Description:
This book provides a blunt assessment of EU enlargement eastwards, based on fifteen years of fieldwork research across Central and Eastern Europe, through a focus on the hitherto neglected social and employment problems at three levels: the largely failed implementation of EU social regulations; social dumping and relocation threats operated by multinational companies; and migration flows resulting in increased worker vulnerability. This is the first critical book on EU enlargement from a social sciences perspective. Unlike existing books on EU enlargement, this volume considers geopolitical and institutional aspects and assesses the link between EU, national and company levels.
Review Quotes:
'Meardi has written a truly informative book about European integration. Based on fifteen years of research and a deep knowledge of Central and Eastern European countries, he covers such issues as human resource management in multinationals, the revitalization of unions, the causes and effects of labor migration. He succeeds in demolishing the illusion that Europe has liberalized its economy while protecting its societies, without succumbing to reactionary Euro-skepticism. Students and researchers alike will benefit from this book.' - Ian Greer, Leeds University
'The volume presents a profound, fairly detailed and concise, up dated, so far non-existing overview of heterogeneous dimensions of EU enlargement - and its fundamental social failures. It constitutes the ideal companion of the few available introductory textbooks dealing mainly with industrial and/or employment relations in the old EU member states. It has to be highly recommended for all practitioners as well as scholars who are interested in European integration in general and its consequences for industrial relations in particular.' - Berndt Keller, University of Konstanz, Germany
'In this excellent book, Guglielmo Meardi offers a compelling analysis of the social failures of the EU enlargement to the East. He argues that EU enlargement did not establish a capitalist paradise despite the betrayal of labor's expectations. The exodus of eastern workers to the west, the rise of political populism, the low organizational loyalty of eastern workers towards their new masters, and occasional local, national, and transnational trade union action has forced governments and multinationals corporations to temper their neoliberal policies towards labor.' - Roland Erne, University College Dublin
'Meardi has written a compelling book that deserves wide attention. It is well grounded in case studies and an extensive knowledge of industrial relations in the new member states of the EU. But it also makes a powerful argument that the consequences of labor's limited voice in these societies extends well beyond the confines of the workplace, and also impacts labor migration, social policy, as well as the quality of capitalism and democracy in the region, in indeed throughout the European Union. Anyone interested in these issues would do well to read this book.' - Stephen Crowely, Oberlin College, USA
'An excellent book that addresses critically and engagingly many of the preconceptions surrounding the eastern enlargement of the European Union.' - Dorothee Bohle, Central European University, Hungary
'Imaginative and plausible analysis of exactly what enlargement means for 'social Europe'... this immensely stimulating book deserves wide readership.' - Michael Gold, Royal Holloway University of London