Introduction

The European economic and political landscape has undergone significant changes since the 2008 economic and financial crisis. The 2008 economic downturn resulted in widespread job losses, reduced bargaining power for workers, and increased job insecurity, triggering a global recession that led to significant economic and political changes, including increased social unrest and protests (Rüdig and Karyotis 2014; Kriesi et al. 2020). In the aftermath of the crisis, economic and political strikes around the world have increased. Strikes have been observed in several European countries, especially in Greece, France, Spain, and Italy, often concomitantly with anti-austerity protests (da Paz Campos Lima and Artiles 2011; Nowak and Gallas 2014; Barron et al. 2016; Portos and Carvalho 2022; Pilati and Perra 2022), in the USA (Rhomberg and Lopez 2021), as well as in the Global South and in countries such as China (Chen 2020).

Due to more and denser labour conflicts, the crisis period permits a more thorough examination of workers’ protests. Today’s emerging picture of worker protests shows different characteristics from the labour movements observed in Europe’s past. One observes changes in the repertoire of actions, a growing differentiation of claims, changes in composition of the workforce, structures mobilizing workers, and a growing diversity of the targets. Strikes too have undergone significant changes in their frequency, intensity, and objectives as well as in the way they are organized and implemented.

Scholars have found that while there has been a decline in workers' participation in economic strikes in Europe recently, there has been a greater propensity to join general strikes, which, in the past decade, have challenged austerity policies implemented during the 2008 recession (Gall 2013; Hamann et al. 2013; Vandaele 2016; Altiparmakis and Lorenzini 2018; Perra and Pilati 2023). As a result, protest actions against national governments in their role as regulators and employers have increased (della Porta 2015; Diani and Kousis 2014). These trends have also been recorded in Italy (Andretta 2018) where the increased use of strikes during the crisis has only partially limited the systematic decline of economic strikes verified in recent decades (Pedersini 2014). Such changes highlight the need for new approaches to study strikes.

In this article, we aim to assess a few of the aforementioned changes regarding strikes. We scrutinize the specificities of economic and political strikes as two separate forms of actions as acknowledged by many scholars. The literature highlights that they have different causes, goals, and involve different workers, as well as unions and organizations that mobilize workers in one or the other forms of actions. Economic strikes typically involve standard workers protesting against their employers over issues such as wages, working conditions, benefits, or increased job security. In contrast, political strikes are more focused on protesting against government policies and decisions or actions, such as austerity measures and political corruption.

We aim to answer questions on how economic strikes and political strikes differ in terms of the organizational structures promoting them, trying to identify which trade unions, grassroots organizations and groups promote them, as well as how they mobilize different workers’ constituencies. We thus examine the role of unions and other labour organizations in organizing and supporting economic strikes and political general strikes. Following a social movement unionism hypothesis, we try to understand how collaboration between these unions varies between the two types of strikes.

We aim to provide better insights into these questions by integrating the fields of industrial relations and social movement literature. This approach allows us to develop a new typology of strikes that combines the strengths of both areas of research (Perra and Pilati 2023). Specifically, the industrial relations literature is useful in analysing labour relations and industrial relations systems and how they influence economic strikes, while the social movement literature provides valuable insights for interpreting political strikes.

The empirical analysis is based on a novel dataset that captures collective actions of workers in Italy between 2008 and 2018, and includes insights on 2,482 strikes. We focus on Italy as, along with France, has been traditionally regarded as a stronghold of the labour movement, seen as belonging to ‘the strike front’, with high rates of non-worked days per year (Bordogna and Cella 2002; Vandaele 2016, 282). Previous research has shown that there was a surge in labour disputes in 2008 in Italy, which was part of a broader wave of contention in Europe (Kriesi et al. 2020). Worker protests reached their peak between 2011 and 2014 (Pilati and Perra 2022), and strikes were the most prevalent form of protest, making up an average of 21.4% of all protest actions between 2008 and 2018 (Perra and Pilati 2023). Furthermore, Italy is a country with high trade union density rates, surpassing 30 percent of the workforce, and with many of trade unions that promote strikes. Trade unions include both established trade union federations that were born back in the 1940s and 1950s (Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro [Italian General Confederation of Labor] - CGIL, Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Lavoratori [Italian Confederation of Trade Unions] - CISL, Unione Italiana del Lavoro [Italian Labour Union] - UIL), autonomous unions, and newer grassroots trade unions. The trade union federations are still considered to be the most legitimate actors in the Italian industrial relations arena (Regalia and Regini 2018), despite their focus on protecting insiders (Jansen and Lehr 2019). In turn, newer, independent and grassroot trade unions have emerged in Italy, as well as other pluralist representative systems in Europe, and these mostly represent outsiders or precarious workers (Cillo and Pradella 2018; 2019; Chesta et al. 2019). Italy provides an ideal case study for examining the involvement of the various trade unions in strikes given its unique labour market dynamics and history of industrial relations.

