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The title of CIRA's 50th anniversary conference -- From Theory and Research to Policy and Practice in Work and Employment -- has a nostalgic ring to it. You will recall, perhaps, that large numbers of people, who used to be known as "workers", were "employed" in something called "industry". Significant numbers of these workers joined organizations called "unions" that established collective "relations" with employers. Implausible as it now seems, governments were once so concerned about "industrial relations" (IR) that they sponsored a great deal of IR research and even conducted their own. The Task Force on Labour Relations, appointed in 1966, enlisted virtually every industrial relations and labour law scholar in the country; compiled shelves-full of ambitious studies; and made scores of recommendations, a surprising number of which ended up being adopted by one or another Canadian jurisdiction. --From author's keynote address
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A self-professed sceptic, the author argues that the recognition of a Charter right of employees to organize, bargain and strike would not likely improve labour's lot in an era of declining union membership and influence. In his view, it is doubtful whether Charter litigation has made much of a difference in Canada's social, economic and political life, which is largely determined not by the formal, juridical constitution but by what he calls the "real constitution" - the unequal distribution of wealth and power in society. Moreover, constitutionalization of collec- tive bargaining rights would probably undermine labour law's auton- omy and its effectiveness by promoting the design of industrial relations systems by judges rather than experts, with dysfunctional results. A reconceptualization of the constitutional significance of "labour" does in fact hold the potential to bring about far-reaching consequences for our approach to labour markets, employment standards legislation, pen- sion laws, and the collective bargaining regime. Howeve, the author says, Charter litigation has little capacity to realize that potential, given itsfocus on the juridical constitution and disconnectedness from the real constitution.
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Considerable evidence points to the diminished significance of ‘labour’ as an industrial and political movement, as a sociological descriptor, and as a distinct field of public policy. This prompts the question: what should labour law be for ‘after labour’? The question is especially timely in the context of what Daniel Rogers has called ‘the intellectual economy of catastrophe’. This Chapter explores three possible responses: that labour law should be viewed as a sub-field of constitutional and human rights law; that it should integrate workers into the structures of capitalism to ensure that they contribute to and benefit from its successes; and that it should maintain its historic function of mobilizing workers to defend their rights and interests, but should also encourage cooperation between workers’ organizations and other social movements. -- From editors' introduction
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