The swimmers: Workers’ turnover against the labour regulation cage

Drawing on qualitative research in Italian and Polish automotive supply chains, we examine how workers navigate labour legislation, weakened industrial relations and the dual (protective and restrictive) character of collective agreements. Integrating Power Resource Theory and Labour Process Theory, we position turnover alongside strikes on a continuum of resistance shaped by institutional, associational and structural power resources and by workers’ capacity to control effort and mobility. In Italy, sectoral agreements protect but divide workers; in Poland, fragmented bargaining and restrictive strike laws constrain collective action, pushing workers toward exit. We show how institutional protections simultaneously enable and constrain workers’ agency in what we call ‘the labour regulation cage’.