* Update 14.10.2015

In the 14th of October 2015, CONECT Association has launched the final findings of the research on the state of social dialogue in Romania. Please see below the final legal and sociological overview.

Launching of the preliminary findings of the research on the state of social dialogue in Romania

Since December 2014, ADO SAH ROM has been undertaking a legal and sociological research on the state of bipartite and tripartite social dialogue in Romania, aiming to make empirically-grounded recommendations regarding the modification of the existing legal and institutional frameworks. The main goal of this research was to assess the impact of the major legislative changes adopted in 2011, while accounting for the effects of the economic crisis and distinguishing between newer and older, historical problems of social dialogue in Romania. Preliminary conclusions of the sociological research—based on in-depth interviews with various social dialogue stakeholders, together with the latest official statistics and a wide array of secondary sources of data—were presented in front of an audience of trade unions’ and employers’ associations’ representatives on June 4th. The final report is due at the beginning of September.

The legal research has aimed to analyze the influences of legislative changes in 2011 on social dialogue, especially on the bipartite social dialogue. A first analysis generates the idea of an imbalance produced in exerting the right of trade union freedom, the restraints brought largely depriving it of content. We have taken into consideration the restrictions imposed by the Romanian state in setting-up a trade union organization, the significant alteration of the right of collective bargaining through: excessive demands for representation, the disappearance of the collective labor agreement at national level, or by removing the real effects of a collective agreement at sectoral level and by constraining the possibility of initiating collective disputes, including strikes.

The findings attempt to clarify the obstacles created by the legislator and to outline the solutions that social partners have at their disposal in order to ensure a climate of stability in labor relations by means of social dialogue.

The research has also focused on the manner by which European rights have been transposed and especially on the role played by the social partners in observing them. The study reveals that there are situations in which even the trade unions have ignored these fundamental rights; for instance the maximum allowed working time in a week, or the fact that some categories of employees have no mandatory protection in the event of insolvency of the employer or that there are legal rules which tend to exclude those who work illegally from the area of labor law and trade union protection.

The sociological research has identified that the major cause of the dysfunctional overall state of social dialogue in Romania at present is stakeholders’ weakness – both internally and in the relation with their dialogue partners —, which means that essential prerequisites for social dialogue to function are lacking. With weak trade unions and weak employers’ associations, there are few incentives and plenty of disincentives for both employees and employers to organize and for the government to approach trade unions and employers’ associations as genuine dialogue partners. Tripartite social dialogue is almost purely formal and rarely provides a real contribution to governmental decisions; it mostly plays an ornamental role in justifying decisions that the government takes unilaterally. After 2011, bipartite collective bargaining has become radically decentralized, especially in the private sector. The number of sectoral and multi-employer collective agreements has dropped dramatically in recent years, due to new legal restrictions, widespread hostility of employers and inability of trade unions to constitute themselves as threatening to both employers and government. After suffering a severe blow in 2010/2011, company-level collective bargaining has been recovering since 2012, though not in the public sector, where bargaining remains severely restricted. Given the worsening situation of employees on the labor market and the radical decentralization of collective bargaining, company-level collective bargaining became much more difficult after the onset of the crisis and the change of legislation.

The recommendations emerging from this research emphasize the importance of strengthening trade unions and employers’ organizations. They include measures meant to render tripartite social dialogue more transparent and democratic, removing restrictions to sectoral and multi-employer agreements and lowering thresholds for union organization at the company level in order to allow for unionization in the private sector. An important conclusion of this research, however, is that any such changes to the existing legal framework will fail to yield any medium and long-term effects in the absence of substantial reassessments and changes in strategy on the part of stakeholders themselves and especially on the part of trade unions.

For more details, see the preliminary conclusions of the research, attached below.

For more details, please contact us at: adosahrom@starnets.ro.

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1 Legal and sociological research - final findings 575 KB descarca
2 Legal and sociological research - preliminary findings 496 KB descarca