Scottish Office: Involving Civil Society in the Work of Parliaments

Involving Civil Society in the Work of Parliaments

Section 3: Social partnership: the wider perspective

3.1 Introduction

In the previous section we discussed examples of the involvement of the social partners in the work of national and regional parliaments elsewhere in Europe. In these examples, the term 'social partners' usually refers to government and both sides of business. However, when 'social partnership' is discussed at international, European and local level, it is frequently given a broader definition that includes the 'third sector'. Increasingly, attention is being drawn to the importance of voluntary groups, community groups, non-governmental organisations and non-profit organisations in contributing to the 'social economy' and in the creation of 'social capital'. In this section of the report, we offer an overview of this broader, more inclusive, understanding of social partnership and draw attention to some examples of social partnerships in Europe which bring together the public, private and third sectors. It will be useful to set out initially the political context within which discussions of broad social partnerships are taking place.

3.2 Political Context

Global level

In 1992, at the Rio Earth Summit, the world's governments signed up to Agenda 21 - the international action plan to promote sustainable development. Rio had significant consequences for participation since in signing Agenda 21, governments were agreeing on the need for consensus-building approaches to sustainable development and on the need to involve different interests and minority groups in the policy process. Section 111 of Agenda 21 is entitled 'Strengthening the role of major groups'. This section begins with the following statement:

Critical to the effective implementation of the objectives, policies and mechanisms agreed to by Governments in all programme areas of Agenda 21 will be the commitment and genuine involvement of all major groups. One of the fundamental prerequisites for the achievement of sustainable development is broad public participation in decision-making.³⁵

Major groups who must be involved in decision making are listed as:

women
children and youth
indigenous people
non-governmental organisations
local authorities
workers and their trade unions
business and industry
the scientific and technological community
farmers

Of particular interest in the context of social partnership is the emphasis placed on the contribution that can be made by organisations that operate on a not-for-profit basis outside of official structures of government. In the preamble to Agenda 21, it is stated that integration of environmental and developmental concerns is necessary to solve the world's major social and environmental problems and that non-governmental bodies must be involved in this process of integration. Chapter 27 states 'Non-governmental organisations play a vital role in the shaping and implementation of participatory democracy'. The input of non-governmental organisations not only helps to create a greater sense ofcommon purpose but is also a major source of expertise and knowledge. Thus the chapter concludes that governments need to develop mechanisms to bring non-governmental organisations and the networks they have set up into the decision-making process.

European level

In addressing issues of poverty, unemployment and social exclusion, the European Union has adopted the strategy of promoting closer collaboration and joint working between different agencies and actors (from the public, private and third sector) and between different levels of government (European, national, regional and local). Article 4 of the new Framework Regulation contains a key innovation with respect to the promotion of social partnership:

1. Community operations shall be such as to complement or contribute to corresponding national operations. They shall be established through close consultations between the Commission, the Member State concerned and the competent authorities and bodies - including, within the framework of each Member State's national rules and current practices, the economic and social partners - designated by the Member State at national, regional, local or other level, with all parties acting as partners in pursuit of a common goal.³⁶

The Economic and Social Committee points out that whilst the wording of this article gives a convenient escape clause to those governments who are loath to include social partners, the thinking behind Article 4 clearly aims at including social and economic partners m EU regional policy. Reporting the results of a questionnaire sent out to social partners throughout Europe ECOSOC states '...at the far end of the spectrum come countries such as the UK which have openly discouraged the involvement of socio-economic organisations (and, in particular, have limited the involvement of trade unions)' .³⁷ In the same document, the UK is critically discussed and the barriers to successful partnership initiatives likely to attract funding from the Structural Fund are identified as:

the lack of involvement of the social partners;
the absence of a regional tier of government;
the existence of a plethora of poorly co-ordinated and overlapping agencies which make it difficult to plan and implement policy effectively;
the exclusion of the public from decision making.

The fill' implementation of Article 4, ECOSOC argues requires:

the political will to implement the article;
an awareness of the general benefits of a consultation process in the framing of development policy;
the existence of a culture of participation and social dialogue;
the allocation of responsibilities and resources at all administrative levels;
the ability to organise participation.

The main arena for a partnership approach in the Structural Funds is the Monitoring Committees which bring together EC, national government, regional and local government and representatives of the social partners. A wide range of programmes and Initiatives such as Poverty 3, LEADER (an initiative for rural development), INTEGRA (an initiative to combat social exclusion), and NOW (an initiative to look at new opportunities for women), have promoted both a local partnership approach and transnational networks of local partnerships. The European Poverty Programmes have been particularly important in developing partnerships to tackle social exclusion. In the Poverty 3

Programmes, the EC required the formal management committee (Partnership Board) of local projects to be composed of a partnership of a number of organisations such as local government, universities, trade unions, voluntary organisations and so on.

