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Protection of Dispatched Workers’ Right to Organize or Participate in Labor Unions 285
Implications for Employment Relations and
Policy
Many macro and individual factors contribute
to the development of dispatched work. For
instance, transformation of economic structure,
global market competition, undertaking of labor
flexibility strategies and change of value between
employers and employees are all directly or indirectly
conducive to the development of dispatched
work. 8 Labor unions in some OECD countries were
defensive, negative and even repulsive in attitude
toward dispatched workers. Nevertheless, in recognition
of the irreversibility of dispatched work,
labor unions have adjusted their attitude and tried
to find an appropriate strategy and method to cope.
Like their counterparts in OECD countries,
labor unions in Taiwan always express openly
their hostility against dispatched work and dispatched
workers. Labor unions in manufacturing
and construction industries and small-sized labor
unions are indeed more inclined to be exclusive to
dispatched workers. Nevertheless, labor unions in
general are not inclined to be as exclusive, the
majority of them even agreeing on the question of
their ability to offer more protection to dispatched
works if membership is allowed.
Most of the dispatched workers are female
workers and none of them are labor union members.
Since job insecurity is the major concern of
dispatched workers, their inclination to join labor
unions seems to be very high.
Though both dispatched workers and labor
unions are not hostile to each other, there still are
8 Please see Cordova, Efren. 1986. “From Full-time
Wage Employment to Atypical Employment: A Major
Shift in the Evolution of Labour Relations?” International
Labour Review. 125(6): 646-648
obstacles to the former to join the latter. One of
them is legal. The Labor Union Act precludes dispatched
workers from joining labor unions in user
enterprises, of which they are not employees. The
act must be amended to provide dispatched workers
with more opportunities to join or participate
in either user enterprise-based or dispatched work
agency-based labor unions.
There is no doubt that job seekers may use
dispatched work as a stepping stone to longer-term
and more secure employment. Their motivation is
to reduce the time and cost to look for jobs in the
triangular arrangement. Female workers, in particular,
find dispatched work to satisfy their demand
for flexibility in work. 9 However, to some
unskilled workers the possibility of being “permanent
dispatched workers” does exist, since skill
deficiency make it difficult for them to land longer-term
and more secure jobs in the labor market. 10
Dispatched work has become widely accepted
by enterprises in Taiwan, especially those
engaged in service industries and with a foreign
capital background, in enlarging their flexibility in
human resource employment. Under such circumstances,
employment relations are bound change.
For instance, the number of workers lacking job
security would increase owing to the development
of dispatch work, and labormanagement relations
in individual enterprise would become tenser
when many peripheral jobs are filled with dispatched
workers. In the face of this transformation,
however, the government in Taiwan cannot make
up its mind where it should stand in the process of
9 Vosko, Leah F. 1998. “Regulating Precariousness?
The Temporary Employment Relationship Under the
NAFTA and the EC Treaty.” Relations Industrielles/
Industrial Relations. 53(1): 129.
10 Polivka, Anne E. & Nardone, Thomas. 1989. “On
the Definition of ‘Contingent Work’.” Monthly Labor
Review. 12(12): 13.