Organization as Collective Rule-Making

The idea that the individualistic-contractualistic view of the work relationship has insufficient regulatory power is attracting renewed attention from jurists, especially in Italy. Consequently, a number of prominent labor law scholars are calling for a dedicated thematization of the “third,” or “collective-relational” dimension of the work relationship, as a distinct component from the individual and the collective-trade union dimension, concerning the coordination of interdependent workers and jobs in the organization. With a view to contributing to this debate, this chapter aims at shedding light on the organizational roots of that dimension. To this end, it focuses on and illustrates two options for interpreting coordination drawn from organizational theory—i.e., predetermination and processual regulation—which reflect two different ideas of the organization and of the workers’ participation in the regulation/coordination of interdependent/cooperative actions. The chapter argues that only by means of an epistemological turn to a processual perspective on organization and regulation/coordination, scholars can go beyond the long-standing and still unresolved opposition, in labor law debate, between contract and organization.