The results of France's 2002 works council elections were published in January 2005. The turn-out among employees had fallen since 1998 but remained relatively high. Over a 10-year period, some trade unions’ share of the vote has not significantly changed, while others have made significant advances.
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The results of France's 2002 works council elections were published in January 2005. The turn-out among employees had fallen since 1998 but remained relatively high. Over a 10-year period, some trade unions’ share of the vote has not significantly changed, while others have made significant advances.
In January 2005, the Ministry of Labour published the results of the elections of employee representatives on works councils (FR0309102T) held in 2002 (Premières Information s, DARES, January 2005, n°03.2). These elections are held on a continuous basis and the Ministry collects and processes the results annually. Since the elections are held every two years, a full electoral cycle can be analysed by looking at the results of odd or even years together. The 2002 results should thus be compared with those in 2000.
The Ministry’s analysis
By comparing the results from 2002 with those from 2000, the Ministry has identified: a rise in turn-out, from 63.7% to 64.7% and stability in the share of the vote going to non-union candidates. While in 2000, the Ministry observed a drop in turn-out and loss of votes for non-union candidates (FR0309102T), the latest figures herald a return to a long-term trend.
It should be noted that the 2002 results derive from a change in the electorate, in quantitative terms at least. The number of registered voters increased by 4.42% between 2000 and 2002, and by 3.27% between 1998 and 2002. It is impossible to find out whether this increase stems from more effective data-collection or the wider spread of works councils. It is likely that the number of works councils has influenced the distribution of votes, even or especially after statistical adjustment, and indeed, in 2002, the figures for the Ile-de-France, Haute-Normandie and Basse-Normandie regions were adjusted to circumvent the problem of ineffective data-collection. Almost 28% of registered voters were concentrated in these three areas.
In the Ile-de-France region, turnout rose from 57.6% to 59.9% and the number of registered voters from 671,798 to 694,639, between 2000 and 2002. This region alone, once 'adjusted', thus accounted for an extra 29,000 of the 110,421 new voters in 2002. In Ile-de-France, non-union candidates got a lower share of the vote than elsewhere in the country (18.9% as opposed to 21.7%). It is therefore possible that the discrepancies between 1998 and 2000 and then between 2000 and 2002 were due to data-collection issues.
A different picture of the latest results can thus be obtained from analysing the 1998-2002 period - see table 1 below. The number of registered voters indeed increased less noticeably (by 3.3%) and the turnout fell from 65.7% to 64.7%. The number of votes cast did rise (by 1.7%), but significantly less than the number of voters. Non-union candidates witnessed a continuing decline their share of the vote, but the decrease was less steep than that between successive elections.
| . | Change (1998 = 100) | ||||
| . | 1998 | 2000 | 2002 | 1998/2000 | 1998/2002 |
| Voters registered | 2,892,664 | 2,860,754 | 2,987,204 | 98.9 | 103.3 |
| Votes cast | 1,900,480 | 1,822,300 | 1,932,721 | 95.9 | 101.7 |
| Turn-out | 65.7% | 63.4% | 64.7% | 96.5 | 98.5 |
| Votes cast by union | |||||
| CGT | 461,817 | 444,641 | 469,651 | 96.3 | 101.7 |
| CFDT | 412,404 | 417,307 | 427,131 | 101.2 | 103.6 |
| CGT-FO | 229,958 | 225,965 | 239,657 | 98.3 | 104.2 |
| CFE-CGC | 110,228 | 103,871 | 108,232 | 94.2 | 98.2 |
| CFTC | 93,124 | 96,582 | 106,300 | 103.7 | 114.2 |
| Other unions | 133,034 | 134,850 | 162,349 | 101.4 | 122.0 |
| Non-union | 458,016 | 399,084 | 419,400 | 87.1 | 91.6 |
Source : DARES, author’s calculations (IRES).
Over the 10-year period from 1992 to 2002, non-union candidates clearly lost ground in terms of share of the vote - see table 2 below. As for the trade unions, with the General Confederation of Labour (Confédération générale du travail, CGT) continuously leading the pack with its stable vote, there was little significant change for the Confederation of Professional and Managerial Staff-General Confederation of Professional and Managerial Staff (Confédération française de l’encadrement - confédération générale des cadres, CFE-CGC) (slightly down) and the General Confederation of Labour-Force ouvrière (Confédération générale du travail-Force ouvrière, CGT-FO) (slightly up). However, there were major gains for the French Democratic Confederation of Labour (Confédération française démocratique du travail, CFDT), and especially the French Christian Workers’ Confederation (Confédération française des travailleurs chrétiens, CFTC) and 'other' unions. The latter group’s sizeable increase in share of the vote is partly due to the emergence of new coalitions - the National Federation of Independent Unions (Union nationale des syndicats autonomes, UNSA), the Group of 10 (Groupe des dix) and Solidarity, Unity, Democracy (Solidaire, Unitaire, Démocratique, SUD).
| . | % of votes cast in | Change 1998/2002 (1998 = 100) | ||
| . | 1992 | 1998 | 2002 | |
| Non union | 26.4 | 24.1 | 21.7 | 91.6 |
| Total union | 73.6 | 75.9 | 78.6 | 105.0 |
| Of which: | . | . | . | . |
| CGT | 24.3 | 24.3 | 24.3 | 101.5 |
| CFDT | 20.3 | 21.7 | 22.1 | 103.3 |
| CGT-FO | 12.2 | 12.1 | 12.4 | 104.1 |
| CFE-CGC | 5.8 | 5.8 | 5.6 | 98.2 |
| CFTC | 4.3 | 4.9 | 5.5 | 115.0 |
| Other unions | 6.7 | 7.0 | 8.4 | 122.5 |
Source : DARES. author’s calculations (IRES).
Commentary
Long-term stability in voting patterns overrides short-term fluctuations. Statistical uncertainty should also urge prudence. Current research appears to show that the losses suffered by the non-union candidates have not really benefited the union ones. Works councils whose non-union representatives lose support frequently close down and very rarely become unionised councils. However, union slates manage to gain votes in workplaces where they are already present, to the detriment of non-union slates. Extra votes have not actually led to more works councils being set up. The Ministry of Labour’s report unfortunately does not allow an assessment of either the number of elections nor of changes to this number.
These results are from the elections held in 2002, some of which took place after the presidential election in which a strong position enjoyed by the far right was demonstrated. We will have to wait for the results from 2003, and more importantly those of 2004, to ascertain the impact that pension reforms (FR0309103F) that deeply split the unions in spring 2003 have had on voting patterns. (Christian Dufour, IRES)
Eurofound recommends citing this publication in the following way.
Eurofound (2005), 2002 works council election results published, article.
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