A Legal Study on Labour Rights in the Era of Globalization

• Main Authors: Ching-an Lee, 李慶恩
• Other Authors: Yen-Sen Teng
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2007
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/36342492768212504693

碩士 === 東吳大學 === 法律學系 === 95 === Labour rights have long been discussed in the world economic system since the establishing of the Commission on International Labor Legislation. After the World War One, by the Treaty of Versailles, International Labour Organization（ILO）was set up in 1919 for the purpose of protecting the rights of labours. Due to its inefficiency in the protection of labour rights, a reinforced mechanism was submitted in the draft of the International Trade Organization（ITO）. After the failure of ITO, the successful establishment of the World Trade Organization（WTO）brought a new hope to the old issue. Developed Countries believe that in favor of the trade links to the labour rights will make the “race to bottom” taking no place on multilateral level; it would ensure a “level playing field” in international trade. However, Developing Countries consider it as protectionism, believe it will damage their comparative advantage of cheap labour and production, therefore Developing Countries have been blocking discussions as long as developed countries submit it into WTO’s meeting scheme. The situation comes to a deadlock and remains. ILO has adopted 187 Conventions and 198 Recommendations since the organization has been established in 1919. But most members choose not to ratify Conventions for the purpose to avoid the burden of obligations due to complicated procedures and reporting duties. Meanwhile, the organization lacks of proper enforcement and supervising mechanisms cause the outcome of the adopted Conventions not as the organization expected. Furthermore, the flexible rule in the Charter of ILO was not well apply to the articles of the Conventions, most articles are hard to be practiced by the members in different economic developing level also makes members are not willing to ratify. ILO has noticed these problems and begins to modify them but the circumstance induced the search for the joining solution from other ways. The demand of the protection then turns to those multinational enterprises（MNEs）and transnational corporations（TNCs）since them have the most economic power in the modern international trade than most Countries. With the consumers and the publics take notice of the products they bought and concern of how them been produced. MNEs and TNCs are required to discipline themselves, to obey certain codes, to fulfill their social responsibility by consumers and the publics. Nevertheless, according to the report 「Codes of corporate conduct: Expanded review of their contents」from Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development（OECD）, most codes and agreements target only on the subjects that concern by the general public, which means in the areas that the general public may not be aware of might be ignored by the MNEs and TNCs. The report also points out that many MNEs and TNCs set up the codes for the economic motivations, such as enhancement of company’s reputation or stronger customer loyalty. Moreover, those codes or agreements do not have any enforcement and proper supervising mechanisms but voluntarily, therefore the long lasting implementation would be the problem for those codes or agreements in the future. Countries have the obligations to its people even TNCs and MNEs have more economic power than them, therefore, the question backs to the Countries themselves eventually. Countries have to fulfill the obligations from the international conventions and agreements that they have ratified and transform then into national law or regulations. To have the international consensus on the labour standards, Developing Countries’ point of view is the key and that needs all countries keep working on it.