Human Rights and Workers: Limits to the International Labor Law (original) (raw)
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This paper considers the role of international labour rights in an era of globalisation. It begins from Patrick Macklem's definition of that role in terms of providing the international legal order with a measure of normative legitimacy. It then interrogates the relationship between sovereignty and international labour rights in an era of globalization, highlighting the particular significance, in this context, of the voluntary surrender by nation states of elements of their sovereignty. It questions whether Macklem has given due consideration to this phenomenon, and to its consequences for the rights and interests of workers; whether, therefore, he has succeeded in providing an account of international labour rights that is at once descriptive and normative, as he intends it to be. Having drawn attention to the limitations of international labour rights, the paper concludes by commenting briefly on the desirability of a body of transnational labour law, of which international labour law would form only one part.
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[Excerpt] This volume is intended to collect the best current scholarship in the new and growing field of labor rights and human rights. We hope it will serve as a resource for researchers and practitioners as well as for teachers and students in university-level labor and human rights courses. The animating idea for the volume is the proposition that workers' rights are human rights. But we recognize that this must be more than a slogan. Promoting labor rights as human rights requires drawing on theoretical work in labor studies and in human rights scholarship and developing closely reasoned arguments based on what is happening in the real world. Citing labor clauses in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is one thing; relating them to the real world where workers seek to exercise their rights is something else. The contributors to this volume provide a firm theoretical foundation grounded in the reality of labor activism and advocacy in a market-driven global economy.
Studia z zakresu Prawa Pracy i Polityki Społecznej
In 2020, for the first time in the history of the International Labour Organization (ILO), we sighted the universal ratification of a Convention, that is, the ratification by all 187 Member States of the Organization. The C182—Convention of Worst Forms of Child Labour (1999) is identified as a fundamental Convention because it refers to one of the fundamental labour rights identified at ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work (1998). This Declaration, despite having been immersed in intense debates on the regulatory option adopted by the ILO (soft law), spelled out a list of fundamental rights and principles at work, approaching to the grammar of human rights. In this sense, it is possible to understand that Convention No. 182, since it is fundamental, already had a prominent role. However, universal ratification presents itself as opportune and strategic, especially when it formalizes the commitment of States to the observance of the parameters presented in the...
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This article analyzes the scope and content of the International Labour Organization’s fundamental labour standards and tracks the way in which they are increasingly included and applied in the context of different international instruments with a public, private, binding, or voluntary character. The contemporary proliferation of these standards can lead to improved protection of workers’ rights. Nevertheless, the fragmentation and diversification of instruments may also include a risk of incoherent application. Securing fundamental labour standards—the prohibition of child labour, the prohibition of forced labour, non-discrimination and equal treatment, and freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining—is immensely important for vulnerable groups that are affected by the negative effects of economic globalization. This article charts the diversity of instruments and their relation to human rights law. Furthermore, it provides an examination of the different supervis...
Civil and political rights have been preferred to the detriment of economic, social and cultural rights. These, the latter have been subject to a weaker application under national legislation, to weak legal interpretation and reduced public awareness. Therefore, economic, social and cultural rights have also been seen as facultative, not straight applicable and implemented by states progressively, only through long programmes. Still, economic, social and cultural rights ensure the full protection of the human being, which makes possible the reconciliation for the exercise of the rights and liberties with the social justice. They are widely recognized and with the same accent as civil and political rights.