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-collar workers (Swedish Confederation of Professional Employees, TCO) and lastly, one for academic professionals (Swedish Confederation of Professional Associations, SACO). Each of these confederations has smaller trade unions organized within them. For example, LO, which is the largest confederation has the Municipal Workers' Union which has about 500,000 members.
Collective bargaining plays a major role in Swedish IR. Bargaining happens at the sector level with minimum terms and then those terms are followed at the local level, which is the final agreement. The state plays very little to no role in the negotiation process. The system is seemed to work very effectively with both sides respecting agreements throughout the length of the agreement. Over the past 15-20 years, centralized collective bargaining has started to emerge. The powers of negotiation over wages and working time have started to be delegated to the local levels. However, trade union confederations and employers still maintain some cross-sector collective agreements on things like insurance and pensions. It can be argued that Swedish collective bargaining is both bipartite and tripartite. This is because though the government has no direct role in the negotiations, the unions are very closely linked to the government and political parties making the government somewhat part of the negotiation process.
Comparison:
When looking at these two countries, France and Sweden, for comparison purposes in determining whether trade union density 'matters' there are a few criteria that should be distinguished and recognized. First, what is density, and is it an appropriate measure with regards to trade unions? Second, what does it mean to be a trade union member in France and Sweden? Thirdly, what structures are set up to benefit or disincentivize those who are trade union members? Lastly, does density play a role in the functionality of the trade union movement within these countries? Hopefully the first two questions will lead to a more substantive understanding of the answer to the third question regarding density.
Density as a Measurement:
Trade union density, for the purpose of this essay, is the ratio of actual members to the potential members (Traxler, 2000). Trade union density is often used an indicator of the strength of either a single trade union or a trade union movement as a whole (Blashke, 2000). There are, however, other ways of judging trade union strength; legal and statutory protections, bargaining power, political power, and mobilizing capabilities (Blashke, 2000). This being said, density is the most readily available and the most common form of measuring trade union strength (Ebbinghause and Visser, 1999). Problems arise with using density as a singular characteristic for trade union strength and effectiveness. Take for example, France, where they have traditionally put little emphasis on recruiting members and therefore have historically had very low membership rates (Goetschy, 1998). Does this necessarily mean that their IR movements and outcomes on the part of unions been ineffective? No, what it does however show is that union membership means highly different things in different contexts within different countries. Density is a factor, but it must be put in relation to other factors within differing countries and that is what will be done from here on out.