ERM report 2020: Restructuring across borders

This report has a dual focus. First, it reviews recent restructuring activity in the EU, from January 2019 up to and including the first impacts of the COVID-19 crisis. The second part presents an analysis of transnational restructuring cases – those that affect workers in more than one country. The main source for both analyses is the European Restructuring Monitor events database, which has collected details of over 25,000 large-scale restructurings since it began in 2002, including nearly 2,000 since the beginning of 2019. The review of the data on transnational restructuring is complemented with a summary of case studies based on international relocations of production. The aim is to highlight the types of dispute that arise, how the restructuring is managed by management and the social partners, and what the outcomes are for the workers affected.