New Zealand Employment Relations: Between Individualism and Social Democracy

ABSTRACT

This article details how New Zealand public policy changes have fostered employment relations arrangements which are dominated by workplace bargaining, individual employment agreements and atypical employment patterns. Against this background, there is an emphasis on the paradoxical results of public policy changes: so-called ‘deregulation’ facilitated an increase in the number of regulations in the 1990s and the recent support for collectivism in the Employment Relations Act 2000 has resulted, so far, in a decrease in the coverage of collective employment agreements. Labour market dynamics have overlaid public policy changes and there has been a growing importance of employee-driven flexibility, individualised career patterns and work-life issues. These changes and their positive and negative effects are illustrated by our case-study research of call centres. Overall, current New Zealand employment relations present a contradictory picture: there have been recent improvements in collective and individual employment rights and in labour market outcomes, but the hangover from the ‘neo-liberal experiment’ and its reductions in employment conditions still have a considerable impact.