Business

Employment Relations

Name: Wong Kei Yin Keith

UBU: 06005789

Question: Q. 1 Critically discuss the differences in the view of conflict between the Unitarist, Pluralist and Marxist perspective on employee relations. Which perspective (or perspectives) do you consider appropriate for the analysis of employee relations in the UK?

Module Leader: Dr Jo McBride

Date: 26th March, 2010.

Word Count: 1,989

1. Critically discuss the differences in the view of conflict between he Unitarist, Pluralist and Marxist perspective on employee relations. Which perspective (or perspectives) do you consider appropriate for the analysis of employee relations in the UK?

Introduction

According to (Rose, 2004) describes employment relation as a study of regulation of the employment relationship between employers and employees. Conflicts are the result of infinite wants of human being which brings conflict into employment relationship but only with limited resources available. I am going to compare Unitarist, Pluralist and Marxist, each offers a particular perception of workplace relations and will therefore interpret workplace conflict very differently. After all, I am going to conclude the essay with the appropriate perspective for analyzing employee relations in the UK.

Nature of Conflict

The conflict between two parties are largely caused by substantive issues, which include salary, annual leave entitlement, pensions, private health company subscriptions, company cars, training, prospects of promotion to higher hierarchy. The tensions generated by a given work situation may cause workers either go on strike, stay at home, hit the foreman, or smash the machine (Hyman, 1982). An industrial society is a highly complex and dynamic arrangements of differentiated groups, activities and industrial relationships intertwined with a variety of attitudes and expectations (Salmon, 1987). (Blyton, 2004) stated ‘reward-effort exchange' which means the effort put in by both parties can be rewarded with satisfactory equivalence. However, if they are unsatisfied, conflicts will occur and both parties start to bargain towards the equilibrium. Conflict will never be eliminated but the form it takes, the severity can vary (Palmer, 1983). While, different people and organizations have different interest in mind, conflicts are deeming to happen. All societies have different kind of problems and they are often hard to resolve and to get everyone satisfied. All organizations must experience some types of conflicts. According to (Cockroft, 1977), even though in some countries strikes are illegal, there will always be strikes and disputes within any industrial bodies. Conflicts doesn't just occur in big industrial bodies, even small self-managing workers co-operatives would have conflicts on insignificant issues. Such as the hours of work, job titles, over differences in interests between occupational groups and individual versus supervision. Hence, it is nearly impossible to avoid conflicts but discussion could be held on the criticism on various perspectives.

Unitarist

Unitarist perspective is based on the assumptions that the organization should be, an integrated group of people with a single authority/loyalty structure and a set of common values, interest and objectives shared by all members of the organization (Salamon, 1987). All participants should share the same goal, harmony and cooperation expected. Conflict is perceived as an irrational activity, disruptive and the pathological result of agitators, interpersonal friction and communication break down.

According to Fox, conflict is not inevitable but it is pathological, in fact the outcome of misunderstanding or mischief. Conflict, when it does arise, is believed to be primarily frictional rather than structural and caused by factors such as the result of management failure to communicate its goal in an effective manner, which lead to temporary friction until relevant message is received. In addition, personalities clashes within the organization and lack of understanding on the part of the employees. Furthermore, agitators purposely over talk and extend the problems, whereas it might not otherwise exist. Most British managements use their authoritarian style to resolve conflicts and often don't