Susan Milner's flexicurity in France presentation, 28th May 2015.

1. Flexicurity à la française?
Navigating labour market policy
in difficult times
Susan Milner
University of Bath
Sheffield Business School, UACES
workshop, 28 May 2015

2. Flexicurity in the French context
• A ‘spent’ concept? Divisive; weak credibility
after 2008
• High salience
• (Apparent) congruence with twin processes of
employer-led national-level bargaining
(Refondation sociale) and state-driven
‘modernisation of social dialogue’)
• Problem of articulation between levels of
dialogue/bargaining

3. Version I: the Sarkozy initiative
• 2008 law (based on social partner agreement) set
the parameters (actor positioning): consensus on
portability of employment-based rights (‘making
employment secure’)
• But failed to reset the policy direction
• Path dependency: incrementalism (new form of
‘probation’ contract rather than reform of
existing contracts) and lowest common
denominator trade-offs
• 2010 follow-up (tripartite fund): state
disinvestment caused distrust

4. Version II: the
Socialist relaunch of social summitry
• 11 January 2013 agreement:
portability of accrued
occupational benefits; state
support for retraining
measures; higher taxes on very
short contracts; monitoring of
redundancy shifted from
public authorities to
bargaining
BUT CGT and FO did not sign

5. 2013 law (LSE): (limited) experiments
in local flexicurity
• Agreement toned down on redundancies; but
internal mobility clauses retained (no bargaining
follow-up identified)
• Portability of health cover currently subject to
sectoral & local bargaining; legislation will force
employers to provide cover by January 2016
• Unemployment insurance coverage extended
(mostly) for those in short-term employment
• Social security coverage for part-time workers:
limited impact on bargaining (fast food, cleaning)
• ‘Database’ for union reps (BDES): little impact

6. 2013 law: personal training accounts
• ‘the major social achievement of the Hollande
presidency’?
• an individual (portable) right: 150 hours in
total
• levy-funded (0.2% of wage bill)
• in force since January 2015 but so far no
takers…

7. Main innovation = ‘competitiveness
agreements’
• ‘Employment maintenance contracts’: 10
agreements registered by March 2015
(automotive, engineering, IT), smaller companies
(100-200), all unions have signed at least one
• ‘Competitiveness pacts’: 21 agreements
(automotive, air transport, metals, shipbuilding,
maintenance), larger companies, all unions have
signed
• Short-time working: little effect, numbers stable
2013-14, mainly manufacturing, more SMEs

8. Version III (current): a scattergun
(state-led) approach?
• Unfinished business: reforming information,
consultation and dialogue mechanisms (June
2015)
• Macron law: picking up earlier
‘competitiveness’ agenda
• National-level tensions (CGT, FO esp.)
• Political tensions still around employment
contracts

9. Overall assessment
• Messy process of adjustment: union demands
taken forward (logic of portability of rights, or
rights-based employability) but subject to
procedural ‘drag’
• Path dependency
• Failure of trust-building and consensus-building
• Heavy contingency (economic and political)
rather than political agency or policy design
• Lack of articulation between levels still a
structural constraint (little impetus for sectoral or
local bargaining)