Unions as 'managers of precariousness': The entrenchment of micro-corporatism in the Spanish automotive industry and its drawbacks

摘要

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to argue that: in a context of global labour market competition and in the absence of new strategic repertoires, class trade unions are progressively becoming managers of precariousness. Thus, the paper challenges the compromise logic as the unique solution to corporate threats to relocation, since it undermines trade union power resources, mainly discursively and organisationally, and hinders trade union capacity to transform the balance of forces to their favour later, when the hegemonic discourse can more easily be challenged in periods of crisis.