Since the beginning of the 1980s, an increase in the number of fixed-term employment contracts has been apparent in a number of free-market-oriented economies. This has been accompanied by amendments to the pertinent legislation. From the early to mid-1980s, a number of EC countries initiated...

The role of private employment agencies in job placement has increased in importance in many European countries during the last decade, but in others the public employment services still exercise a monopoly. The following paper offers an assessment of the experiences to date.

In view of high and persistent unemployment in the European industrialised countries there is growing consensus that more flexibility is needed with regard to both the legal and institutional conditions governing the labour market (external flexibility) and the management of human resources...

From the mid-1980s until 2005 the German labour market was characterised by continuous deregulation. In the period of an improving German labour market, the German governments have since imposed measures to re-regulate the labour market in order to strengthen employees' rights. At the same time...