Project: New diversity

The project was funded by the Hans Böckler Foundation and ran from October 2008 to December 2010.

Project management: Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schroeder

Project management: Samuel Greef, Viktoria Kalass

For some years now, professional trade unions have been attracting increasing public attention: small but powerful associations that organize professional groups such as train drivers, doctors or pilots are terminating their cooperation with the large trade unions of the DGB and are putting considerable pressure on employers and others with their strikes. The phenomenon affects the German trade union model as a whole.

Insufficient knowledge about professional or sectoral trade unions, but above all the attention that the issue of collective bargaining unity and trade union competition is attracting in the politically interested public and especially among lawyers, suggests that this topic should be taken up in an independent research project. This study deals with the phenomenon of the transformation of professional associations into independent collective bargaining organizations and questions its conditions and causes. In this sense, the study is intended as a fundamental contribution to the question: What are the essential elements of the transformation of the German trade union model and what are the consequences for its functioning and performance?

In order to understand and explain the causes and consequences of collective bargaining overbidding competition by professional trade unions, a detailed, empirical look at the underlying conditions and actors of transformations that have already taken place is essential. The following questions guide the findings of this study:

1. What is the phenomenon of the integration crisis? How does this phenomenon fit into the crisis symptoms of the German trade union model?
2. What are the causes of the double integration crisis? What is the basis for the new offensiveness of the professional associations, which are now acting as trade union actors?
3. What effects does the integration crisis have on the German model of industrial relations? Is it a partial, temporary or permanent challenge to the German trade union model? What does this phenomenon mean for the future of the German model?

Four organizations were included in the study: the Marburger Bund, Verband der angestellten und Beamteten Ärztinnen und Ärzte Deutschlands (MB), the Verein Deutscher Ingenieure (VDI), the Gewerkschaft Deutscher Lokomotivführer (GDL) and the Verband angestellter Akademiker und leitender Angestellter der Chemischen Industrie (VAA).
The qualitative investigation of the individual cases is based on a wide range of empirical data, material and approaches to the associations. In addition to secondary literature and written association sources and materials, the study is based on qualitative interviews conducted by the authors with representatives of both the four organizations studied and other associations and trade unions, as well as with experts in the immediate environment of the selected case studies at various organizational levels. In addition, a wide range of data on the development of the profession and industry was used.

• The outbidding competition by professional trade unions is an expression of a double integration crisis: Integration deficits of the sectoral trade unions in relation to individual occupational groups (highly qualified workers). Integration crisis of the German model in relation to the professional associations that were previously integrated via the DAG.
• The transformation of professional associations into trade unions is a preconditional phenomenon. It requires a specific opportunity structure (environmental change in the industry, profession, working conditions and the behavior of the established players). In order to take advantage of this opportunity, however, an association must also have resources at its disposal and be able to mobilize them.
• The preconditional nature of the transformation suggests that the phenomenon will only spread to a limited extent at best and not to a comprehensive erosion of the entire system.
• The double integration crisis nevertheless requires solution strategies on two levels: development of new cooperation models in the case of competition between trade unions. New integration approaches to accommodate differentiated interests in order to counteract further splintering.