Sociálne partnerstvo v Českej a Slovenskej republike
Social Partnership in the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic

Summary/Abstract: Social Partnership In The Czech Republic And The Slovak Republic. This paper analyses the development of relationships and institutions of social partnership in transformation of the social sphere in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. It is based on semi-standard interviews with participants in the social partnership: the representatives of employers' associations, the trade unions and government bodies, and also on the analysis of respective documents. In the post-communist Czechoslovakia social partnership emerged in the context of the social structure homogenized by the socialist experiment and with the aim of revitalizing social structure and a democratic system, to revive the economy and simultaneously to preserve social peace. The cumulation of these aims reflects the systems change and makes it possible simultaneously. Social partnership was institutionalized in both the countries at the macro-level (the tripartite), at the mezzo-level (the sphere of economic branches and regions) and at the micro-level (a firm). While at the micro-level the social partnership still keeps developing in both countries similarly (collective contracts and collective bargaining in the firms), we can already observe a difference at the mezzo-level and macro-level. While the functions of the tripartite in Slovakia - in comparison with the federal model, did not change substantially (responsibilities in the sphere of economy, social affairs and employment), in the Czech Republic they were reduced by a new statute. These differences seem to result of the fact that the development of social partnership is not independent of the government in these countries: in the Czech Republic a coalition of liberal and conservative parties won the elections, in Slovakia the elections were won by the parties in the center or on the left from the center. The neo-liberal politics, typified by a certain distrust of the mediatory role of institutions of civil society, including the tripartite, has prevailed in the Czech Republic. More social-democratic approach with the rising elements of neocorporatism prevailed in Slovakia.

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