Cet article examine la réglementation adoptée par cinq administrations publiques en Amérique du Nord qui ont choisi de faire appel à la science de l’ergonomie comme outil réglementaire de prévention des troubles musculo-squelettiques (TMS). Aux États-Unis, seul le règlement de la Californie, d’une portée fort limitée, a pu survivre aux pressions politiques qui ont mené à l’abrogation des règlements de l’État fédéral américain (OSHA) et de l’État de Washington. Au Canada, la Colombie-Britannique et la Saskatchewan appliquent de tels règlements, mais contrairement aux instruments américains abrogés, ceux du Canada misent plutôt sur le processus de prise en charge que sur des normes spécifiques qui quantifient les gestes à risque et déterminent de façon stricte les actions attendues de l’employeur. La description du contexte d’adoption et du contenu des règlements est ensuite suivie d’une comparaison sommaire de cette réglementation avec le droit québécois régissant la prévention des TMS.This article examines five ergonomic standards adopted by regulatory agencies in North America for the purpose of preventing musculo-skeletal disorders (MSDs), one of the most costly categories of injury throughout North America. Since 1988, three regulatory agencies in the United States and two in Canada have chosen to implement “ergonomic standards”, relying on knowledge produced by the science of ergonomy to prevent injury associated with various risk factors known to contribute to MSDs. Saskatchewan was the first to regulate the prevention of MSDs in 1988, followed by California (1997), British Columbia (1998), Washington State (2000) and OSHA (2001). While the first three regulations are still in force, political pressure by business lobbies led to the repeal of both the OSHA regulation, repealed shortly after the Bush cabinet came to power, only weeks after its adoption, and the Washington State regulation, repealed as a result of a referendum in late 2003.The article first situates ergonomic standards in the historical context of occupational health and safety regulation. Gunningham and Johnstone (Regulating Workplace Safety: Systems and Sanctions, Oxford University Press, 1999), in a historical overview of regulatory strategies in occupational health and safety, show that, in many Anglo-Saxon jurisdictions, the traditional approach of command and control regulation, based on a multitude of technical specifications, has evolved into a performance based approach, relying on general duty clauses and codes of practice while placing less reliance on technical specifications. The third and most recent regulatory approach, relying on process regulation and occupational health and safety management systems, has developed considerably in Europe but has not yet taken hold in most North American jurisdictions.The historical overview allows us to consider why the various ergonomic standards studied have led to so much controversy, particularly in the United States, as tensions arose as those who preferred stringent regulation of ergonom...
