Did trade unions reinforce the neoliberal transformation? The Dutch case

Union responses to the liberalization of the political economy are often portrayed as either beating the same drum for decades or retreating into the defence of an increasingly small group of core workers. This article argues otherwise. A longitudinal ideational analysis of collective bargaining documents issued between 1976 and 2021 by the Netherlands Trade Union Confederation (FNV) shows that the Federation has gradually adapted its Keynesian-inspired interests to a more market-oriented understanding of the labor market, wages, and employment, legitimized by Third Way ideology in the 1990s.... Mehr ...