British Trade Unions in Decline: What Has Happened to Trade Union Recognition in British Establishments

De‐unionization has been one of the most significant features of the British labour market in the 1980s. All conventional measures of union presence and power vividly demonstrate this. The proportion of British establishments which recognised manual or non‐manual trade unions for collective bargaining over pay and conditions fell by almost 20% (from 0.67 to 0.54) between 1980 and 1990; the proportion of workers covered by a collective agreement fell from 0.71 in 1984 to 0.51 in 1990 (Millward et al., 1992); aggregate union membership fell from 13.2 million in 1980 to 9.9 million by 1990; the corresponding fall in aggregate union density was from 54% to 38% (and it has continued to fall post‐1990). The longer time series profile of aggregate union density (defined as the number of union members divided by the total workforce) is very dramatic. The 1980s declines have completely reversed the gains achieved in the 1970s and union density now stands at its lowest level for 30 years.