Arguments against and for Reframing Labor Rights as Human Rights Assignment

Arguments against and for Reframing Labor Rights as Human Rights - Assignment Example The labor law on the other hand argues that although the Act may be helpful in filtering and filling some gaps in the framework of legal protection at the workplace, the general effect is quite limited. This is due to the narrow range of employment-related issues to which convention rights apply. In addition, the Act provides limited opportunities for direct and indirect enforcement of employees who claim to be victims of a breach by their employers (Bakan, 1997). The effect of the duty on courts to interpret legislation in a manner which gives effect to convention rights is likely to disappear through the narrow interpretation of the respective rights by the Strasbourg authorities and the equivocal nature f the rights themselves. Incorporation is not a substitute for carefully tailored legislation as it raises questions about the obligations under the international treaties in the social field like the Council of Europe’s Social Charter. The first argument for reframing labor rights as human rights is that human rights approach facilitates partnerships with human rights friends. In addition, the system works well with the inexorable internationalization of labor struggles, it allows the naming, blaming and shaming of labor abusers and it is more responsive to the current political and cultural zeitgeist as compared to the traditional labor arguments (Savage, 2009). A human rights reframing is likely to bring about authoritativeness to labor discourse that will never be achieved by trade unionists (Adams, 2008). The historical curve of labor organizations keeps on changing toward wage compression, equal pay for work of equal value as well as equal benefits bringing up the bottom at a faster pace than advancing the top. Some unions that had gone to two-tier contracts succeeded in reversing them when possible.  Ã‚