The Legal Framework of Employment Relations

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to reassess the place of labour law in the wider area of employment relations research and to argue the case for labour law's importance to social scientists. We give an analytical account of the principal institutional features of labour law as a form of legal regulation, from an interdisciplinary perspective which takes into account both the internal workings of the labour law system and the social and economic context within which it has evolved. We analyze, in the manner of an internal or 'immanent' critique, the categories which are generally used within labour law discourse to describe the social and economic relations of employment; account for their emergence and evolution in historical terms; consider the origins of their diversity across different national systems; and look at future prospects for convergence or divergence.

History of theBritish Industrial Relations Field Reconsidered: Getting from theWebbs to the New Employment Relations Paradigm

“…Three branches in the IR family tree remained, as in the pre‐Second World War period, somewhat sparsely represented. Showing the most growth, stimulated by the shrinkage of private sector collective bargaining, rise of legal enactment in place of collective laissez‐faire in UK employment policy and growing importance of European Union directives, is the labour and employment law branch (Ewing ; Deakin and Njoya ). The social insurance/welfare component of legal enactment remained lightly represented (e.g.…”

Path Dependent Obstacles to Cross-Border Insolvency: A Social Darwinian Perspective

“…The advent of the welfare state and the extension of collective bargaining caused employment law to change direction, but the traditional hierarchy of employer and employee remained difficult to dislodge from the legal psyche. 107 While this has been tempered since the 1940s and given legal status following the introduction of the Employment Rights Act of 1996 as well as other more progressive employment oriented legislation, the master and servant approach is still evident in Britain's regulatory approach to employment law. 108 54 The French employment relationship began with a similar approach to that of the UK.…”

“…The contrat du travail would become the core of the French employment relationship, the central pillar of which was the principal of subordination in which the employee's duty of obedience was exchanged for the acceptance and absorption by the enterprise of a range of social risks. 110 55 The master and servant relationship prevailed in Britain until quite recently and its echoes can still be observed in the nature of British labour and employment regulation. Its continued existence was due in part to the parallel existence of capitalist enterprise and the fading pseudo-feudal tradition.…”

The changing role of employment tribunals: The case of the Employment Appeals Tribunal in Ireland

“…The manner in which they behave and conduct themselves with employees is also to some extent prescribed by law. Thus the employment relationship is not an unfettered, atomistic legal relationship, but one that is socially and legally embedded (Deakin and Njova, 2008). For some time now, societies have considered it necessary to establish a regime of legal rules to govern the manner in which people are incorporated into the world of work.…”