The data set was built using protest event analysis (PEA). Data are derived from an original data set of collective actions by and for workers in Italy from 2008 to 2018. Albeit partially, this data set compensates for the absence of data from official statistics on strikes and other forms of protest in Italy during the decade in question (Vandaele 2016). In Italy, official statistics do not cover strikes for the most recent years and we do not have available data for other types of collective actions. The National Institute of Statistics (Istat) stopped publishing statistics on labour conflicts in April 2010. At the moment, the only data available concern strikes in the public sector.

Changes between old and new strikes

During the transformative period of the 1960s and 1970s, which continued into the 1980s, collective action manifested in two distinct realms: the economic and the political. The economic sphere revolved around the intense capital-labour conflict, with the workplace assuming a central role. Trade unions emerged as key actors, prioritizing the representation of workers' interests and rights. Strikes served as the primary means of exerting pressure. Moreover, workers resorted to other disruptive tactics such as industrial boycotts, go-slows, and stop-work meetings during the most disruptive phases of contention. Additionally, general strikes were proclaimed to bolster trade unions' bargaining power in negotiations with employers and governments.

In contrast, the political sphere encompassed a broader range of protests primarily focused on civil and political rights. Street marches, blockades, and community assemblies were common expressions of dissent, beyond the workplace boundaries. Grassroots and social movement organizations drove mobilizations in this sphere, recognizing the state and government as their primary counterparts. Their influence was further strengthened through alliances with left-wing parliamentary and extra-parliamentary parties. Trade unions and workers actively participated in these political mobilizations providing substantial support to student movements, feminist causes, anti-militarist campaigns, and peace movements.

In contrast with the past, contemporary strikes are just one component of a much broader repertoire of collective actions that workers can employ to advance their interests and interact with their employers. The traditional model of labour union-led strikes has been supplanted by a diverse range of collective actions that workers can utilize to advocate for their rights and seek compensation in the labour-capital conflict (Gentile and Tarrow 2009; Gentile 2015). While strikes remain one major form of action used by workers to put forward their claims, in many cases, actions unfold in demonstrations such as anti-austerity marches that serve as an alternative to traditional strikes, and in addition to tactics like boycotts, sit-ins, and blockades (della Porta 2015; Kriesi et al. 2020; Bojar et al. 2021).

A more diverse number of organizations mobilize workers today, including not only established trade unions but also newer groups that have emerged to represent workers, often to support outsiders’ claims (Meardi et al. 2021, 49-50; Carver and Doellgast 2021; Bondy 2021). This occurred despite the efforts by trade union federations to incorporate outsiders and maintain their pivotal role in industrial relation system (Benassi and Vlandas 2016; Natili and Puricelli 2021). Established trade unions have thus lost their hegemony in mobilizing workers. Other organizations such as social movement and civil society groups, Non-Governmental Organization (NGOs), self-organized worker groups, grassroots informal groups, and various networks coordinate protests and challenge trade union federations. At times, this has led to the emergence of social movement or radical movement unionism, that is, forms of collaborations between trade union federations with grassroot trade unions and social movement organisations (SMOs) or between grassroot trade unions and SMOs (Pilati and Perra 2020). In part, this trend can be explained by the revitalization strategies implemented by established trade unions. However, it is also linked to the history of the Italian trade unions. While they have played a crucial role in the political sphere, they have always been subordinated to the labour parties. As pivotal studies show, the mixed repertoire and alliances began with the union movement’s Autunno Caldo (Hot Autumn) in 1969 (Tarrow, 1975; Tarrow 1989; Crouch and Pizzorno, 1978) despite the centre of industrial conflict being inside the factories (Regalia et al. 1978). 

