Susan Milner

University of Bath | UB · Department of Politics, Languages and International Studies

In 2011, the UK government recognized the lack of corporate board diversity as an economic and social problem. This led to the establishment of a high-level review process that set a voluntary target of 25% female board members in FTSE 100 companies by 2015. A second review process set the target of 33% by the end of 2020. Although the 33% target w...

Using data from the Labour Research Department's Payline bank of collective agreements, and drawing on case studies of the (male-dominated) rail transport and (female-dominated) food retail sectors, this article analyses agreement on enhanced work–family benefits, focusing on maternity and paternity leave and pay, and Shared Parental Leave (SPL) an...

The gender pay gap in France has proved particularly persistent, whereas it has narrowed in many other European countries over the last decade. The intractability of gender pay inequality and wider workplace disparities raises questions about the efficacy of collective bargaining as a policy solution, since it has been the major tool for government...

This article uses Acker’s concept of inequality regimes to analyze qualitative research findings on work-life balance and gender equality for women in British television production. Female survey respondents, focus group participants, and interviewees spoke of their subjective experience of gendered work practices which disadvantage women as women....

This article sets out to explain why mandatory gender pay gap reporting regulations were introduced in 2016, whereas the two main parties had previously opposed state regulation. Observing the rise in the number of female MPs, it argues that the rise in descriptive representation has enabled substantive representation, but that this does not necess...

‘Bargained equality’ reflects wider characteristics of French employment relations whereby state‐driven collective bargaining is a major mode of regulation but is based on weak workplace bargaining cultures outside the largest firms. This article focuses on duties on French employers to bargain on gender equality. It presents findings of a project...

This chapter illustrates father–child interactions in early childhood development, which has been the subject of intense policy interest over the past two decades, but where the challenges for researchers are heightened by the difficulties of eliciting views from very small children. Father involvement in children's social and educational developme...

Introduction The idea that children are expert informants on family life is now widely accepted within the policy and academic communities, alongside recognition of their rights (Christensen, 2004; Buckingham and De Block, 2007), but eliciting participation from young children in particular poses particular challenges (Prout and James, 1997). Resea...

This article provides a critical overview of labour and employment policy during the Hollande presidency, evaluating the extent of continuity and change between 2012 and 2017. Although the term of office may be divided into three broad phases, with a shift towards more liberalising, business-friendly policies over time, it is argued that the period...

Although existing notions of reflexivity address the positionality of researchers, they rarely consider the processes through which methods and methodologies can come about. This study builds children’s reflexivity into the research design. Drawing on footage from a pilot visual ethnography of paternal engagement in home environments, we show first...

This paper analyses the impact of a UK local authority initiative – Fathers’ Friday – aiming to involve fathers in their children’s education, which took place in 20 early years’ and primary school settings. Whilst the study involved a range of methods, in this paper interview data associated with practitioners’ perspectives of the initiative are u...

This article reviews policy debates and output on employment rights for fathers in France, focusing on paternity leave and the debates leading to reform of leave in 2014. Since the extension of paternity leave to 10 days in 2002, take-up has increased but a minority of fathers, particularly those in managerial positions, find it difficult to access...

The diversity of European responses to unemployment has increased since 2008. On the basis of an analysis of French labour market and employment policies since 2008, with a particular focus on the policy output under the Hollande presidency since 2012, this article argues that France has maintained a distinctive mix of labour market policies. Altho...

Collective bargaining is widely advocated as one means of addressing continued gender pay disparities. However, since collective bargaining has been weakened as a mode of employment regulation, its efficacy relative to statutory regulation is a matter of debate. This article examines the relationship between collective bargaining and the law and th...

Purpose – The purpose of this editorial is to provide an overview of the wider debates concerning the evolution of work‐life balance practice and policy since the onset of the “Great Recession” of 2008 and to draw out some comparisons of the issues raised by the papers in the special issue by focusing particularly on the example of the UK. Design/...

Union density in France has fallen to exceptionally low levels, yet unions are able to mobilise millions of supporters against government austerity measures. Some authors therefore argue that the union revitalisation literature overemphasises density over other power resources. The article first confirms the decline of density and the scale of the...

The flexicurity approach to labour market policy may offer advantages for trade unions but also poses challenges, given their weak situation in policy formulation at EU level and in many member states. This article explores unions’ capacity to mobilize around flexicurity issues and to influence policy debates and outcomes in two member states. In t...

Taking as its starting point the programme and campaign of Nicolas Sarkozy in the presidential election of 2007 around the ‘value of work’, this article reviews and assesses the main reforms undertaken during the period of his presidency. It focuses on the reform of working time regulationsg through tax exoneration for overtime hours, minimum incom...

This article reviews the way that fatherhood is constructed in the public discourse and more broadly in the public sphere in the UK and France by examining (1) the fatherhood regime and its influence on the construction of fatherhood in the two countries; (2) gender attitudes and parenting roles; and (3) popular images of fatherhood, particularly a...

Industrial unrest is back on the political agenda. Susan Milner examines the re-emergence of strike action in the UK. After two relatively quiet decades, industrial unrest is back on the political agenda. In light of recent strikes – and with the prospect of more to come –Susan Milner examines the re-emergence of industrial action in the UK.

