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Two discursive frameworks concerning ideology in Australian industrial relations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2023

Simon Fry  and
Bernard Mees
Simon Fry*
Affiliation:
RMIT University, Australia
Bernard Mees
Affiliation:
RMIT University, Australia
*
Simon Fry, School of Management, RMIT University, GPO Box 2476, Melbourne, Victoria 3001, Australia. Email: simon.fry@rmit.edu.au
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Abstract

There are two discursive frameworks concerning ideology in Australian industrial relations. In many disciplines concerned with aspects of industrial relations, including political science, law and history, it is the traditional political ideologies of the industrial era which take centre stage: liberalism (classical, social and neoliberalism), socialism (Marxism, social democracy and labourism) and conservatism. By contrast, ideological issues in the discipline of employment relations are chiefly addressed in terms of Fox’s three analytical perspectives: unitarism, pluralism and radicalism. The disjunction between these parallel discourses goes largely unnoted in the literature of the relevant disciplines, which all tend to proceed using their own preferred approach without making reference to the other. This article critically explores the relationship between these two discourses and investigates the broader implications that the existence of the two different discursive traditions has for the analysis of industrial relations phenomena in Australia.

Keywords

J59Ideologyindustrial relationsliberalismpluralismsocialismunitarism
Type
Articles
Information
The Economic and Labour Relations Review , Volume 28 , Issue 4: Financialisation, construction work and inequality , December 2017 , pp. 483 - 499
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2017

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