The Dynamics of the Regulation of Labor in Developing and Developed Countries since 1960

This paper examines both the determinants and the effects of changes in the rigidity of labor market legislation across countries over time. Recent research identifies the origin of the legal system as being a major determinant of the cross-country variation in the rigidity of employment protection legislation. However, the supporting evidence is largely confined to levels of regulation and is almost exclusively based on international cross-section data for the post-1995 period. This paper introduces a new index capturing the rigidity of employment protection legislation (LAMRIG) for an unbalanced panel of more than 140 countries over time starting in 1960. Although the importance of legal origins in explaining the level of rigidity of labor regulations across countries is replicated using LAMRIG, their explanatory power is much weakened for changes over time (1960-2004.) More important as determinants of such changes are the level of development and other reforms such as trade liberalization. With respect to the effects of changes in the rigidity of labor regulations on growth and inequality, which have been very controversial in the literature, results with LAMRIG support Freeman’s conjecture that changes in rigidity do not systematically affect economic growth but do lower income inequality.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/133054/1/wp1037.pd

Post-Partnership Strategies for Defining Corporate Responsibility: The Business Social Compliance Initiative

While cross-sectoral partnerships are frequently presented as a way to achieve sustainable development, some corporations that first tried using the strategy are now changing direction. Growing tired of what are, in their eyes, inefficient and unproductive cross-sectoral partnerships, firms are starting to form post-cross-sectoral partnerships (‘post-partnerships’) open exclusively to corporations. This paper examines one such post-partnership project, the Business Social Compliance Initiative, to analyse the possibility of post-partnerships establishing stable definitions of ‘corporate responsibility’. We do this by creating a theoretical framework based on actor–network theory and institutional theory. Using this framework, we show that post-partnerships suffer from the paradox of striving to marginalise those stakeholders whose support they need for establishing stable definitions of ‘corporate responsibility’. We conclude by discussing whether or not post-partnership strategies, despite this paradox, can be expected to establish stable definitions of ‘corporate responsibility’

Transnational Governance of Workers' Rights: Outlining a Research Agenda

In twentieth century Europe and the USA, industrial relations, labour, and workers’ rights issues have been handled through collective bargaining and industrial agreements between firms and unions, with varying degrees of government intervention from country to country. This industrial relations landscape is currently undergoing fundamental change with the emergence of transnational industrial relations systems that complement existing national industrial relations systems. Despite the significance of this ongoing change, existing research has only started to explore the implications of this change for how workers’ rights are governed around the globe. This paper addresses this gap by outlining an agenda for future research into the transnational governance of workers’ rights. Fulfilling such a research agenda would be both challenging, as it requires combining the so far divergent industrial relations and business ethics research streams, and rewarding, as it provides ample scope for promising future research