Towards a new web of rules: An international review of institutional experimentation to strengthen employment protections
Publikation: Bidrag til tidsskrift › Tidsskriftartikel › Forskning › fagfællebedømt
Standard
Towards a new web of rules : An international review of institutional experimentation to strengthen employment protections. / F. Wright, Chris ; J. Wood, Alex ; Trevor, Jonathan ; McLaughlin, Colm ; Huang, Wei ; Harney, Brian ; Geelan, Torsten; Colfer, Barry ; Chang, Cheng ; Brown, William .
I: Employee Relations, Bind 41, Nr. 2, 2018, s. 313-330.Publikation: Bidrag til tidsskrift › Tidsskriftartikel › Forskning › fagfællebedømt
Harvard
APA
Vancouver
Author
Bibtex
}
RIS
TY - JOUR
T1 - Towards a new web of rules
T2 - An international review of institutional experimentation to strengthen employment protections
AU - F. Wright, Chris
AU - J. Wood, Alex
AU - Trevor, Jonathan
AU - McLaughlin, Colm
AU - Huang, Wei
AU - Harney, Brian
AU - Geelan, Torsten
AU - Colfer, Barry
AU - Chang, Cheng
AU - Brown, William
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - The purpose of this paper is to review “institutional experimentation” for protecting workers in response to the contraction of the standard employment relationship and the corresponding rise of “non-standard” forms of paid work.The paper draws on the existing research and knowledge base of the authors as well as a thorough review of the extant literature relating to: non-standard employment contracts; sources of labour supply engaging in non-standard work; exogenous pressures on the employment relationship; intermediaries that separate the management from the control of labour; and entities that subvert the employment relationship.Post-war industrial relations scholars characterised the traditional regulatory model of collective bargaining and the standard employment contract as a “web of rules”. As work relations have become more market mediated, new institutional arrangements have developed to govern these relations and regulate the terms of engagement. The paper argues that these are indicative of an emergent “patchwork of rules” which are instructive for scholars, policymakers, workers’ representatives and employers seeking solutions to the contraction of the traditional regulatory model.While the review of the institutional experimentation is potentially instructive for developing solutions to gaps in labour regulation, a drawback of this approach is that there are limits to the realisation of policy transfer. Some of the initiatives discussed in the paper may be more effective than others for protecting workers on non-standard contracts, but further research is necessary to test their effectiveness including in different contexts.The findings indicate that a task ahead for the representatives of government, labour and business is to determine how to adapt the emergent patchwork of rules to protect workers from the new vulnerabilities created by, for example, employer extraction and exploitation of their individual bio data, social media data and, not far off, their personal genome sequence.Originality/valueThe paper addresses calls to examine the “institutional intersections” that have informed the changing ways that work is conducted and regulated. These intersections transcend international, national, sectoral and local units of analysis, as well as supply chains, fissured organisational dynamics, intermediaries and online platforms. The analysis also encompasses the broad range of stakeholders including businesses, labour and community groups, nongovernmental organisations and online communities that have influenced changing institutional approaches to employment protection.
AB - The purpose of this paper is to review “institutional experimentation” for protecting workers in response to the contraction of the standard employment relationship and the corresponding rise of “non-standard” forms of paid work.The paper draws on the existing research and knowledge base of the authors as well as a thorough review of the extant literature relating to: non-standard employment contracts; sources of labour supply engaging in non-standard work; exogenous pressures on the employment relationship; intermediaries that separate the management from the control of labour; and entities that subvert the employment relationship.Post-war industrial relations scholars characterised the traditional regulatory model of collective bargaining and the standard employment contract as a “web of rules”. As work relations have become more market mediated, new institutional arrangements have developed to govern these relations and regulate the terms of engagement. The paper argues that these are indicative of an emergent “patchwork of rules” which are instructive for scholars, policymakers, workers’ representatives and employers seeking solutions to the contraction of the traditional regulatory model.While the review of the institutional experimentation is potentially instructive for developing solutions to gaps in labour regulation, a drawback of this approach is that there are limits to the realisation of policy transfer. Some of the initiatives discussed in the paper may be more effective than others for protecting workers on non-standard contracts, but further research is necessary to test their effectiveness including in different contexts.The findings indicate that a task ahead for the representatives of government, labour and business is to determine how to adapt the emergent patchwork of rules to protect workers from the new vulnerabilities created by, for example, employer extraction and exploitation of their individual bio data, social media data and, not far off, their personal genome sequence.Originality/valueThe paper addresses calls to examine the “institutional intersections” that have informed the changing ways that work is conducted and regulated. These intersections transcend international, national, sectoral and local units of analysis, as well as supply chains, fissured organisational dynamics, intermediaries and online platforms. The analysis also encompasses the broad range of stakeholders including businesses, labour and community groups, nongovernmental organisations and online communities that have influenced changing institutional approaches to employment protection.
U2 - 10.1108/ER-10-2018-0259
DO - 10.1108/ER-10-2018-0259
M3 - Journal article
VL - 41
SP - 313
EP - 330
JO - Employee Relations
JF - Employee Relations
SN - 0142-5455
IS - 2
ER -
ID: 289401293