Social Harmony and the Small Firm: A Reappraisal

Abstract

Government, academics and the media have, over the past decade, entered fully into the spirit of ‘small business revival’. Many of the contributions to this debate, however, have taken for granted the nature of small firm employment relations. It has frequently been remarked that workers in a small firms behave in ways more compatible with the goals and interests of their employers than employees in large firms. Thus, industrial relations are assumed to be more harmonious. In support of this assertion attention is usually drawn to the relative infrequency of conflict and industrial disputes, and the absence of militant trade unionism as an indication of the small firm workers' greater commitment to the goals of the enterprise and the interests of the employer (Ingham 1970). This paper suggests that such assumptions are unwarranted and provide a potentially misleading starting point for studies of employment relations in small firms. Data from a small number of in-depth interviews with small firm personnel is used to illustrate some of the complex and contradictory processes through which capital-labour relations may be constituted within small enterprises.