Stages and Strategies of Collective Bargaining

The ILO Right to Organize and Collective Bargaining Convention (No. 98), 1949 describes collective bargaining as:

"Voluntary negotiation between employers or employers' organizations and workers organizations, with a view to the regulation of terms and conditions of employment by collective agreements."

Collective bargaining could also be defined as negotiations relating to terms of employment and conditions of work between an employer, a group of employers or an employers' organization on the one hand, and representative workers' organizations on the other, with a view to reaching agreement.

There are several essential features of collective bargaining, all of which cannot be reflected in a single definition or description of the process:

• It is not equivalent to collective agreements because collective bargaining refers to the process or means, and collective agreements to the possible result, of bargaining.
Collective bargaining may not always lead to a collective agreement.
• It is a method used by trade unions to improve the terms and conditions of employment of their members.
• It seeks to restore the unequal bargaining position between employer and employee.
• Where it leads to an agreement, it modifies, rather than replaces, the individual contract of employment, because it does not create the employer-employee relationship.
• The process is bipartite, but in some developing countries the State plays a role in the form of a conciliator where disagreements occur, or where collective bargaining impinges on government policy.
Stages of Collective Bargaining
Collective bargaining is a dispute redressal mechanism where workers and employers engage in a series of negotiations, and diplomatic and political maneuvers, to effect a collective agreement to resolve the dispute. The scope of the agreement usually relates to terms and conditions of employment, and clarification on rights and responsibilities of workers.
The International Labor