Seminar: From Sectoral Bargaining to Works Councils: is a Consensus Really Emerging in the US?

Guest presenter: Benjamin Sachs is the Kestnbaum Professor of Labor and Industry and faculty director of the Center for Labor and a Just Economy at Harvard Law School. Prior to joining the Harvard faculty in 2008, Professor Sachs was the Joseph Goldstein Fellow at Yale Law School and served as Assistant General Counsel of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). His writing has appeared in the Harvard Law Review, the Yale Law Journal, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and elsewhere.

Presentation: To prevent a downward spiral in economic and political inequality in the United States, the Center for Labor and a Just Economy at Harvard Law School issued the Clean Slate Report. The report proposed rewriting American labor law in a manner that is explicitly designed to enable workers to build collective economic and political power. The report argues that in order for American labor law to succeed in this mission, it must enable workers to build collective organizations that can countervail corporate power wherever that power impacts workers’ lives. Among others, the report recommends adopting a system of sectoral bargaining to complement worksite level negotiations, implementing a menu of representational choices – including works councils – at the firm level, and strengthening employees’ ability to engage in collective action including through digital picket lines.

Conservatives in the U.S. – including the American Compass think tank and politicians like J.D. Vance – have recently begun advocating for some of the same reforms called for in Clean Slate, including sectoral bargaining and works councils. In his talk, Professor Sachs will outline the reforms called for by Clean Slate and those called for by this strand of conservativism. He will compare the proposals in order to highlight where the two groups are aligned and where they diverge (on the level of policy design, motivation for reform, and overall vision for the U.S. economy). And he will offer some ideas about what we can learn from this unexpected political development.

Programme:

12:00  Light lunch

13:00  Welcome by professor Jens Kristiansen, WELMA, University of Copenhagen

13:05  Presentation by professor Benjamin Sachs, Harvard Law School

13:50  A Danish perspective on collective bargaining

  • Associate professor Søren Kaj Andersen, Employment Relations Research Centre (FAOS), University of Copenhagen
  • Chief Negotiator Mina Bernardini, The Danish Trade Union Confederation (FH)
  • Director Collective Bargaining and Labour Law Steen Müntzberg, Confederation of Danish Employers (DA)

14:30  Questions and discussion

For registration, Please click here

Time:  Monday 28 October 2024 12:00-15:00

Venue:  Justitia Mødeboks (7A.2.04), South Campus, Njalsgade 76, DK-2300 Copenhagen S.