the environment and diversity, transnational social dialogue to early restructuring. These agreements involve various types of participants such as European or international trade union federations, European works councils, national organisations, etc. A census carried by the European Commission shows that 150 transnational agreements are in force today, including 60 international framework agreements, 80 European agreements and 10 mixed agreements.
- Updated: 30.12.2008
