Employment Relation

Introduction

This paper will talk about the employment relations from two perspectives, a unitatist perspective and a pluralist perspective, and then make an analysis of the Australian Waterfront Dispute 1997-1998 from these two perspectives. In order to make clear the changes of the stevedoring industry in Australia, one has to understand the disputes occurred between 1997 and 1998. These disputes were not simple because they demonstrated the employment relations in the industry or even the whole economy (Trinca and Davies, 2000).

Thus, what is the Australian Waterfront Dispute 1997-1998? And how it happens and changes? About these two questions, the paper will give a clear outline on the changes and related issues of the Dispute in its third part. And to be in accordance with the question requirements, the paper will also tackle what are unitarist and pluralist perspectives in the second part. The detailed information about these two perspectives are based on the PPTs in class and related theories, as well as some philosophical ideas. After clarifying the two perspectives, making an analysis of the Australian Waterfront Dispute 1997-1998 is essential to answer the question. As mentioned, this section will be included in the third part. Now it comes to the last part, the conclusion part. In this part, the paper will give an overall evaluation on the two perspectives in the process of dispute changes, and show the author’s standpoint on this issue.

Analysis of Australian Waterfront Dispute 1997-1998

The case study gives the example of the Australian Waterfront Dispute 1997-1998. And this paper will make analysis of the dispute changes from two perspectives above.

The first stage of the Dispute: MUA

The big changes in the stevedoring industry of Australia are two organizations, the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU). The appearance of these two organizations leaked out the defects of the industry. The reason of disputes is the impartiality of power and the unequal employment relations. MAU is a kind of collective cooperation which always makes reactions to the low pay, poor conditions and dangerous (Wiseman, 1998). It is a system focusing on daily work of employees and taking the control of the whole waterfront business. But such kind of organization can still achieve a fairly equal competitive position for workers. However, the organization has not escaped from the hands of the Communist Party of Australia which resists changes with a rigid attitude. As a result, this economic organization was elapsed into the political conflicts. After that, some want to save the whole industry by monopoly. Indeed, this kind of idea has some effects on the industrial development. Two dominate stevedoring companies achieved a reward to control the waterfront and the MAU became