The State of Industrial Relations
Source: The Evatt Foundation
(This is from the introduction to the bnook, which is available in the library)
"The words that open this collection by Sidney and Beatrice Webb are suggestive of the context within which the work has been produced in several ways. In the first place, the Webbs remind us that the origins of the recent political struggle over the direction of the nation's industrial relations are very old. Although the debate was pursued in many terms, seen in the long view, at its heart, WorkChoices was another round in the age-old bid by employers to privilege individual over collective bargaining. What people usually mean by 'freedom of choice' in such contexts, the Webbs pointed out in 1894, 'is freedom of opportunity to use the power that they happen to possess; that is, to compel other less powerful people to accept their terms.' As they concluded, 'this sort of personal freedom in a community composed of unequal units is not distinguishable from compulsion.'"