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Full-Text Articles in Business
Corporate Hypocrisy: Violations Of Trade Union Rights By European Multinational Companies In The United States, Lance A. Compa
Corporate Hypocrisy: Violations Of Trade Union Rights By European Multinational Companies In The United States, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
Many European corporations adopt American management-style attitudes toward trade unions, notwithstanding their publicly-declared support for global norms on workers’ freedom of association. They exploit US labor laws that violate international standards and interfere with trade union formation. Case studies examine several examples of this anti-union hypocrisy on the part of European firms. At the same time, some European companies have chosen to respect workers’ organizing rights in the United States. The conclusion contains recommendations for securing multinational companies’ respect for workers’ freedom of association in the United States, including application of ILO core standards, UN Guiding Principles, OECD Guidelines, and …
The Wagner Model And International Freedom Of Association Standards, Lance A. Compa
The Wagner Model And International Freedom Of Association Standards, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] I first met Pierre Verge just before beginning my service with the NAFTA labour commission in 1995. Not long after that, Pierre Verge and my own labour law professor at Yale in 1972, Clyde Summers, jointly wrote a penetrating evaluation of the first years of the NAFTA labour side accord, which still serves as the best single analysis of that seminal but flawed instrument linking labour standards and a trade agreement (Summers, Verge and Medina, 1998; Verge, 1999; Verge, 2002). Since then, my understanding of international labour standards and how they relate to labour law in North America has …
Do International Freedom Of Association Standards Apply To Public Sector Labor Relations In The United States?, Lance A. Compa
Do International Freedom Of Association Standards Apply To Public Sector Labor Relations In The United States?, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] After November 2010 elections in the United States, human rights aspects of labor policy suddenly emerged at sub-federal levels. Elections in many states brought a sharp turn to conservative Republican rule. In this new climate, conflicts over workers’ rights took shape not at the ozone layer of high international policy, but at the oozing landfill level of local labor politics. Governors and legislatures in Wisconsin, Ohio, Florida, Michigan, and other states moved to strip public employees of collective bargaining rights, blaming their wages and benefits for budget shortfalls. A vindictive North Carolina legislature made it unlawful for public school …
Enforcing European Corporate Commitments To Freedom Of Association By Legal And Industrial Action In The United States: Enforcement By Industrial Action, Lance A. Compa, Fred Feinstein
Enforcing European Corporate Commitments To Freedom Of Association By Legal And Industrial Action In The United States: Enforcement By Industrial Action, Lance A. Compa, Fred Feinstein
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] We believe it is important to discuss industrial action as one way to enforce commitments to abide by international labor standards in part because of the challenges of "hard" law enforcement, not only in an international context but also in the enforcement of domestic labor policies. Because of the challenges presented by "hard" enforcement of labor policy in both the domestic and international context, it is important to examine the dynamics that initially motivate the adoption of IFAs and other commitments to abide by international labor standards as an important aspect of their enforcement. What unions and other advocates …
Violations De La Liberté D’Association Des Travailleurs Aux États-Unis Et Normes Internationales Des Droits De L’Homme, Lance Compa
Lance A Compa
A culture of near-impunity has taken shape in much of U.S. labor law and practice. Any employer intent on resisting workers' self-organization can drag out legal proceedings for years, fearing little more than an order to post a written notice in the workplace promising not to repeat unlawful conduct. Many employers have come to view remedies like back pay for workers fired because of union activity as a routine cost of doing business, well worth it to get rid of organizing leaders and derail workers' organizing efforts. [Article in French]
Works In Progress: Constructing The Social Dimension Of Trade In The Americas, Lance A. Compa
Works In Progress: Constructing The Social Dimension Of Trade In The Americas, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] This paper reviews labor rights in the trade arrangements of four regional and binational settings in the Americas: • the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) among Canada, Mexico and the United States; • the Common Market of the South (Mercosur) among Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay; • the Canada-Chile Free Trade Agreement (CCFTA); and • the Caribbean Community (Caricom) embracing several island nations in a common market. The labor rights agreements, charters and declarations examined here are at different levels of development and experience. They are "works in progress," just beginning to experiment with the central challenge of …
Author’S Reply To Wheeler-Getman-Brody Papers, Lance A. Compa
Author’S Reply To Wheeler-Getman-Brody Papers, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] The contributions of Hoyt Wheeler, Julius Getman and David Brody in the December issue of this journal give important insights into strengths and weaknesses of the Human Rights Watch Report on workers' rights in the United States. Stephen Wood, Sheldon Friedman and the editors are to be commended for advancing a debate on the Report's approach, findings and recommendations. Each of these three major figures in American labour scholarship brings the power of decades of research and analysis on these issues. Together, their critiques stretch the Report backward and forward: back to unstated assumptions that underlie the Report (or …
Workers’ Freedom Of Association In The United States: The Gap Between Ideals And Practice, Lance Compa
Workers’ Freedom Of Association In The United States: The Gap Between Ideals And Practice, Lance Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] What is most needed is a new spirit of commitment by the labor law community and the government to give effect to both international human rights norms and the still-vital affirmation in the United States' own basic labor law of full freedom of association for workers. A way to begin fostering such a change of spirit is for the United States to ratify ILO conventions 87 and 98. This will send a strong signal to workers, employers, labor law authorities, and to the international community that the United States is serious about holding itself to international human rights and …
A Strange Case, Lance A. Compa
A Strange Case, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] The disconnect reflected in Bosch's action at the Wisconsin plant between promise and performance is the theme of a new Human Rights Watch report titled A Strange Case: Violations of Workers' Freedom of Association in the United States by European Multinational Corporations. The report details ways in which European firms have exploited weak US labour laws to carry out aggressive campaigns against workers' organising and bargaining in the United States. "A Strange Case" comes from Robert Louis Stevenson's famous The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
A Strange Case: Violations Of Workers’ Freedom Of Association In The United States By European Multinational Corporations, Lance A. Compa
A Strange Case: Violations Of Workers’ Freedom Of Association In The United States By European Multinational Corporations, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] A central conclusion of this report is that firms’ voluntary principles and policies are not enough to safeguard workers’ freedom of association. They can be important initiatives, but only when they contain effective due diligence, oversight, and control mechanisms. Otherwise, as shown here, shortcomings in US labor law create enormous temptation - especially among US managers not sufficiently overseen by European parent company officials - to take advantage of them by acts inconsistent with international norms. The pattern that emerges in the examples presented here suggests inadequate due diligence and internal performance controls to prevent and correct US management …
Unfair Advantage: Workers’ Freedom Of Association In The United States Under International Human Rights Standards, Lance A. Compa
Unfair Advantage: Workers’ Freedom Of Association In The United States Under International Human Rights Standards, Lance A. Compa
Lance A Compa
[Excerpt] Human Rights Watch selected case studies for this report on workers’ freedom of association in the United States with several objectives in mind. One was to include a range of sectors - services, industry, transport, agriculture, high tech – to assess the scope of the problem across the economy, rather than to focus on a single sector. Another objective was geographic diversity, to analyze the issues in different parts of the country. The cases studied here arose in cities, suburbs and rural areas around the United States. Another important goal was to look at the range of workers seeking …