Strikes In Essential Services

National Health Service. Prospect for the future.

Designing a fair, effective and acceptable regime that will reconcile public interest and the public’s need for an uninterrupted flow of essential services on the one hand, while maintaining the freedom of collective bargaining on the other, is an ever more difficult public policy challenge. This book, the first detailed comparative analysis of existing legal and practical approaches across a spectrum of key national jurisdictions, provides a structured and insightful overview of the law and practice of regulating strikes in essential services. As such it can be of great value for public policy debate and the enhancement of national law in the field. The editors have assembled experts from fourteen countries who describe and analyse their respective country’s experience with strikes in essential services and the legislative and judicial as well as informal approaches towards regulating and intervening in such strikes. Departing from legal theory with systematic comparative ‘law in action’ research, the contributors offer innumerable valuable insights into a broad array of issues and topics as the following: – mechanisms aiming at compensating employees for encroaching on their collective bargaining rights; – public accountability and responsible management of public finance; – role of international conventions; – effects of globalization and advances in technology; – privatization, outsourcing and the decline of unions and workers’ solidarity; – growing popular intolerance towards strikes in essential services; – effect of human rights-related court decisions; – convergence and divergence among contemporary legal regimes in defining and approaching strikes in essential services; – dispute process design and dispute resolution processes (mediation, conciliation and arbitration); and – substantive and procedural restrictions on the right to organize, bargain collectively and strike. The country reports are preceded by a detailed analysis of the inherent normative policy dilemma and a conceptual framework for designing and evaluating models of regulation. The concluding chapter presents a comparative overview of the insights gained. With its comparative perspective on one of the most sensitive areas of industrial relations and labour law, and its contextually relevant options for strategic choice and public policy debate, this incomparable volume will be welcomed by labour lawyers, legislators, policy makers, judicial bodies and researchers in the field of collective labour relations and fundamental human rights of workers on the national as well as international level.

About this book: Regulating Strikes in Essential Services offers a comparative perspective on one of the most sensitive areas of industrial relations: strike in essential services. Designing a fair, effective and acceptable regime that will reconcile public interest and the public's need for an uninterrupted flow of essential services on the one hand, while maintaining the freedom of collective bargaining on the other, is an ever more difficult public policy challenge. This book, the first detailed analysis of existing legal and practical approaches across a spectrum of key national jurisdictions, provides a structured and insightful overview of the law and practice of regulating strikes in essential services. As such it could be of great value for public policy debate and the enhancement of national law in the field. What's in this book: The editors have assembled experts from fourteen countries who describe and analyse their respective country's experience with strikes in essential services and the legislative and judicial as well as informal approaches towards regulating and intervening in such strikes. Departing from legal theory with systematic comparative 'law in action' research, the contributors offer innumerable valuable insights into a broad array of issues and topics as the following: mechanisms aiming at compensating employees for encroaching on their collective bargaining rights; public accountability and responsible management of public finance; role of international conventions; effects of globalization and advances in technology; privatization, outsourcing and the decline of unions and workers' solidarity; growing popular intolerance towards strikes in essential services; effect of human rights-related court decisions; convergence and divergence among contemporary legal regimes in defining and approaching strikes in essential services; dispute process design and dispute resolution processes (mediation, conciliation and arbitration); and substantive and procedural restrictions on the right to organize, bargain collectively and strike. The country reports are preceded by a detailed analysis of the inherent normative policy dilemma and a conceptual framework for designing and evaluating models of regulation. The concluding chapter presents a comparative overview of the insights gained. How this will help you: With its in-depth discussion of the regulatory dilemma of protecting the fundamental right to strike for all employees while ensuring the uninterrupted flow of services, deemed as essential for the public, this book forms a refined and nuanced basis for further academic research. Its contextually relevant options for strategic choice and public policy debate makes this book an incomparable handbook for labour lawyers, legislators, policymakers, judicial bodies and researchers in the field of collective labour relations and fundamental human rights of workers on the national as well as international level.

Topics covered include "the complex subject of designing a fair and sensible regime for collective bargaining and essential services."

�We are undertaking the most tremendous move ever made by LABOR in this country, a move which will lead�NO ONE KNOWS WHERE!� With these words echoing throughout the city, on February 6, 1919, 65,000 Seattle workers began one of the most important general strikes in US history. For six tense yet nonviolent days, the Central Labor Council negotiated with federal and local authorities on behalf of the shipyard workers whose grievances initiated the citywide walkout. Meanwhile, strikers organized to provide essential services such as delivering supplies to hospitals and markets, as well as feeding thousands at union-run dining facilities. Robert L. Friedheim�s classic account of the dramatic events of 1919, first published in 1964 and now enhanced with a new introduction, afterword, and photo essay by James N. Gregory, vividly details what happened and why. Overturning conventional understandings of the American Federation of Labor as a conservative labor organization devoted to pure and simple unionism, Friedheim shows the influence of socialists and the IWW in the city�s labor movement. While Seattle�s strike ended in disappointment, it led to massive strikes across the country that determined the direction of labor, capital, and government for decades. The Seattle General Strike is an exciting portrait of a Seattle long gone and of events that shaped the city�s reputation for left-leaning activism into the twenty-first century.

This book explores new forms of popular organisation that emerged from strikes in India and Brazil between 2011 and 2014. Based on four case studies, the author traces the alliances and relations that strikers developed during their mobilisations with other popular actors such as students, indigenous peoples, and people displaced by dam projects. The study locates the mass strikes in Brazil’s construction industry and India’s automobile industry in a global conjuncture of protest movements, and develops a new theory of strikes that can take account of the manifold ways in which labour unrest is embedded in local communities and regional networks. “Jörg Nowak has written an ambitious, wide-ranging and very important book. Based on extensive empirical research in Brazil and India and a thorough analysis of the secondary literature, Nowak reveals that numerous labour conflicts develop in the absence of trade unions, but with the support of kinship networks, local communities, social movements and other types of associations. This impressive work may well become a major building block for a new interpretation of global workers’ struggles.” —Marcel van der Linden, International Institute of Social History, The Netherlands “Nowak’s book meticulously details the trajectory of strikes and its resultant new forms of organisations in India and Brazil. The central focus of this analytically rich and thought provoking book is to search for a new political alternative model of organising workers. A very good deed indeed!” —Nandita Mondal, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, India “Jörg Nowak analyses with critical sense forms of popular organization that often remain invisible. It is an indispensable book for all those who are looking for more effective analytical resources to better understand the present situation and the future promises of the workers’ movements.” —Roberto Véras de Oliveira, Federal University of Paraíba, Brazil “In this timely and important study, Nowak convincingly challenges the dominant Eurocentric approach to labour conflict and calls for a new theory of strikes. He stresses the need to engage in a wider perspective that includes social reproduction, neighbourhood mobilisations, and the specific traditions of struggles in the Global South.” —Edward Webster, University of Witwatersrand, South Africa