This book explores the changing role of trade unions as products of, and agents for, democracy. Despite conventionally being portrayed as politically marginalised and in terminal decline, trade unions continue to represent a significant component of society within most industrialised countries and have demonstrated a capacity for revival and renewal in the face of difficult corcumstances.
It brings together a distinguished panel of leading and emerging scholars in the field, and provides a critical assessment of the current role of trade unions in society, their capacity to impact on state policies in such a manner as to ensure greater accountability and fairness, and the nature and extent of internal representative democracy within the labour movement.
This volume will be of interest to students and academics in industrial relations, critical management studies, political studies and sociology.

Mark Harcourt is Associate Professor in the Department of Strategic Management at Waikato University in New Zealand. Geoffrey Wood is Professor of Comparative Human Resource Management at Middlesex University Business School, and Overseas Associate of the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa