Documents Zbyszewska, Ania 6 results

"This special issue is the result of a scholarly dialogue in which the guest-editors and the article contributors engaged in the context of the international symposium ‘The Labour-Environment Nexus: Legal Perspectives and Beyond'. The special issue contributes to the existing labour law literature on the labour-environment nexus by charting new territory and populating this emerging field of inquiry within labour law – a field which provides fertile ground for reexamining established concepts and boundaries within our area, exploring its relationship to and interaction with other disciplines, and its transformative potential. After presenting the background to this special issue, and setting out some key research questions for the debate, the guesteditors provide an overview of the main issues addressed in the articles, concluding with an outline for a future research agenda in the field of the labour-environment nexus."

"The existential threat posed by anthropogenic climate change is a powerful indictment of contemporary capitalism. It requires us to directly confront modern capitalism as a civilizing project that renders irrational and obsolete other possibilities of organizing economic and social life. Adopting a decolonial perspective that incorporates theories of racial capitalism, coloniality, and social reproduction, we examine how racial/colonial capitalism articulates the labourenvironment nexus in ways that facilitate or undermine different sorts of livelihoods and socioecologies. We then reflect on how the differentiation and hierarchization that flow from exploitation (labour) and expropriation (labour and land) are reproduced in labour law's epistemology, evidencing its coloniality. We conclude with a call to embrace epistemic pluralism as crucial to developing labour law that reflects and facilitates heterogeneous livelihoods and ecopolitical justice."

"Age has become a crucial factor in labour market regulation measures adopted in Poland in recent years. Inspired by the Europe 2020 strategy of ‘smart, sustainable and inclusive growth', Poland's own long-term development plans, especially those adopted by the former Civic Platform-led administration, place a significant emphasis on extended working lives as essential to economic sustainability. Due to low employment rates among Poland's senior age cohorts, and the shortfall between the actual and statutory age of retirement, many of the country's Active Aging measures have focused primarily on employment activation of workers over the age 50. The supply-side activation techniques and demand-side incentives, combined with pension system reforms, have been the key measures designed to encourage longer working lives. However, there is a need to consider the extent to which these measures are achievable and adequate. From a feminist, socio-legal perspective, this article critically evaluates Poland's Active Aging policy and reforms by locating them at the intersection of the transformation and restructuring of the Polish welfare state and the re-regulation of the country's labour market according to neoliberal values. Two key points of interest, or sources of tension, are identified: the extent to which efforts to bolster older people's employment participation take adequate account of labour market conditions, and the roles that older people play in the provision of care and other activities involved in the maintenance of living standards. As the article shows, the potentially negative consequences of this policy trajectory for the well-being of older people in and out of the labour market, and for the organization of care and the broader processes of social reproduction, though potentially exacerbated by current policies, have tended to be downplayed in policy and legal reform."

"The European Commission's 2015 Roadmap on work-life balance cites a comprehensive policy and regulatory approach as essential to addressing the interrelated goals of reconciling work and family, the sharing of care work between women and men, and attaining substantive gender equality. However, the EU's key instrument setting ‘normal' hours of work standards, the Working Time Directive, is absent from the measures identified as central to such a comprehensive approach. Attributing this omission in part to the Directive's historic evolution, its controversial and unsettled status, and its apparent gender ‘neutrality', this article argues that work-life balance strategies must incorporate standard working-time considerations if they are to be effective; likewise, a more meaningful engagement with and the advancement of workfamily reconciliation and equality goals is crucial for the Working Time Directive's continued relevance. Failing such a more obvious articulation between the two sets of policies, a number of goals currently on the EU agenda will be difficult to attain, as supporting caregivers and redistributing unpaid work between women and men, but also objectives of active aging and Europe's long-term social sustainability, require the development of more sustainable work models and working-time practices."

"On 1 July 2009, the Anti-Crisis Act temporarily amended the working-time provisions of the Polish Labour Code to allow for more flexibility and more efficient deployment of labour during the economic downturn. Following a long-term trend in Polish labour law reform and taking its cue from the European Union (EU) Working Time Directive, one of the key changes the Act introduced was a provision allowing the extension of reference periods for the calculation of average weekly hours to a maximum of twelve months. Long reference periods have become a common feature of many European working-time regimes. As this paper argues, however, Polish specificities make this form of flexibility particularly problematic. In the context of Poland's entrenched overtime culture, insecure, competitive, and unequal labour market, and high level of employment law violations (mainly in connection with working time), the extension of working hours threatens to strain the already difficult working conditions for many Poles. With the existing gender dynamics, insufficient measures for work-family reconciliation, and scarce state provision for care of dependants, what effects will the extension of working time have on the conditions of women workers? This paper examines the post-transition trajectory of Polish working-time reform and questions the sustainability of the working-time regime it attempts to create."

"Agreenment – A Green Mentality for Collective Bargaining investigates the role of social dialogue and collective bargaining in promoting sustainable development and the Just Transition to a low-carbon economy in six countries: France, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and the UK. The Agreenment project is co-funded by the European Commission, DG Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion, under budget heading VP/2017/004 (Grant Agreement VP/2017/004/0037), Improving expertise in the field of industrial relations."