Trajectories of Neoliberal Transformation: European Industrial Relations Since the 1970s by Lucio Baccaro & Chris Howell

Author:Lucio Baccaro & Chris Howell [Baccaro, Lucio]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2017-10-11T16:00:00+00:00

Figure 7.3. Atypical forms of work

Source: Eurostat

Also, in 2003, Article 18 was the target of another political initiative of opposite sign. A group of radical political forces, including the FIOM, launched a popular referendum to extend its application to all workers, including those employed in firms below the threshold. This extension was a logical corollary of the argument that Article 18 was a fundamental right of workers. As such, all workers should benefit from it. This referendum, too, failed to reach the quorum for legal validity, even though a majority of voters (more than ten million) voted for the extension (Baccaro and Simoni 2004).

In 2012, the reform of Article 18 featured prominently in the Monti government's attempt to regain the confidence of international financial markets (Sacchi 2012). The Monti government, an executive of technocrats supported by a three-way grand coalition among center-left, center and center-right forces, was put in power to reassure the international policy-making elites, most importantly the European Central Bank and the European Commission, that Italy was ready to implement a program of “structural reforms” (involving labor and product market deregulation) and fiscal adjustment to boost international financial market confidence. The government's policy style shunned concertation with the social partners and emphasized the ability to pass reforms unilaterally. These reforms were presented as necessary to increase economic efficiency and to rebalance the scales between “insiders” and “outsiders” in the Italian labor market.

The government managed to pass a draconian pension reform that increased retirement age, abolished seniority pensions and imposed the application of the pro rata method of capitalized contribution to calculate the pension benefits of retirees who had entered the labor market before the reforms of the 1990s. When it came to Article 18, however, the government had to modify its original proposal – which would simply have abolished the possibility of reinstatement for workers fired for economic reasons – due to opposition from within its own parliamentary majority and had to reintroduce the principle of judicial discretion. With this reform, judges had the possibility of choosing between monetary compensation and reinstatement when faced with an economic firing decision that they deemed unjustified.

It looked as though not even a technocratic government operating under conditions of extreme external urgency (a sovereign debt crisis) would be able to decisively reform Article 18. However, the government's twenty-year attempts came to fruition in the spring of 2015. With the strong support of Confindustria and against the opposition of all trade unions, the Renzi center-left government eliminated the possibility of reinstatement for illegitimate economic firings. The new norm would apply to new employment contracts, while previous ones would still be protected by the old Article 18. The new employment protection regime would thus cover the entire Italian labor force only in due time. This reform was part of an ambitious program of labor market reform aimed to shift the center of protection away from the job and toward workers and their employability. However, while some measures have been taken to extend unemployment insurance

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