However, with the crisis of the parties that began in the 1990s and the collapse of the old party system, trade unions’ institutional power weakened. In the subsequent years, unions thus tried to reinforce their role in the political sphere through their participation in the mobilizations promoted by social movements (Gentile 2014; Bondy 2022).

In the 1960s and 1970s, European labour movements were also predominantly composed of unionized workers who had a collective class identity expressing a strong sense of solidarity and were often organized by manufacturing sector or metallurgical and mining industry. Today, the workforce mobilized in strikes is becoming increasingly heterogeneous. Multiple occupations participate in strikes, including many service and public sector employees. This trend has led to the "tertiarization" of conflicts and strikes (Bordogna and Cella 2002). Furthermore, worker protests also often involve non-unionized workers, those who work in the informal sector including agency and autonomous workers.

In the 1960s, labour movements in Europe focused primarily on demanding better working conditions, wages, and social insurance and other benefits. Today, the labour market dualization and the distinction between insiders, that is, those workers with stable employment relationships, protection against dismissal, and full access to social protection, and outsiders (Emmenegger et al. 2012) has led to a growing differentiation of claims appealed through strikes. Today, worker protests focus on issues such as job security or precarious work which are typical claims from the outsiders. As demonstrated by the insider–outsider theory (Lindbeck and Snower 1988), insiders’ interest is to maximize their own wages while they tend to care about their acquired rights, job security and low taxes. In contrast, outsiders and their representative bodies are more likely to be interested in the expansion of jobs, contract renewals, more generous unemployment benefits, employment promotion measures, and social safety nets (Burgoon and Dekker 2010; Rueda 2005; Schwander 2019; Schwander and Häusermann 2013).

Claims are furthermore heterogeneous due to the involvement of various actors beyond workers and their representative bodies. These actors include students, political parties, loosely organized social groups such as social centres or migrant committees and played a significant role in the anti-austerity protests (Pilati and Perra 2022, 20). Their focus is primarily on political and social rights claims like housing, transport, and pensions rather than on economic issues. As a result, the nature of claims by workers has evolved to include opposition to political reforms in addition to economic and labour issues. 

Finally, the target of strikes has changed as well. In addition to “employers” themselves, targets include the governments as in the case of general strikes (Hamman et al. 2013, 2016). Today’s claims addressing employers are co-present to those that have the state as the target of protests.

Economic and political strikes

The aforementioned changes in strikes have resulted in an increasing diversification of strikes that has principally led to the distinction between economic and political strikes.

The International Labour Organisation’s International Conference of Labour Statisticians defines strikes as a temporary work stoppage or closure of a workplace resulting from the initiative of one or more groups of workers or employers to enforce or resist demands and express grievances, or to support other workers or employers in their demands or grievances. By abstaining from work, employees in a specific industry or company withhold their labour in order to gain concessions from their employer. Most of these strikes can be defined as economic strikes. They are typically driven by labour-related motivations, such as demands for higher wages, better working conditions, or increased job security. These strikes are usually organized by workers and their labour unions and are intended to pressure employers to negotiate better terms of employment (Pizzorno 1978; 1980).

Conversely, according to Hyman's definition (1989, 17), a general strike is a “temporary, national stoppage of work by workers from many industries, directed against the executive or legislative arms of government, to enforce a demand or give voice to a grievance.” Due to this, general strikes have been often referred to as political strikes. More specifically, political strikes are typically organized by broader coalitions of social and political groups and are often aimed at influencing government policy or addressing broader societal issues. The goal of a political strike is to pressure the government to take action on a particular issue or to express opposition to a particular policy.

However, the concept of general strike is quite ambiguous when we consider the nature of the issues and grievances claimed and the targets and the consequences of strikes (Hamman et al. 2013; Gallas 2018; Pizzorno 1980). Often, general strikes include economic claims, next to political ones, and the state is addressed as the employer of many public employees like teachers. In general strikes, the addressee identified is the political actor. According to a narrow conception, the general strike involves all sectors of production. In a broader conception, the general—and more properly political—strike involves not only various categories of workers in one or more sectors, but also participants from non-working categories such as students or citizens. Some general strikes are focused on labour issues such as wages, benefits, or working conditions, while others may be driven by political or social issues such as opposition to government policies or support for social justice causes (Bèroud 2018; Gentile 2015). We thus try to identify, within the broad category of general strikes, general political strikes and general economic strikes. A general economic strike is a type of strike where workers in multiple industries and sectors of the economy participate directly tackling the State as the employer. In turn, a general political strike tackles the State as the political actor taking some decisions and acting accordingly.

Following this, in an attempt to clarify the definition of strikes, Perra and Pilati (2023) have recently distinguished between three types of strikes: local economic strikes, general political strikes and general/large scale economic strikes (see Table 1). This typology draws on two main dimensions that differentiate strikes. Following Pizzorno (1978), one dimension is related to the addressee of the strike, whether political or economic. The second dimension is the issue that is at stake and it can be either political or economic. By crossing these two dimensions, we identify three types of strikes (the fourth category – type 3 in Figure 1 – is less common empirically): when both the issue and the addressee match, strikes can be easily defined as either political (type 1) or economic ones (type 4). The former ones, political strikes, are mostly observed at the regional and national level and can thus be identified as general political strikes (type 1). The latter ones, economic strikes, are observed more often at the local level and can thus be identified as local economic strikes (type 4). Things become more complicated when the issue and the addressee have either an economic and a political nature and they do not match. Type 2 thus identifies those strikes characterized by economic issues but addressed to a political actor. We refer to them as general or large-scale economic strikes as their addressee is a political actor, the State or the Municipality, acting as the public employer. The strikes are also defined as general as they are often organized at a large scale. Type 3 is rare as it concerns political issues but addresses the private employer. This type of strike may include the case of migrant workers demanding more internal democracy within a union, or making demands to employers for housing or support for residency permits and challenging prevailing policies.

TABLE 1 HERE

 

 

Beyond economic explanations: Social movement unionism and the political process model

The aforementioned distinction among different types of strikes comes with some consequences for the theories that can explain strikes.

Industrial relations scholars focus on trade unions and industrial actions directed against the employers with claims that are directly related to working conditions (Shalev and Korpi 1980; Bordogna and Cella 2002; Gall 2013; Vandaele 2016; Molina and Barranco 2016; Gumbrell-McCormick and Hyman 2018; Brandl and Traxler 2012; see however Hamann et al. 2013, 2016 on general strikes). Within this literature, the economic model suggests that strikes are sensitive to economic conditions such as inflation, GDP growth, and unemployment rates. This model views strikes as pro-cyclical, with activity increasing during economic expansions and decreasing during recessions.

Another model centres on institutional variables, which reflects the role of governments in managing and regulating industrial relations and focuses on the institutional power of the trade unions. This political model of strike activity suggests that political exchange mechanisms influence strike activity. Scholars talk of a political model of strike activity (see Korpi and Shalev 1980). Variables used to test this hypothesis include characteristics of the industrial relations system such as the presence of the labour party in the government, decentralization of collective bargaining, bargaining coverage, and wage coordination.

Another approach focuses on mobilizational and organizational factors (see Shorter and Tilly 1974; Franzosi 1995, 99-101). This model argues that strikes are reliant on organizational resources, with unionization playing a significant role in increasing strike activity. This results in a union mobilization model, and variables to test this hypothesis include measures such as trade union density.

While the aforementioned models were crucial to assessing strikes in the past, they cannot fully account for the recent changes in strike characteristics. In particular, by focusing on trade unions, they cannot completely explain the presence of a growing heterogeneity of actors. Furthermore, they cannot explain the emergence of political claims characterizing general political strikes.

To explain the changes that affect strikes and their diversity, we thus draw on political accounts of strikes (Hamann et al. 2013) and, in particular, on the literature of contentious politics given that strikes are one form of protest. This literature has gained prominence in explaining general strikes emerged since the beginning of the Great Recession in Europe in 2008. In contrast to industrial relations, contentious politics offers a more comprehensive framework for analysing strikes and worker collective actions beyond the workplace. In particular, this approach helps to interpret strikes in light of the concept of the political opportunity structure (POS), that is, the changing dimensions of the political institutional contexts. Dimensions of the POS include decisions and actions taken by the government (Tilly 1978; Tarrow 1989; Kriesi et al. 1995). In light of the POS, general political strikes observed after 2008 have been thought as a response to austerity reforms rather than to economic cycles or to unions’ institutional power (Kriesi et al. 2020). General political strikes in Italy included protests against the budget laws and were characterized by demands regarding reforms and government policies. These include the 2008 university strikes and the Onda movement involving the school sector against Berlusconi IV’s cabinet. They also include protests against austerity reforms implemented from 2011 onwards during Monti’s cabinet, against the 2014–2015 labour market reform (referred to as Renzi’s “Jobs Act”), and, around 2015, the introduction of another school reform, the so-called “Buona Scuola” [good school] (Zamponi 2011; Pilati and Perra 2022).

The second perspective within the literature on contentious politics that helps explain the diversity of strikes, is the relational perspective. It places emphasis on the networks among challengers but also draws on the model focusing on mobilizational and organizational factors (see Shorter and Tilly 1974; Franzosi 1995: 99-101). By focusing on inter-organizational networks, this approach helps us to assess the role of trade unions in relation to the new emerging actors and to explore, if any, the networks formed by them. It thus allows us to test what has been referred to as social movement unionism, that is, alliances among trade unions and other actors. Alliances are processes through which groups exchange various types of resources in pursuit of a common goal, and are of the utmost importance when actors cannot afford to pursue their goals in total autonomy (Van Dyke and McCammon 2010). Through social movement unionism, trade unions have been able to capture new claims by workers including those by ‘outsiders’ related to temporary jobs, to rising unemployment, or to civil rights matters (Tapia and Alberti 2019). The promotion of social movement unionism has been mostly observed in countries such as the US, Great Britain and France where unions have followed peculiar strategies of revitalization by extending solidarity with other organizations and community networks (Baccaro et al. 2003; Le Queux and Sainsaulieu 2010; Tapia and Turner 2013; Alberti and Però 2018).

In the following empirical analysis, we try to explore strikes and alliances promoting them by looking into the hypothesis of social movement unionism in the Italian case. We address this issue by providing some evidence on the actors involved in the three types of strikes and their networks. As the literature on anti-austerity protests has shown, we mostly expect social movement unionism to take place among challengers active in general political strikes or large-scale economic strikes. Indeed, anti-austerity protests included general strikes involving a variety of actors, such as trade unions as well as non-working categories like students or citizens (della Porta 2015; Kriesi et al. 2020; for the Italian case, Andretta 2018). In contrast, for most types of strikes, that are local economic strikes (see Pilati and Perra 2022), we expect a fragmentation of the networks of challengers active in such strikes (Pilati and Perra 2020). Local-level actions are in fact likely to be associated with the variety of unions that has been observed in Italy and the different claims they address (Meardi et al. 2019). This may lead to fragmentation between unions - especially between confederal and independent, grassroots small rank-and-file unions - competition between them and the polarization of the organizational field.

The empirical case

The data source

The changed nature of strikes and the presence of different organizations and trade unions mobilizing them is not accounted by the currently available strike-related data. This deficiency in data can result in an incomplete and imprecise representation of the actual extent of strike activity.

Our study examines strikes using data collected from an original data set that contains information on conflictual collective actions in industrial relations, including strikes, observed in Italy from 2008 to 2018. To collect the data we employed Protest Event Analysis (PEA), which is an established method in social movement studies. Specifically, we selected articles and coded the information on workers collective actions from both the national and ten local editions of La Repubblica, a major Italian newspaper. This resulted in a sample of 9,910 collective actions.

Our data set is unique for several reasons. Firstly, it is the first to include collective actions that specifically concern workers, with detailed information on the occupational category of workers involved in the protests. Secondly, it includes information on a wide range of actions, including protests such as strikes, sit-ins, occupations, and traffic blockades, as well as actions that take place using institutional channels. Thirdly, the data set captures actions at the local level, allowing us to examine the consequences of the process of “downward scaleshift” resulting from the decentralization of bargaining processes in the field of industrial relations.

We focus on strikes and investigate their characteristics using a sample of 2,482 cases. We identified 360 general strikes, and strikes that involved abstention from work which represented 2,122 events. We then distinguished local economic strikes and large-scale economic strikes by considering the scale of the action.

We provide an in-depth analysis of the networks of the actors involved in strikes by selecting the sample of strikes in Lazio, the region in Italy with the highest number of strikes, and in 2012, they year with the highest number of strikes occurred in the 2008-2018 decade. The analysis is reduced to such limited sample to better examine whether trade unions engage in social movement unionism as this allows us to provide a clearer picture on their relationships and networks.

To identify the organizations and the type of worker occupations involved in the strikes, we make reference to the following two sets of variables collected in our dataset:

Workers’ occupation: a nominal variable whose categories include the major occupations involved in strikes as identified through the 2008 ISCO (International Standard Classification of Occupations) code. We focus on those occupations mostly involved in strikes: plant and machine operators, craft and related trade workers, elementary occupations, service and sales workers, professionals, and a residual category of other occupations. Our dataset contains up to 4 of these variables.

Actors involved: a variable identifying the organizations promoting or involved in the events. It is a nominal variable whose categories are the following: trade union federations, independent trade unions, professional associations, unorganized workers, and non-working categories including student organizations, social movement organizations (SMOs), and civil society organizations (CSOs). Our dataset contains up to 8 of these variables.

Strike activity in Italy between 2008-2018

Table 2 displays information about different types of protest actions taken between 2008 and 2018. The protest actions are categorized into three groups: traditional, institutional, and disruptive. Traditional actions include strikes, sit-ins, demonstrations, assemblies, pickets, and other similar actions. Institutional actions refer to actions taken by organizations using institutional channels such as collective bargaining. Disruptive actions include actions like squatting, traffic/goods/port block, damages, and hunger/thirst strikes.

The data presented in the table suggests that workers have engaged in a range of actions, with traditional actions being the most commonly used protests. The data also shows that institutional actions have become more frequent in recent years, while disruptive actions are less common than traditional and institutional actions. The table indicates that traditional actions, particularly strikes and sit-ins, were prevalent throughout the decade from 2008 to 2018. The most common type of traditional action was strikes, but the frequency of strikes varied across the years. The table also displays the frequency of institutional actions taken during various years, indicating that negotiations were the most common type of institutional action taken, with an increasing trend over time. Lastly, squatting was the most common type of disruptive actions taken by workers, followed by traffic/goods/port block (see Pilati and Perra 2022 for a thoughtful analysis).

TABLE 2 HERE

 

 

Considering strikes more specifically, the decline of strikes in Italy, without distinction on the type, began in the 1980s. This trend continued into the second half of the 1990s and the early 2000s until 2008. Concurrently, the number of workers involved in strikes decreased as well. In 1980, strikes and lockouts affected approximately 13 million individuals, whereas in 1994 this number decreased to around 2 million, and by 2003, it was only 1.5 million. Despite this decline, unions retained their ability to mobilize workers for general strikes with high political significance. However, their capacity to mobilize for economic strikes was much more limited during this time period (Pulignano 2003).

The years following 2008 were characterized by an increasing level of social conflict expressed through a new cycle of protests (Pilati and Perra 2022). Despite the rapidly changing economic and political landscape, strikes remained one of the preferred forms of collective action for both unions and workers in private and public sector.

General political strikes and social movement unionism

We now consider the level of engagement by unions in the 2008-2018 period. Separate analyses show that trade union federations have the highest participation rates in all three types of strikes, while grassroot and autonomous trade unions have the highest participation rates in general/large-scale economic strikes. Unorganized workers have high participation rates in local economic strikes. Additionally, students have a relatively high participation rate in general political strikes, while professional associations largely engaged in general/large-scale economic strikes. In particular, general political strikes involve a variety of actors, including trade unions as well as non-working categories such as students or citizens, or social categories like parents protesting against the government to implement better education to their children (see also della Porta 2015; Kriesi et al. 2020; for the Italian case, see Andretta 2018).

The patterns of participation by unions and other organizations and groups is better shown in Figure 1 illustrating the networks of participation in strikes occurred in Lazio in 2012. In particular, Figure 1 illustrates the organizations (left side) and the occupations (right side) engaged in 2012 in the three types of strikes: local economic strikes (top graphs), general political strikes (middle graphs), and general/large-scale economic strikes (bottom graphs). The pictures shown in Figure 1 are 2-mode networks (Borgatti and Everett 1997) in which the circles represent the single strikes occurred in 2012 and the squares represent the actors involved in the strikes, namely, the trade unions and organizations promoting them (on the left side) and the occupations of workers involved (on the right side). The ties in the network represent participation or involvement by trade unions and workers’ occupations in the single strikes. Below each graph in Figure 1, we include two measures that inform on how cohesive networks are: density and fragmentation. 

[Figure 1]

Looking at Figure 1, it is clear that the three different types of strike show diverse network patterns.

