European employment regulation has been repeatedly identified by policymakers as too stringent resulting in policy recommendations aimed at a more flexible labour market. This diagnosis has been reaffirmed, particularly by international policymakers, in the post-2008 economic and jobs crisis with... Find out more

This policy brief looks at how effective worker participation can make digitalisation a programme for success for companies and employees alike. The author provides a great number of good examples of negotiated solutions on the company level. Find out more

This working paper looks at recent structural reforms of the Spanish labour market and evaluates them against the government’s stated objectives to reduce unemployment.It concludes that the labour market flexibilisation approach has not helped to reduce unemployment, nor has it contributed to the... Find out more

This Working Paper investigates links between employment changes and both sectoral developments and changes in earnings levels in six EU member states. The paper challenges the view that a remedy focusing on reducing employment protection and pay levels leads to higher levels of employment. It... Find out more

This paper provides a comparative analysis of the Memorandums of understanding (MoUs) in Greece and Portugal in the areas of old-age pensions and labour market policies and shows that, compared to earlier economic governance instruments, the MoUs have entailed much greater interference in setting... Find out more

This policy brief demonstrates how the EU's financial and economic crisis has been used to attack European collective labour law. Amendments to the Lisbon Treaty, changes in the EU's economic governance and austerity measures have led to drastic national labour law reforms which undermine... Find out more

Widening economic and social gaps among EU member states, as well as among different groups and categories of citizens within society, are not only placing in jeopardy the future of Social Europe but threatening to undermine also the whole project of European integration. The post-2008 recession and... Find out more

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The third ETUI Policy Brief European Economic and Employment Policy in 2010 analyses the performance of European countries in the crisis according to their levels of flexibility and security. To this end, the author, Andranik Tangian, of the Institute for Social Research at the Hans-Böckler... Find out more

‘Flexicurity’ has become one of the more fashionable elements of the European political discourse addressing social and economic policies in general and employment and labour market policies in particular. The European Commission is strongly pushing for flexicurity as the answer to Europe’s... Find out more