Concept
Social corporatism, also called social democratic corporatism, is a form of economic tripartite corporatism based upon a social partnership between the interests of capital and labour, involving collective bargaining between representatives of employers and of labour mediated by the government at the national level. Social corporatism is present to a lesser degree in the Western European social market economies. It is considered a compromise to regulate the conflict between capital and labour by mandating them to engage in mutual consultations that are mediated by the government. Generally supported by nationalist and/or social-democratic political parties, social corporatism developed in the post-World War II period, influenced by Christian democrats and social democrats in Western European countries such as Austria, Germany, the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. Social corporatism has also been adopted in different configurations and to varying degrees in various Western European countries. The Nordic countries have the most comprehensive form of collective bargaining, where trade unions are represented at the national level by official organizations alongside employers' associations. Together with the welfare state policies of these countries, this forms what is termed the Nordic model. Less extensive models exist in Austria and Germany which are components of Rhine capitalism. Some controversy has existed in the political left over social corporatism, where it has been criticized for abandoning the concept of class struggle in favour of class collaboration and compromise, legitimizing privately owned enterprise and for lending credence to a form of regulated capitalism. Others on the left counter these criticisms by claiming that social corporatism has been progressive in providing institutional legitimacy to the labour movement that recognizes the existence of ongoing class conflict between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, but they seek to provide peaceful resolutions to disputes arising from the conflict based on moderation rather than revolution.