Unions and organizations involved in local economic strikes show the most fragmented networks while general political strikes show the most cohesive ones.

Local economic strikes are highly fragmented as shown by the upper left-hand graph which presents six components in the organizational field. This suggests that each type of union or organization engages in specific and different local strikes. The same graph also shows that the main component includes trade union federations (CGIL, CISL, UIL) and UGL which engaged together in four strikes. In contrast, strikes promoted by grassroots unions such as Unione Sindacale di Base [Union of Rank-and-File Workers] (USB) are different from those promoted by Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Autonomi Lavoratori [Italian Confederation of Free Workers' Unions] (CISAL), as well as from those promoted by professional organizations. Therefore, the graph indicates that grassroots trade unions are fragmented and promote different strikes. These strikes are also often characterized by the presence of unorganized workers (signalled by the label “workers” in the graph) who do not have any support from unions in promoting strikes.

Local economic strikes also see different occupations being mobilized in different strikes as drivers and mobile plant operators engage in strikes that are different from those by health professionals and those involving legal, social and cultural professionals (see top right-hand graph of Figure 1). This is partly expected given that the motivations that drive actions by these different categories are diverse, ranging from work and contractual conditions, layoffs, and the non-payment of salary. Additionally, local economic strikes occur at the city level and are likely to address specific firms and employers. Our data further show that local economic strikes by service and sales workers addressed working conditions in private companies, including timekeeping at Almaviva, or the opening of shops on Sundays and public holidays, like April 25— the Liberation Day. Some strikes focused on recovery plans that companies were implementing or intended to implement. Others involved sales workers occupied in general retail trade, including workers from companies like Auchan, Carrefour, Coop, Decathlon, IKEA, Mercatone Uno, and call centres like Almaviva Acea. Contention involving service and sales workers occurred in the Lazio region in 2014, where the major airport hub, Fiumicino, is located, and where workers at Alitalia, Meridiana, and Easyjet protested their employers’ claims of job redundancy as outlined in the companies’ recovery plans.

In contrast to the networks that characterize local economic strikes, the picture for general political strikes (the middle graphs in Figure 1) is less fragmented and more cohesive (see the measure of fragmentation, which is lower for general political strikes than it was for local economic strikes, and the density which is, instead, higher). Two main components emerge when considering participation of unions in joint strikes (middle left-hand side graph in Figure 1). The main component clearly shows patterns of social movement unionism, that is, of collaborations among established trade unions (CGIL, CISL, and UIL) and the new emerging actors mobilizing workers including political parties, students, and other informal actors. In particular, the organizations promoting general political strikes comprise both trade union federations and non-working categories such as students or broader constituencies of citizens. They represent the actors who were involved in anti-austerity protests after the implementation of austerity measures. One of the major general political strikes in early 2012 was indeed related to the “Save Italy” measures, an emergency decree passed in December 2011. This was a package of spending cuts and tax increases which included deeply unpopular measures like the Fornero pension reform named for the Minister of Labour in the Monti cabinet. It raised the country’s retirement age to 62 for women and 66 for men; unlike the previous system, it based pensions on the number of years of contributions, not on the worker’s salary at the time of retirement. The second component of the networks observed in the left-hand side of the middle graph comprises a few autonomous trade unions (Confederazione dei Comitati di Base [Confederation of Rank-and-File Workers] - COBAS, USB and other grassroot unions). This graph suggests that while trade union federations ally with non-working categories, grassroot trade unions remain peripheral to these actions but ally with one another.

The right-hand side of the middle graph further shows that general political strikes involve a multiplicity of job occupations, ranging from plant and machine operators and assemblers to craft and related trades workers like metal workers. Many of these workers, especially the metal workers likely have high levels of affiliation to trade union federations that are very involved in general political strikes. Craft and related trade workers—especially metal, machinery, and related trade workers like steel workers—mobilized throughout the decade. During the wave of contention they challenged important private companies like FIAT (now Stellantis), Fincantieri, one of the world’s largest shipbuilding groups; Leonardo-Finmeccanica, one of the world’s biggest companies building high tech, including technologies for defence, aerospace, and security; and ILVA, one of the major Italian steel companies.

