Employment Protection in Europe - online course

Compensation: doctoral studies

Target group: post-graduate students in social sciences

Credits: 4 ECTS of active participation and extra 2 ECTS from essay.

Time: Starts up in the week 45, 2010 and ends in the week 4, 2011.

An advance enrollment for a course in week 43, 2010.

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Employment Protection in Europe

Introduction to the idea, history, methods and national practices of employment protection.

Objectives:

The history of social policies and social movements clearly verify that in the coattails of industrialization there was interest to protect labour for economic and work related risks. The labour, and, in some degree, their families have been protected against too long working days, low pay, unfair contracts and unhealthy working conditions. The early interventions are seen as expression of the interest to develop minimum rules and negative control against dismissals. Later on the idea of social protection took more positive and proactive forms within the areas of employment protection, career development, training and re-training and workers´ codetermination rights at the work place. This lead to the declaration of the fundamental rights of workers, first by the ILO ( ILO: workers´ rights) and then by the EU (The Charter of Fundamental Social Rights of the European union 1999).

The objectives of this online course are to introduce doctoral students into the history, concepts and methods of employment protection and give an overview of practices and outcomes of employment protection.

Teachers:

Pertti Koistinen in cooperation with Kimmo Jarvanne, Alfred Bittareav and invited speakers.

Teaching method:

Online course including presentations, texts for reading. We use the Moodle -learning software.

Contents:

1. lecture: The Concept of employment protection (early ideas of employment (labour) protection; dimensions of employment protection; waves of development in industrial countries)
2. lecture: Short history of employment protection in the developed industrial countries (national regulations; ILO regulations, other international regulations, etc.)
3. lecture: Old and new risks of (in) employment and risks sharing (old and new risks of employment, role of social policies, perceptions of job insecurity)
4. Lecture: Collective dismissals and employment protection (national regulations, efficiency and outcomes)
5. lecture: Transitional labour markets (national settings, the role of institutions)
6. lecture: Social risks of mobile labour (international mobility of labour, risks related to migration and national variation of social norms)
7. lecture: New issues of labour and safety rules and labour law (Regulative concepts and new social risks in employment)
8. lecture: Capital risks and risks of labour (an Marxian theory of property and labour;  locational flexibility as enterprise strategy;  Collin Grough´s argument.)

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Literature:

Anderssen T., et al (2007) The Nordic model - embracing globalisation and sharing risks. ETLA publications.

Brzinsky-Fay, Chr. (2010) The concept of transitional labour markets - a theoretical and methodological inventory. (forthcoming)

Crough, C., (2010) Beyond the flexibility trade-off: reconciling confident consumers with insecure workers. (a paper)

Glassner, V., Keune., M. (2010) Collective bargaining in a time of  Crisis. (http://www.gusto-project.eu/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=158:collective-bargaining-and-the-crisis&catid=35:academic-papers&Itemid=57)

Erlinghagen, M., (2008) Self-perceived job insecurity and social context: a multilevel analysis of 17 european countries. European sociological review, vol 24. 2: 183-197

Julkunen, R., (2009) Uuden työn paradoksit. Vastapaino.

Koistinen, P., (2010) Employment protection in the context of collective dismissals - an european view. (forthcoming)

Määttä, P., (2008) The ILO principle of equal pay and its implementation, Tampere University Press. Tampere

Perotti, E., von Thadden, E-L., (2006) Political economy of  corporate control and labour rents. Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 114 No. 1, 145 - 174.

Van Peijpe, T., (1998) Employment protection under strain. Kluver.

Suoranta, A., (2009) Halvennettu työ. Vastapaino.

Supiot, A., (2001) Beyond employment - changes in work and the future of labour law in Europe. Oxford University Press.

Taylor-Gooby, P., (2004) New risk, new welfare: the transformation of the european welfare state. Oxford university press. Oxford.

Other sources:

Harvey, D., (2010) Reading Marx with David Harvey (http://davidharvey.org/)

Crough, C. (2010) Gusto -project (http://www.gusto-project.eu/)

EIRO: European Industrial Relations Observatory (http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/eiro/structure.htm)

Belgian precedence program 2010 (http://www.eurofound.europa.eu/presidencies/index.htm)