Annual Review 2012 Regional Project on Labour Relations and Social Dialogue Warsaw in February 2013 Czech Republic ­Labour Relations and Social Dialogue Author: Sona Veverkova 1 , Research Institute for Labour and Social Affairs, Prague Executive Summary Social dialogue in the Czech Republic was considerably affected particularly by the level of com­munication of the government and social partners in the period from 2007 to 2012. The first signs of an economic crisis showed in the Czech Republic in 2008 during the right-wing government of Prime Minister Miroslav Topolánek, whose government, however, was prematurely replaced in April 2009 by the caretaker government of Prime Minister Jan Fischer – who pledged to communi­cate with social partners and respect their views, thus the relations between the government and social partners were consolidated in the period from 2009 to July 2010. However, the right-wing government of Petr Ne č as(ODS) that had resulted from elections of May 2010 refused to respect the results of the previous social dialogue. As a consequence, the relations between the govern­ment and social partners have been getting worse, which is obvious especially with trade unions. On the contrary, the relations among social partners at the central, branch and company levels remain mostly good, since for the benefit of production and job maintenance, the economic crisis necessitated closer cooperation that had been accepted by social partners. 1 Sona Veverkova, 1979, graduated in 2002 from the University of Economics in Prague. Since 2005 she has been working as a researcher in the Research Institute for Labour and Social Affairs(Vyz­kumny ustav prace a socialnich veci, v. t. i.) in the Social Dialogue Department." 1