The Social Dimension of the European Economy

Abstract

Discussion of the ‘Social Dimension’ (Commission, 1988a; Venturini, 1989) has come as a late addition to the Community project of a ‘Single European Market’ in 1992 (on ‘1992’ see Bieber et al. 1988). As the concept is used in the political debate, it refers by and large to what is commonly called ‘social policy’, the definition and regulation of the institutional status of organised labour in the political economy, as well as substantive policies concerning the protection and reproduction of labour as a production factor and a social category. In both respects the focus is on political intervention, for the benefit of labour, in two spheres: the operation of (labour) markets on the one hand, and the exercise of hierarchical authority inside private firms on the other.

Paper originally prepared for the 1989 Meeting of the Andrew Shonfield Association, Florence, 14–15 September. Much of the inspiration for this paper goes back to a conference organised by the Berkeley Roundtable on the International E,conomy in January 1989. The author is obliged to Mohammed Bamyem for research assistance