Development, and more recently sustainable development, has become a topical area of discussion for policy-makers and academics working in various disciplines. The current global economic crisis and its devastating effects on the labour markets of developing countries, has reignited the search for sustainable methods of development which combine social and economic criteria with environmental concerns in order to improve the living and working conditions in developing countries. The approaches to sustainable development in the literature vary. The language of universal human rights is often invoked on the basis that development is a human right which ‘every human person and all peoples are entitled to participate in, contribute to, and enjoy’ (UN Declaration 1986). Amartya Sen in Development as Freedom (1999) adopts a broader approach and argues that development should be seen in terms of ‘the expansion of the ‘‘capabilities’’ of people to live the kinds of lives that they value – and have reason to value’ (pp 54–5). Sustainable development is also discussed in the context of trade where the argument is made that multinational enterprises should shoulder responsibility in contributing to the improvement of living and working standards in these countries (for an overview of the vast amount of literature on this topic see, eg, P Muchlinski, Multinational Enterprises and the Law, OUP, 2007 at chapter 13).
The Role of Labour Standards in Development—a collection of essays written by some of the participants of a conference held at the British Academy Rooms in London in May 2009—sees sustainable development as ‘both a goal to be achieved and a means to promote well-being’ (p 2). In adopting this definition as a starting point, the authors in their essays move beyond sustainable development as an environmental concern and consider ‘how labour standards fit within the matrix of development’ (p 3). The essays—which are predominantly authored by legal academics, with contributions from economists and a political scientist—cover a diverse set of topics ranging from theoretical connections between work and development and child labour, to development through social dialogue, corporate social responsibility and other participatory strategies. The essays start from the presumption that labour standards can be implemented in developed and developing countries in a sustainable manner and then consider how individual and collective engagement can and should aid the process of development. In adopting this approach, the essays manage, in a very concise form, to bind together a lot of different ideas on how to improve the current system's flaws. Challenges which are taken into account include the current economic crisis (Hepple), problems of migration from developing to developed countries (Fudge), and the lack of concern for social developments at a global level in times of economic turmoil (Sjåfjell). Due to space constraints, it is not possible to adequately review every contribution made in this book, all of which offer an interesting approach to the overarching topic of the role of labour standards in development; the aim is rather to give a general overview with specific examples drawn from individual essays.
The first part of this book sets the scene by investigating possible theoretical connections between work and development. Hepple's opening challenges the widespread belief that development can only function effectively if countries’ labour laws become more similar and argues instead that ‘nations prosper in a globalised economy […] by building their institutional advantages on a floor of fundamental human rights’ (p 20). He goes on to develop this argument in the context of national responses to the current economic crisis. The chapter presents an impressive number of ideas which provide much food for thought and a starting point for more research. For example, the issue of enforcement is only briefly touched upon and it would be interesting to develop further how states can be bound to higher labour standards which they have agreed to in theory but neglect to uphold in practice. Different stakeholders presumably have a wide range of views on this problem and it would be interesting to explore their perspectives on how to encourage the development of institutional advantages on the basis of a floor of fundamental rights in both developed and developing countries.
Problems surrounding enforcement crop up repeatedly in parts two and three of this book on, respectively, social exclusion and discrimination, and child poverty and child labour as obstructions to development. Fudge considers the issues of gender, equality and capabilities in care work. She explains the differences in the perception and execution of care work in the North and South before identifying a vicious circle in which the migration of care workers from South to North leads to a labour shortage in the South and detracts from collective efforts in the North to find convincing public policies which enable women to effectively combine paid employment with care responsibilities. She recognizes that ‘so long as men can choose not to do domestic labour women will have no choice but to do it’ (p 53) and thus calls for both an increase of ‘incentives for men to take on a greater share of unpaid labour’ and for a challenging of ‘cultural norms that associate women with certain kinds of domestic labour’ so that women ‘are given a real choice about how to spend their time’ (p 53). In her chapter on the political economy of women's human rights True identifies a link between patterns of violence against women and trends in global transformation based on migration. She advocates a practical solution to the problem of violence against female migrant workers. Rather than encouraging an end to migration, she argues in favour of creating guarantees for women and girls to be able to migrate ‘safely and with dignity’ (quoting Ramírez et al, p 71). While both chapters adopt practical solutions to real problems, questions over the viability of implementation and enforcement remain and should be explored in future inter-disciplinary research combining academic perspectives from law, economics, political science and associated disciplines with the insights of stakeholders such as NGOs and government agencies.
Bhalotra in chapter six continues the practical trend of the preceding chapters and adopts a rational approach to child labour. Rather than arguing in favour of complete abolition of the practice which many stakeholders would surely prefer, she dispels the myth that employers are solely to blame for child labour by recognizing that ‘the majority of employers are parents, and, when not, parents have volunteered the child for work’ (p 97). By adopting such an approach, she is able to make a convincing argument that ‘educating children is a way of breaking the inter-generational cycle of poverty’ (p 97). She takes into account various parameters which might hinder states in providing education to draw conclusions on the viability of a total ban on child labour. What is interesting about her approach is the range of parameters at a national and international level which make a ban viable or not. Her conclusion on a partial ban of child labour in a particular sector or industry—that it is ‘typically a bad idea’ (p 104)—is illuminating as it excludes an option that is often mooted as practical.
Parts four and five of the book discuss strategies for achieving development with the help of trade, aid, social dialogue, corporate social responsibility, and other participatory strategies. The multifaceted approach of combining trade, labour standards and development taken in these essays is interesting and makes it obvious that there is no easy solution. Blackett makes it clear that development and labour standards are not only a problem for the ‘developing South’. She also takes into account the ‘South in the North’ or the unravelling of labour regulatory systems in developed countries. To counter this negative development, she argues for a reverse social clause which is understood as a ‘decent work complement to reasonable labour market access in labour receiving countries’ (p 153). As economic power shifts between ‘old’ and ‘new’ economies particularly in the wake of the current economic crisis, this concept of the ‘South in the North’ will gain in importance and will need to be addressed. This wider definition which goes beyond the traditional categories of ‘South’ and ‘North’ is a useful starting point.
One final point that should be mentioned is raised in chapters ten (Villiers) and eleven (Tajgman) which tease out the conflict between company law, with its focus on profit maximization and the protection of shareholder interests, and corporate social responsibility. The extent to which companies have responsibility for upholding human rights standards (and conversely are liable for violations of those standards) has been much debated in the academic literature and it is not proposed to enter into that debate here. However, what seems to be increasingly obvious is that although corporations may have a duty to promote and respect human rights and labour standards, there is a limit as to how far a company can adopt the duties of a state. There are also suggestions by Villiers, that a ‘CSR agenda does not ensure greater integration for employees or their representatives’ (p 178). It may therefore be more sensible for corporate social responsibility to focus on those areas where corporations can play an effective role (eg, in the development of labour standards for their workers and information and consultation rights for worker representatives) than to include broader and usually vague commitments to a ‘better’ society overall. Such concerns should be addressed in terms of sustainable development of countries.
The multi-disciplinary nature of the book, as well as the practical approach taken by many of the authors, is to be commended. In the final substantive essay Novitz notes how difficult it is to pinpoint the exact meaning of sustainable development as ‘it means so many different things to different people and organisations’ (p 227). While the essays in this book depart from a common basis, they move in different directions and cover a wide variety of topics and approaches. It becomes obvious that there are no easy solutions to the dilemma of how to achieve sustainable development while adhering to core labour standards. It is also clear that labour standards can play different roles in development. More research is needed to combine academic thinking, policy and practice and this book is a welcome starting point for that research to proceed.
