Social Differentiation examines the economic, political, and normatively defined relations that underlie the construction of social categories. Social differentiation, embedded in inequalities of power, status, wealth, and prestige, affects life chances of individuals as well as the allocation of resources and opportunities. Starting with a theoretical framework that challenges many traditional analyses, the contributors focus on four specific strands of social differentiation: gender, age, race/ethnicity, and locality. They explore the historically specific social practices, policies, and ideologies that produce distinct forms of inequality, in turn revealing and explaining such issues as the formation and maintenance of a gendered order; the privileging of prime-age workers; the penalties incurred by visible minorities in the labour market; the highly disadvantaged position of Aboriginals; and the economic decline of agriculture, resource, and fishing dependent regions. By paying special attention to political processes, norms, and representations, and by indicating how social policies shape economic functioning and relate to normative definitions, this book will interest policy-oriented researchers and decision-makers.
This study examines the problems of poverty and isolation among status Indians in the Prairie Provinces of Canada since the signing of treaties and formation of reserves, with arguments for native self-government.
Investigates the use of race-conscious practices in social policy in Britain and America and evaluates the effectiveness of a range of education and employment policies.
This book argues that traditional complaint-based antidiscrimination laws are inherently inadequate to respond to systemic discrimination in employment. It examines the mechanisms and characteristics of systemic discrimination and the shortcomings of complaint-based laws. Yet these characteristics can also inform employers and government authorities of the kinds of preventive action that help alleviate systemic discrimination at the workplace. In its search for a rational government policy response to systemic discrimination, the book evaluates selected legal regimes which impose proactive obligations on employers to promote equality at the workplace. Proactive regimes are regulatory in nature, rather than adjudicatory. They induce employer compliance through technical assistance, dialogue and regulatory pressure, rather than court orders. By examining the key elements of these regimes the author explains why some proactive regimes function better than others, and why proactive regimes function better than complaint-based laws in addressing systemic discrimination.
No one will deny that labour standards comprise a necessary framework for balanced economic and social development. Yet on a global level such balanced development has not occurred, despite the existence of a rigorous body of international labour law that has been active and growing for almost one hundred years. The implementation of this law devolves upon states; yet many states have failed to honour it. If we are to take serious steps toward a remedy for this situation, there is no better place to start than a thorough, well-researched survey and analysis of existing international labour law - its sources, its content, its historical development, and an informed consideration of the barriers to its full effectiveness. This book is exactly such a resource. It provides in-depth interpretation of the crucial International Labour Organisation (ILO) instruments - Constitution, conventions, declarations, resolutions, and recommendations - as well as such other sources of law as the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises and various model and actual corporate codes of conduct. Among the substantive areas of labour law covered in this book are the following: the relationship between international labour law and economic competition standards on industrial relations collective bargaining and dispute settlement procedures protection of trade unions prohibitions on enforced and child labour promotion of equal opportunity and treatment time and rest provisions wage determination and protection occupational health and safety provisions special issues on non-standard forms of employment foreign and migrant workers social security provisions privacy protection precarious work The presentation demonstrates that these rules and standards offer invaluable benchmarks to governments, judiciaries, employers, and trade unions. The book’s combination of detailed commentary and an overarching social policy will make it especially valuable to legislators, human resources managers, employers’ organizations, trade unions, jurists, and academics concerned with the role of work in our globalized social system. This seventh edition of the book by Jean-Michel Servais analyses the potential of those standards in a globalized world, and the necessary evolution. It examines the actual implementation of those rules in the national context, comparing different experiences. It integrates the latest instruments. It examines the most recent public debates on labour regulation (dealing with health and security at work, personal data, minimum wages, social security, strikes, etc.), updates the bibliography and opens some perspectives for the future work of the global institutions.
An excellent book addressing the dilemmas in the new policy agendas for women and government. Gender relations are being transformed and a new gender settlement is being created. The challenge to ensure the social inclusion of women within this new settlement is complicated by the diversity in women's lives, in particular between those who are qualified and able to engage in employment and those who are not. This wide-ranging book is written by leading academics who have advised key members of the Labour Party.
This is the most comprehensive collection of primary source materials in the labour law and social policy of the European Community ever brought together. With documents and decisions reflecting the state of play at 1st June 2002, it includes: key legislative instruments in EC labour law and social policy; significant associated policy documents produced by the Commission; and important relevant decisions of the European Court of Justice. Since the first edition of this work in 1999, the pace of social policy change and innovation at the level of the European Community has increased dramatically. Indeed, developments during the past three years are little short of remarkable, with particularly important advances in relation to the promotion of information, consultation and participation for workers, along with growing concern for several much broader social policy issues. Recognition of the changes in emphasis and scale for European social policy, and the presence of substantially more material to be included, have caused this edition of the work to be divided into two volumes. Volume I covers social dialogue, industrial relations and labour law, while Volume II is concerned with a wide range of material touching "dignity at work" in the European Community. The arrangement of the material in two self-contained volumes also reflects a division of convenience. Thus, those whose main focus is upon the "labour law" aspects of European social policy may choose to utilise primarily the material contained in the first volume, while those who wish to concentrate more particularly upon fundamental social rights, equal opportunities, anti-discrimination, and dignity at work might wish to take advantage of the framework presented in the second volume. Advocates, judges, policy-makers, scholars and students will all appreciate this essential sourcebook in EC labour law and social policy.
