E-Book Overview
Policy discussions play an important role in labour law, and labour lawyers draw on a wide range of disciplines and approaches in order to construct their arguments. This overview of the basic principles of labour law and the related policy arguments introduces two of the main perspectives used in the analysis of labour law today - human rights and economics. It offers a brief history of the influence of human rights and economics on labour law since the 1950s, explains neoclassical and new institutional economics and summarises the historical development of international human rights law. The insights of rights theorists and economists are then applied to a selection of topics in labour law, including anti-discrimination law, dismissal, working time, pay, consultation and collective bargaining, trade union membership and industrial action, in order to demonstrate the interplay between the two perspectives.
E-Book Content
Perspectives on Labour Law Policy discussions play an important role in labour law, and labour lawyers draw on a wide range of disciplines and approaches in order to construct their arguments. This overview of the basic principles of labour law and the related policy arguments introduces two of the main perspectives used in the analysis of labour law today: human rights and economics. It offers a brief history of the influence of human rights and economics on labour law from the 1950s to the present day, explains neoclassical and new institutional economics and summarises the historical development of international human rights law. The insights of rights theorists and economists are then applied to a selection of topics in labour law, including anti-discrimination law, dismissal, working time, pay, consultation and collective bargaining, trade union membership and industrial action, in order to demonstrate the interplay between the two perspectives. Anne Davies is Fellow and Tutor in Law at Brasenose College, Oxford, and Reader in Public Law at the University of Oxford, where she teaches labour law and public law. The Law in Context Series Editors: William Twining (University College London), Christopher McCrudden (Lincoln College, Oxford) and Bronwen Morgan (University of Bristol). Since 1970 the Law in Context series has been in the forefront of the movement to broaden the study of law. It has been a vehicle for the publication of innovative scholarly books that treat law and legal phenomena critically in their social, political and economic contexts from a variety of perspectives. The series particularly aims to publish scholarly legal writing that brings fresh perspectives to bear on new and existing areas of law taught in universities. A contextual approach involves treating legal subjects broadly, using materials from other social sciences, and from any other discipline that helps to explain the operation in practice of the subject under discussion. It is hoped that this orientation is at once more stimulating and more realistic than the bare exposition of legal rules. The series includes original books that have a different emphasis from traditional legal textbooks, while maintaining the same high standards of scholarship. They are written primarily for undergraduate and graduate students of law and of other disciplines, but most also appeal to a wider readership. In the past, most books in the series have focused on English law, but recent publications include books on European law, globalisation, transnational legal processes and comparative law. Books in the Series Anderson, Schum & Twining: Analysis of Evidence Ashworth: Sentencing and Criminal Justice Barton & Douglas: Law and Parenthood Beecher-Monas: Evaluating Scientific Evidence: An Interdisciplinary Framework for Intellectual Due Process Bell: French Legal Cultures Bercusson: European Labour Law Birkinshaw: European Public Law