The European Commission seems to have gained substantial advantages from entering into various kinds of social partnerships particularly in the fields of local development and regeneration and in tackling poverty and social exclusion. The partnership principle is now central to EU policy making and for this reason the promotion of social partnership will be an important role for a future Scottish Parliament.

Local level

By the late 1980s, growing numbers of local authorities were pointing to the limitations of the existing forms of public participation in decision making at local level. Partly as a result of the new Urban Left experiments of the mid-1980s, some authorities considered new forms of participation and community involvement in policy areas such as the environment, health and social services, and regeneration. One of the objectives listed in Section 111 of Agenda 21 is that by 1996, most local authorities in each country should have undertaken a consultative process with their populations and achieved a consensus on a 'local Agenda 21' for the community. Local Agenda 21 thus provided a further impetus for concerted efforts at local level to develop innovatory forms of participation. Another important objective stated in Agenda 21 is that by 1994 all local authorities in each country be encouraged to implement and monitor programmes which aim at ensuring that women and youth are represented in decision-making, planning and implementation processes. The point is again stressed that only through a partnership between citizens, and local, civic, community, business and industrial organisations can strategies for sustainable development be worked out.

The present DETR's paper, Modernising Local Government, states the present UK government's commitment to democratic renewal and to a partnership approach to local government:

It is in partnership with others - public agencies, private companies, community groups and voluntary associations - that local government's future lies .³⁸

Over the last decade there has been growing interest in the development of social partner-ships at local level. In the 1980s partnerships initiated by the Conservative government such as the Urban Development Corporations (UDCs) were partnerships between central government and the private sector. In response to the criticism that such initiatives excluded local authorities and local communities, partnerships initiated in the 1990s such as City Challenge and the Single Regeneration Budget (SRB) gave local authorities a greater role and attempted to involve representatives from local communities and the voluntary sector. These initiatives were often motivated by the belief that only by including all the stakeholders in a particular area would it be possible to promote social and economic regeneration.

Interest in social partnership has therefore been developing from a number of sources and is a now a central concern both for policy makers at all levels of government; the more traditional social partners; and groups within the third sector who are seeking greater participation.

3.3 The Third Sector

...tens of thousands of voluntary, community-based organisations enable local people to improve the conditions of their localities and take some control over their own lives... they come in a variety of forms and meet many kinds of needs, identified by local people. They are already creating jobs, work and incomes. But their activities are barely recognised by mainstream political debate. ³⁹

Definitions

The editorial of the first volume of the International Journal of Voluntary and Non-Profit Organisations, Voluntas, points out that definitions in this area of research are highly problematic. The 'third sector' is a shorthand term for a huge number of organisations with very different areas of activity, diverse aims, sources of funding, histories and so on. The 'residual' approach to definition describes the sector as what is left over once government and the commercial sector are taken out - thus the terms non-government, non-profit or third sector are often used. But it is also necessary to think about the positive characteristics that this group of organisations share. Voluntas sets out the following points about the organisations that fall within its focus:

they are formal, 'regularised', structured entities, probably with a constitution and set of rules, perhaps formally registered with a public body (including the tax authorities) or incorporated under company law
the organisations will be self-governing and constitutionally independent of government
they are not able to distribute surplus revenue to owners, members, directors or trustees
they benefit from voluntarism in terms of cash, time or kind
they provide public, social or external benefits⁴⁰

Figure 16: 'The Scope of the Social Economy at the Local Level'

PRIVATE SECTOR

SOCIAL ECONOMY

PUBLIC SECTOR

LEGAL STRUCTRE

Specific legal structures for companies

Co-ops

Mutuals

Associations and Foundations

Legislation leads to a variety of legal structures

TYPES OF ORAGANISATION

Firms of all kinds and sizes from transnationals down to small firms;

profit-oriented public/private partnerships

Worker co-ops

Food co-ops

Community businesses

Credit unions

LETS;

Permaculture Schemes;

Danish community windfarms;

Training & managed workspace projects;

Neighbourhood development trusts;

EC forest projects;

Community co-ops;

Neighbour-hood mutual aid (restricted member- ship) Housing co-ops; User groups;

Alternative health projects;

Recycling schemes;

Environment improvement projects.

Self-help Organisations with open membership;

Heritage trusts;

Wildlife bodies;

Community arts projects;

Traditional voluntary organisations

Sector organisations

Small housing associations.

Departments, corpora- tions and government agencies at the national level;

municipalities, regional and city councils, and other sub-national and local governments