Employmentweb_low

EmploymEnT, woRk, and hEalTh inEqualiTiEs - a global perspective
mother and child at female workers’
rally. El paso, Texas (united states).
source: © ilo/r. lord (2009)
interventions may also occur at the employer/organisational level
and the job/task levels.
even so, while interventions related to employment conditions
may occur at the organisational and job/task level, employment
conditions can be restructured (perhaps more so than working
conditions) at the societal/regulatory level. voluntary measures by
employers or corporations have a role to play, but are too
fragmented to reshape employment conditions and lift standards
generally. The same applies to union and community activities,
although unions can generalise collectively negotiated protections
(nationally and internationally) and, as evidence from poor countries
attests, community actions can act as an important adjunct or
impetus to government measures. historically, government action,
often in response to community pressure, has set minimum social
standards.
Mandating standards or enacting regulation has little effect
without adequate, supportive infrastructure and rigorous
enforcement. evidence of the failure of existing regulations to
protect vulnerable workers, even in wealthy countries (lipscomb,
Mcdonald, dement, schoenfisch, & epling, 2007), generally reflects
a failure of enforcement rather than an argument against the
regulatory option. likewise, the failure to enforce labour standards
in poor countries results from political and social decisions, not
economic necessity (Brown & o’rourke, 2003). on the other side of
the coin, however, the combination of pressure from unions and
social communities plays a vital role in ensuring government action,
something well-illustrated by the prolonged struggle to ban
asbestos and recent actions to address children kidnapped and
forced to work in brick-making in the shanxi and henan provinces in
china (sydney Morning herald, 2008). as was true in the past
(Macdonagh, 1977), evidence attesting to the effectiveness of new
policy and regulatory measures addressing the ohs threats of
employment conditions will only accumulate slowly, and will further
involve a process of trial, error and refinement in the context of
ongoing community pressure.
fundamental questions also need to be asked about how
employment conditions best serve the long-term health and wellbeing
of the global community. leaving the health consequences of
employment conditions as an afterthought or "downstream"
consideration in trade, commercial transactions, business practices
and industrial relations will simply perpetuate the problems
identified in this book. enforceable standards (with effective
sanctions) are essential at the national and international levels,
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