| In an attempt to bridge the gap in the existing literature in industrial sociology and the sociology of law, this research examines the effects of labor law on practices of industrial conflict at the shopfloor level. Most of the literature on workplace conflict has either ignored the role of law entirely as a significant structural variable or else treated its effects as rigidly deterministic, without consideration of other social variables.; Substantively, this research focuses on workplace conflict in six different manufacturing plants in Milan, Italy, in light of a major law reform, the Worker's Charter of 1970. Data was collected between 1981-1982 through empirical studies inside the factories. The research material is organized through the use of paired contrasts of factories, in which a quasi-experimental design was used, holding some independent variables constant, while allowing others to vary. In two experiments, labor process, work force skill and gender and company market position were held constant, while the political character of the employees' organization (factory council) was varied. In another, the work force was varied while management and factory council differences were controlled. A final experiment compared a single factory over time, to examine the effect of conjunctural factors on the law.; The results of the study demonstrate that the law has direct effects on industrial conflict in terms of class formation at the workplace, labor market flexibility and company employment policies. Other effects of the law are mediated by company specific factors--labor process, work force skill and gender and the employee organization--and external economic and political developments that change over time. However, a notable characteristic of the law is that its structural rigidity dampens changes in political and economic conjunctures. The law also allows for considerable social indeterminacy, which permits militant workers to considerably expand their control over the immediate work process. |
