Nicolas de Guzman Chorny, Amy Raub, Alison Earle and Jody Heymann
Nearly every country has committed to protect children from work that could be harmful or interfere with their education by ratifying the International Labour Organization Minimum…
Abstract
Purpose
Nearly every country has committed to protect children from work that could be harmful or interfere with their education by ratifying the International Labour Organization Minimum Age Convention (C138). Yet there is little transparency and accountability around whether countries have followed through on these commitments by passing legislation to protect children from work. The paper aims to discuss these issues.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper reports on analyses conducted of child labor legislation from all 193 United Nations member states to determine whether countries that have committed to ending child labor have taken the first step by passing legislation to protect children and youth from: work that is likely to be hazardous, work that is likely to interfere with their education and work that is harmful to their healthy development.
Findings
Findings show one in five ratifiers legally allow children to do hazardous work, and a similar number permit admission to employment at a young age. Moreover, legislative loopholes significantly undermine the protections that do exist in many countries.
Originality/value
Existing reporting mechanisms sometimes obscure whether central legal protections are in place, make cross-country comparisons difficult and impede the analysis of possible relationships between policies and outcomes across countries. This paper illustrates a novel approach to provide transparency and accountability on whether countries are meeting child labor commitments by using quantitative, globally comparable policy indicators.
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Aleta Sprague, Amy Raub and Jody Heymann
As coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) spreads globally, the economic and health consequences are disproportionately affecting marginalized workers. However, countries' existing…
Abstract
Purpose
As coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) spreads globally, the economic and health consequences are disproportionately affecting marginalized workers. However, countries' existing labor and social security laws often exclude the most vulnerable workers from coverage, exacerbating existing inequalities. Guaranteeing the rights to adequate income even when ill, decent working conditions and nondiscrimination in constitutions may provide a foundation for protecting rights universally, safeguarding against counterproductive austerity measures, and providing a normative foundation for equality and inclusion as economies recover. The purpose of this article is to examine the prevalence of these rights globally and assess some of their early impacts amid the pandemic.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors created and analyzed a database of constitutional rights for all 193 United Nations member states. All constitutions were double coded by an international multidisciplinary, multilingual team of researchers.
Findings
This study finds that 54% of countries take some approach to guaranteeing income security in their constitutions, including 23% that guarantee income security during illness. Thirty-one percent guarantee the right to safe working conditions. Only 36% of constitutions explicitly guarantee at least some aspect of nondiscrimination at work. With respect to equal rights broadly, constitutional protections are most common on the basis of sex (85%), followed by religion (78%), race/ethnicity (76%), socioeconomic status (59%), disability (27%), citizenship (22%), sexual orientation (5%) and gender identity (3%). Across almost all areas, protections for rights are far more common in constitutions adopted more recently.
Originality/value
This is the first study to systematically examine protections for income security and decent work, together with nondiscrimination, in the constitutions of all 193 UN member states.
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Jody Heymann, Sheleana Varvaro-Toney, Amy Raub, Firooz Kabir and Aleta Sprague
While only one aspect of fulfilling equal rights, effectively addressing workplace discrimination is integral to creating economies, and countries, that allow for everyone's full…
Abstract
Purpose
While only one aspect of fulfilling equal rights, effectively addressing workplace discrimination is integral to creating economies, and countries, that allow for everyone's full and equal participation.
Design/methodology/approach
Labor, anti-discrimination, and other relevant pieces of legislation were identified through the International Labor Organization's NATLEX database, supplemented with legislation identified through country websites. For each country, two researchers independently coded legislation and answered questions about key policy features. Systematic quality checks and outlier verifications were conducted.
Findings
More than 1 in 5 countries do not explicitly prohibit racial discrimination in employment. 54 countries fail to prohibit unequal pay based on race. 107 countries prohibit racial and/or ethnic discrimination but do not explicitly require employers to take preventive measures against discrimination. The gaps are even larger with respect to multiple and intersectional discrimination. 112 countries fail to prohibit discrimination based on both migration status and race and/or ethnicity; 103 fail to do so for foreign national origin and race and/or ethnicity.
Practical implications
Both recent and decades-old international treaties and agreements require every country globally to uphold equal rights regardless of race. However, specific national legislation that operationalizes these commitments and prohibits discrimination in the workplace is essential to their impact. This research highlights progress and gaps that must be addressed.
Originality/value
This is the first study to measure legal protections against employment discrimination based on race and ethnicity in all 193 UN countries. This study also examines protection in all countries from discrimination on the basis of characteristics that have been used in a number of settings as a proxy for racial/ethnic discrimination and exclusion, including SES, migration status, and religion.
