LABR 623 - Comparative Labor and Employment Law (3 Credits)

Prerequisite: None
This course is designed to provide students with an overview of labor and employment law in several countries representing different approaches to the fundamental social and legal project of protecting workers’ rights and regulating the relationship between labor and capital. By exploring labor and employment laws that are rooted in different histories, political economies, and sociocultural and legal systems, students will develop a broader understanding and deeper appreciation of the fundamental labor / management issues confronting contemporary industrial societies, including the US. Individual and collective contracts, wages and benefits, working hours and leave entitlements, protections from discrimination and unfair dismissal, the right to organize, bargain collectively, and seek redress of grievances - these are some of the issues that will be explored in a comparative framework. In an era of global supply chains, decentralized production, and the increasingly rapid and transnational movement of capital, goods, information and people, it is important for students of labor to develop a comparative and international perspective on the laws that govern labor relations.