Purpose – This paper focuses on the role of organizations in mediating the impact of national work-life balance (WLB) policy on employees, in particular fathers. Design/methodology/approach – It presents existing research about WLB policy implementation in organizations as well as the findings of empirical work in insurance and social work in Franc...

This article examines recent parental leave initiatives in France and the UK within the context of broader debates about family policy. Specifically, it analyses the 2006 Work and Families Act and changes to the Complément de Libre Choix d'Activité. It argues that the discourse of parental choice in both countries is deployed to open up the space f...

The mixed empirical findings to date have indicated that some, but not all, unions in industrialized countries are actively involved in campaigning and bargaining around work-life balance (WLB) issues, as part of a modernization agenda linked to feminization and to 'positive flexibility'. This article seeks to identify factors that might encourage...

Work–life balance has come to the forefront of policy discourse in developed countries in recent years, against a backdrop of globalization and rapid technological change, an ageing population and concerns over labour market participation rates, particularly those of mothers at a time when fertility rates are falling (Organization for Economic Co-o...

This paper contrasts and compares the institutional framework for fatherhood and father involvement and the survey evidence relating to fathers’ contribution to childcare and domestic work in the two countries. It shows that while men’s contribution to such activities appears to be increasing in both France and the UK, change is slow and father inv...

The article critically examines the plan for the employment of older workers, presented by the French government in 2006, within the context of domestic policy reform and current shifts in the relationship between state, business and labour. It assesses the extent to which the plan represents a paradigmatic shift in the French life-course regime or...

A partir d’une enquete par questionnaires et entretiens realisee dans des entreprises d’assurances et des services de travail social en France et en Grande-Bretagne, les auteures analysent la mise en oeuvre des politiques de conciliation entre vie familiale et vie professionnelle. Dans les deux pays, cette politique se traduit par une flexibilite a...

This article reviews the position of the main French left groupings in relation to European integration since the early 1990s. The views of the more pro-European Socialist Party (Parti Socialiste) are contrasted with those of the Mouvement des Citoyens and the far left. The radical left view is anti-elitist and critical of the lack of direct citize...

Public policy and the involvement of fathers. An Anglo-French comparison. In a context of profound socio-economic changes, the construction of new forms of fatherhood is on the agenda in France and in Great Britain. The authors examine public policy on fathers and data for the family practices of fathers in both countries. A similarity is observed...

The changes described in this book point to a country undergoing large-scale transition, but at the same time attempting to preserve traditional ways of doing things: in other words, a reinvention of French society and politics which implies adaptation of existing institutions and modes of behaviour to a changed external environment. How far this r...

This article, in reviewing of one the major policies of the Jospin government, lays emphasis on the relative ambiguities of the reforms and legislation put forward to reduce working time in France to a 35-hour week. The article examines the effects of the policy on the range of actors involved, including the unions and the employers, as well as sit...

This article examines the extent to which employment, particularly manufacturing employment, has been 'hollowed out' as a result of internationalisation strategies of leading French multinationals. It finds evidence of a shift to overseas employment, but notes the complexity of globalising trends which make it difficult to interpret them solely in...

This article seeks to explain the marked downturn in French public support for the European Union in the early 1990s. Although public support has increased since 1997, voting for Eurosceptic parties has remained important although such parties continue to be marginalized in national elections. The article discusses party‐based Euroscepticism in the...

This article seeks to provide a framework for the following articles in this issue which analyze national case studies of Euroscepticism (in Britain, France, Germany and the Nordic region). It draws on existing analysis of European public opinion surveys in order to identify trends and suggest some explanations for fluctuations in support for Europ...

The place of trade unions within the national power structures — specifically, the relationship between the unions and the state — has been at the heart of activity and policy since labour organization was permitted in 1884. By legalizing union activity (albeit within strict limits) the republican government sought to channel working-class protest...

European integration poses dilemmas of governance for EU member‐state governments. Specifically, how are national leaders to manage the interface between ‘Europe’ as cause of change, catalyst for reform, and scapegoat for dissent? Some answers can be found in France, where Lionel Jospin's government has embarked on a radical process of reconstructi...

In his last New Year’s message to the nation, President Mitterrand called for a ‘new social contract’ to combat unemployment: rather late in the day, one might think, and something of an acknowledgement of the failure of the Mitterrand presidency to create the conditions for meaningful social dialogue in a country so proud of its ‘social model’. In...

This article compares two areas, Sesto San Giovanni near Milan and V6nissieux near Lyon, which until recently were characterized by a working-class culture and a communist identity, which in turn stemmed from a concentration of large-scale heavy industry and the presence of powerful trade unions. Both areas have gone through a process of severe de-...

Despite an abundance of literature on the Second International relatively little is known about the work of the International Secretariat of National Trade Union Centres (ISNTUC). Foundect in 1901 by the German and Scandinavian labour leaders, this exclusively trade union International (the forerunner of the post-war International Federation of Tra...

This paper discusses two pieces of legislation within the context of regulatory trends in the EU and in EU member states: the Working Time Directive and the Directive on Part-Time Work. These pieces of legislation represent different regulatory approaches corresponding to the SEA and the Maastricht Treaty. They will be examined with particular refe...

Thesis (Ph.D.)