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Jody Heymann, Bijetri Bose, Willetta Waisath, Amy Raub and Michael McCormack
There is substantial evidence of discrimination at work across countries and powerful evidence that antidiscrimination laws can make a difference. This study examines the extent…
Abstract
Purpose
There is substantial evidence of discrimination at work across countries and powerful evidence that antidiscrimination laws can make a difference. This study examines the extent of protections from discrimination at work in countries around the world and which groups were best covered.
Design/methodology/approach
This study assesses legal protections in hiring, pay, promotions/demotions, terminations and harassment for 13 different groups across 193 countries using a database the authors created based on analysis of labor codes, antidiscrimination legislation, equal opportunity legislation and penal codes. Differences in levels of protection were examined across social groups and areas of work, as well as by country income level using Chi-square tests.
Findings
Protection from gender and racial/ethnic discrimination at work was the most common, and protection across migrant status, foreign national origin, sexual orientation and gender identity was among the least. For all groups, discrimination was more often prohibited in hiring than in promotion/demotion. There was inconsistent protection from harassment and retaliation.
Research limitations/implications
Addressing discrimination at work will require a broad range of synergistic approaches including guaranteeing equal legal rights, implementation and enforcement of laws and norm change. This study highlights where legislative progress has been made and where major gaps remain.
Originality/value
This article presents findings from an original database containing the first data on laws to prevent discrimination in the workplace in all 193 countries around the world. The study analyzes legal protections for a wide range of groups and considers a full range of workplace protections.
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This chapter focuses on the Trump administration's health policies, with an emphasis on its efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act and its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It…
Abstract
This chapter focuses on the Trump administration's health policies, with an emphasis on its efforts to repeal the Affordable Care Act and its response to the COVID-19 pandemic. It assesses those policies both in the context of the administration's broader goals and motivations, and in the context of systemic deficits and deficiencies in American health policy. I argue that failures of health policy and health security in the face of the pandemic reflect those longstanding weaknesses, much more so than the administration's actions (or inaction).
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Estelle van Tonder, Daniel J. Petzer and Sam Fullerton
Customers’ proactive helping behaviours involving personal initiative taking may present an effective solution for assisting other customers in avoiding harmful brands…
Abstract
Purpose
Customers’ proactive helping behaviours involving personal initiative taking may present an effective solution for assisting other customers in avoiding harmful brands. Accordingly, this study aims to propose a model explaining the role of positive psychological capital (self-efficacy and optimism) in influencing customers’ proactive helping behaviours involving personal initiative taking. The study additionally provides greater clarity regarding the moderating effect of emotional self-control within the suggested model.
Design/methodology/approach
Survey data were collected from 256 respondents in South Africa, who reported on their perceptions and the degree to which they engage in proactive helping behaviours to assist other customers in avoiding harmful brands. Hypotheses were tested using regression analysis.
Findings
General self-efficacy and social optimism influence customers’ proactive helping behaviours. Emotional self-control moderates the indirect effect of general self-efficacy on customers’ proactive helping behaviours through social optimism.
Research limitations/implications
Greater insight is obtained into the interplay between factors representing a positive psychological state and self-control of negative emotions and these factors’ effect on customers’ proactive helping behaviours involving personal initiative taking.
Originality/value
The research extends knowledge of proactive helping behaviours involving personal initiative taking to assist other customers in avoiding harmful brands and subsequently provides a baseline for further research in this regards. Practically, the research is useful to social agents of society concerned with promoting responsible purchasing practices.
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Janine Burghardt and Klaus Möller
This study examines the relationship between the use of management controls and the perception of meaningful work. Meaningful work is an important driver of individual performance…
Abstract
Purpose
This study examines the relationship between the use of management controls and the perception of meaningful work. Meaningful work is an important driver of individual performance of managers, and employees and can be enabled by sufficient use of management controls. The purpose of this paper is to address this issue.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on bibliometric analyses and a structured literature review of academic research studies from the organizational, management and accounting literature, the authors develop a conceptual model of the relationship between the use of management controls and the perception of meaningful work.
Findings
First, the authors propose that the use of formal management controls in a system (i.e. the levers of the control framework) is more powerful than using unrelated formal controls only. Second, they suggest that the interaction of a formal control system together with informal controls working as a control package can even stretch the perception of meaningful work. Third, they argue that the intensity of the control use matters to enhance the perception of meaningful work (inverted u-shaped relationship).
Originality/value
This study presents the first conceptual model of the relationship between the use of management controls and the perception of meaningful work. It provides valuable implications for practice and future research in the field of performance management.