Voice, regulation and memory in a voiceless environment: Case studies of informal legacies of collectivism, voice and regulation in non-union SMEs in the United Kingdom

This study explores employee voice and participation within small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and non-union contexts. It seeks to better understand how informal relations develop and configure forms of participation, and how the memories of the workforce – in relation to representation and regulation – contribute to the nature of employment relations in SMEs. Drawing from a qualitative enquiry comprising two case studies, the findings illustrate how a diversity of approaches to employee voice within informal spaces may be understood. This variation even within non-union contexts is in part attributable to organisational memories, the experiences of internal management relations, and the idiosyncrasies linked to the composition of the workforce and their previous collective experiences of unionised settings.