Employmentweb_low

EmploymEnT, woRk, and hEalTh inEqualiTiEs - a global perspective
and promoting health through individual behaviours, such as stress
management and quitting smoking, while ignoring the
organisational context of those behaviours.
research suggests that social relations and structural working
conditions (including worker participation and empowerment)
determine employee’s reactions to the conditions under which they work
more than personal characteristics do (see case studies 74 and 75).
dangerous working conditions, characterised by material hazard, are
risks that are common in situations of precarious employment, and the
problems that arise from this are only exacerbated by a systematic
pressure to not blow the whistle on dangerous workplace environments
for fear of losing one’s job. one example of a policy designed to change
working conditions, albeit at the micro-level, is the legal requirement for
an enterprise to have trade union representatives be trained in
occupational health and responsible for prevention in the workplace.
This would in all likelihood bring about a reduction in occupational risks
in the workplace and a decline in occupational injuries and illnesses.
Thus the risk posed to worker health by both the adoption of dangerous
behaviour and exposure to serious hazards is made worse by the lack of
advocacy available to the worker.
The strengthening of business interests, the atomisation of
companies, precariousness, short-term work, and rotation of
employment do not contribute to the constitution of strong union
actors. additionally, deregulation policies and strategies increase
companies’ aversion to unions and reinforce anti-union practices.
Unemployment, freedom to fire workers at will, and management
policies exert a powerful, social disciplining effect on workers,
convincing them to give up their most basic rights, such as those
to health, decent working conditions, and equity. They are forced to
accept unilateral reductions in pay, extension of the workday,
elimination of break periods, etc. They do not gain access to
unionisation, given the expressions of hostility from employers and
the fear of losing their jobs (carnevale & Baldasseroni, 2005;
ferez, 2005).
There are many policy options that could be explored at entry point
c. regulators could impose norms defining acceptable levels of
occupational risk and working conditions standards, the length of the
working day, and occupational health and working environment
monitoring programmes (Westerholm, 1999; rantanen, 1999;
hogstedt & lundberg, 1998). another option is to launch preventive
programs of screening and surveillance in the workplace, on an area
basis or at the level of the workers themselves, for the early detection
of health problems or high levels of exposure to work-related risk
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