독일 작업장평의회의 주요 특징과 최근 변화에 대한 연구 고찰

This paper contains critical reviews on recent German works councils studies in the aspects of historical, theoretical and empirical trends. The purpose of this paper is to rethink the academic value of German works councils study, and to suggest implications for Korean labor-management committees both practitioners and scholars. For this purpose, there are four issues covered in the paper. Firstly, it provides several implications for Korean labor-management committees, focusing on the concept, historical development and recent features of German works councils. Secondly, it reviews recent research trends in German works councils studies in the aspect of theoretical perspectives. In theoretical views on German works councils there are four perspectives existed, such as ‘Industrial Democracy’, ‘Employee Participation’, ‘NER: Nonunion Employee Representation’ and ‘Mutual Gains’. Thirdly, in empirical aspects, there are also negative as well positive arguments debated. Especially negative opinions and results mainly come from mainstream economists, on the other hands, positive opinions and results come from most of sociologists, management and IR scholars. However, positive views are more dominant in the quantitative study area. Finally, it identifies and evaluates the critical issues on recent German works councils, it includes such as it’s stability debates after the German unification and recent global/EU financial crisis.