Our third category is large economic strikes (bottom graphs) and lies in between local economic strikes and general political strikes. On the one hand, looking at the left-hand side of the bottom graph, they appear to show patterns of social movement unionism as general political strikes do. However, non-working categories do not appear as significant actors in large economic strikes as they did in general political strikes. Instead, the main component of the network concerning large economic strikes shows that trade union federations engage in large-scale economic strikes with grassroots trade unions and professional associations. This suggests that in large economic strikes, trade unions appear to be collaborating one another. Trade union federations and grassroots unions may in fact find a common terrain especially when engaging in issues resonating with outsiders’ claims, such as fixed contracts, the renewal of their contracts, social safety nets or job placement (Benassi and Vlandas 2016; Pilati and Perra 2022). Therefore, while established trade unions mostly protect insiders (Jansen and Lehr 2019), the analysis of the issues raised suggests trade unions make an effort to incorporate outsiders (Benassi and Vlandas 2016; Natili and Puricelli 2021; Pilati and Perra 2022).

Looking at the presence of specific types of occupations in large economic strikes the fragmentation is lower than it was for local economic strikes, but strikes are still marked by a division. For example, legal professionals are involved in large economic strikes that differ from those involving customer service clerks or drivers and mobile plant operators. In general, plant and machine operators and assemblers including drivers and mobile plant operators represent the largest share of workers who joined strikes in 2008 and during the height of the crisis, in 2011 and 2012. Their actions involved trucking and public transportation—trains, buses, metros, ports—and most strikes focused on economic issues such as contract renewal and working and contract conditions, as well as the non-payment of salaries, workplace safety, and layoffs. Public transportation drivers mobilized the most, often against companies managing public transport. In this type of strike, independent trade unions play a pivotal role as the actors organizing most of the protests and strikes in the public transportation sector at both local and national levels.

Conclusions

Our article provides some evidence of the evolving nature of strikes in contemporary society. We argue that it is essential to expand our understanding beyond economic strikes and acknowledge the emergence of political strikes. To achieve this goal, we propose a comprehensive typology of strikes by examining two crucial dimensions: the issues advocated by workers and the targets of the strikes. By intersecting these dimensions, we identify and categorize four distinct types of strikes. In our study, we specifically focus on three types of strikes and shed light on the defining characteristics of general political strikes, general/large-scale economic strikes, and local economic strikes.

Our results show that the three types of strike, local and large-scale economic strikes and general political strikes, show distinctive patterns of participation by trade unions and organizations promoting them, as well as by occupations. Social movement unionism has been mostly observed in the case of general political strikes while more fragmentation has involved economic strikes, especially those at the local level. Additionally, general political strikes show more heterogeneous actors, as they involve both workers and non-working categories.

The differences between political strikes and economic strikes suggest that we should reconsider the theories so far used to explain economic strikes which cannot account for the changes observed in today’s strikes and the peculiarities of political strikes. Therefore, we advocate for the integration of various approaches to explain strikes. We believe that it is crucial to consider both the role of business cycles and economic variables that have been adopted to explain industrial conflicts and economic strikes so far, and theories of contentious politics. The latter can in fact account for the role of the political context, namely of governmental decisions and reforms. Furthermore, relational approaches to social movements can account for the growing diversity of actors and their interconnections.

The integration between these perspectives improves knowledge about the transformations of work, production relations and labour relations. This is a prerequisite for explaining why people participate in collective action and which actors will represent their interests and rights.

The patterns of economic and political strikes, as well as the characteristics of union membership and the motivations behind them, underscore the differentiation between interests and rights. This emphasizes the crucial role of unions in delineating how both interests and rights can be represented and safeguarded, with particular attention given to non-standard workers, the outsiders.

Our data also suggest that the formation of social class varies across different occupational categories. Specifically, we observed that occupational categories strongly affiliated with trade union federations, such as steel workers who represent the core of the working class, are more likely to garner higher visibility and legitimacy for their actions compared to other occupational categories. Indeed, trade union federations appear to occupy central positions in the networks.

In contrast, elementary occupations, such as cleaners and refuse workers, display lower levels of affiliation with trade union federations. These workers tend to have higher rates of unorganized labour or are affiliated to grassroots trade unions. Consequently, they are more susceptible to experiencing a heightened risk of marginalization given that these organizations occupy more peripheral positions in the networks examined. Additionally, their participation in general political strikes can serve as an indication of the vulnerability and diminished political influence of these workers.

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