Czech public sector industrial relations in the aftermath of the crisis: keeping the status quo as a successful strategy to protect working conditions
Abstract
In this chapter, we investigate the impact of industrial relations and social dialogue on working conditions and the quality of employment, and subsequently, on the quality of services provided in the public sector in Czechia. The chapter focuses on the three subsectors of the public sector, namely healthcare, with a focus on hospitals, education, with a focus on primary schools, and municipalities, with a focus on pre-primary school education.
We have devoted special attention to the crisis measures which, despite having a limited impact on employment, have contributed to social partners' mobilisation. Czechia, similarly to Slovakia, has avoided deep reform in the public sector in the aftermath of the economic crisis, and many of the reforms impacting on the quality and quantity of employment had been introduced earlier in the transformation and pre-accession periods.