Thesis defense - Sander Junte

This thesis analyzes the challenges that the transition toward battery electric vehicles (BEVs) poses for trade unions in the automotive industry, focusing on the Volkswagen Group’s shift toward a new production model and its impact on labor relations in West Germany and Spain. These regions occupy different positions within the European division of labor, with West Germany situated in the industrial core and Spain in the semi-periphery. Based on fieldwork in Wolfsburg and a combination of primary and secondary sources, the study reconstructs the Group’s trajectory from 1950 to 2024, as well as the evolving challenges faced by trade unions.

The thesis integrates three complementary perspectives on trade unions within global production networks: the GERPISA theory of production models, global value chain approaches, and the theory of trade union power resources. It argues that spatial relocation and modularization—understood, respectively, as spatial and technological solutions to issues of profitability and product complexity—have weakened the structural power of trade unions and fostered concessionary bargaining, without, however, eliminating their capacity for action.

Empirically, the study demonstrates how, thanks to its robust institutional resources, the German union IG Metall has historically secured high-value-added production in West Germany, whereas Spanish unions have remained dependent on agreements conditioned by German bargaining power. These asymmetries reproduce patterns of uneven development within the Group’s production network. Nevertheless, declining profitability and increasing modularization in battery electric vehicles could facilitate the relocation of production and further erode structural resources. The future balance between institutional protection and structural pressures remains uncertain, particularly for trade unions in both the core and the semi-periphery.

Date: 30/10/26

Time: 11:00h

Place: B3/012 Faculty of Economics and Business studies