A COMPARATIVE LAW COMPENDIUM,
IDEAL FOR EMPLOYMENT LAWYERS IN THE UK AND ABROAD
An appreciation by Elizabeth Robson Taylor of Richmond Green Chambers and Phillip Taylor MBE, Head of Chambers
and Reviews Editor, “The Barrister”
Brexit or no Brexit, this new title from Hart Publishing should attract the immediate interest of UK employment lawyers as well as their continental European counterparts.
As the subtitle indicates, the relationship between employer and employee -- and their reciprocal rights and obligations -- is the focus throughout. ‘The Concept of Employee’, says the book’s editor, Bernd Waas, is ‘arguably the most important one in labour law, defining as it does, the scope of the discipline as a whole’.
Perhaps a point here should be clarified. The ‘discipline’ referred to as labour law is what we know also in the UK as ‘employment law.’ There are those who will recall the term ‘employment law’ encompassing ‘trades union law’, known at one time as ‘industrial relations law.’ Confusing, isn’t it!
It seems that the nomenclature has changed since the 1980s in response to changes in the labour, i.e. employment markets. In those far off days, trades unions had a much higher profile than they now do. This was before membership generally declined almost by one half due to legislative changes and economic factors, particularly self-employment, as the UK moved relentlessly toward developing an entrepreneurial culture in which former ‘employees’ found themselves becoming ‘employers.’
But setting aside the cultural and economic factors at play, this book will continue to be relevant to comparative lawyers in the UK, as it does provide an interesting shift in perspective, especially to those specializing in employment law.
As a ‘restatement’ of the concept of the employee in European labour law, the book examines in detail the attendant problems and their possible solutions, by comparing the differing approaches to labour issues taken in each of the European member states plus several others.
The book is a monumental study which interestingly, does not confine itself to the European Union. It also examines the ‘concept of employee’ in the thirty-eight countries represented by the European Labour Law Network, of which the general editor, Bernd Waas, is the Coordinator.
With the ‘generous material support’ of the European Commission, the book obviously grew into a massive project which provides a comparative overview of its theme as manifested in the EU and in other states as well, including Russia, Norway, Iceland, Turkey and Switzerland. The results are eye-opening and certainly useful. This publication, says Waas, ‘aims to identify problem areas and highlight the solutions adopted in member states as clearly as possible.’
Unlike many a text on European law, this book is not necessarily orientated toward encouraging the harmonization of EU legal systems. Instead, the aim is ‘a little more modest,’ say the editors, in that the insights and information revealed will help to ‘increase knowledge and gain a better understanding thereof.’
This, then, is a compendium of comparative law which, in one volume, delivers the combined expertise and copious research of its forty or so international contributors. The result creates a picture of what the legal landscape looks like within a diverse grouping of nations, the last one on the alphabetical list being the United Kingdom. (We haven’t left the EU yet, y’know- that is for 28th March 2019!)
For employment or comparative lawyers in the UK or abroad, this book, with its wealth of references, is an excellent acquisition for your bookshelf.
The publication date is cited as at 27th July 2017.
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