Third-party interventions in workplace bullying: a neoliberal agenda?

Purpose Bullying is a persistent, damaging feature of neoliberal workplaces, despite the increased use of third-party interventions (TPIs). The purpose of this paper is to investigate how TPIs relate to individualisation of the employment contract, whether TPIs deflect attention away from bullying a...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Employee relations 2019-04, Vol.41 (3), p.506-519
Main Authors: Mawdsley, Hazel, Thirlwall, Alison
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Bullying
Counseling
Disputes
Employees
Employers
Employment
Human resource management
Individualism
Intervention
Labor relations
Labor unions
Legislation
Mediation
Mediators
Neoliberalism
Perceptions
Performance management
Third party
Working conditions
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Purpose Bullying is a persistent, damaging feature of neoliberal workplaces, despite the increased use of third-party interventions (TPIs). The purpose of this paper is to investigate how TPIs relate to individualisation of the employment contract, whether TPIs deflect attention away from bullying and the impact for targets. Design/methodology/approach Data were gathered from focus groups and interviews with members and officials of three large UK trade unions. Findings TPIs individualise bullying allegations and such interventions are further characterised by impotence, injustice and lack of impartiality, serving to deflect bullying claims and exacerbate targets’ suffering. Practical implications Recommendations are made to improve the efficacy of interventions. Originality/value This paper increases the limited research into the efficacy of TPIs and makes a significant contribution to debates on neoliberal individualism.
ISSN:0142-5455
1758-7069
DOI:10.1108/ER-09-2017-0216