Perhaps no other country in recent years has witnessed greater change in its collective bargaining framework than the UK. This paper describes the dramatic developments and their consequences. Like Gaul, it is in three parts. The first part charts the six major pieces of legislation;...

German law guaranteeing works councils is not a datum. The thrust of legislation has changed significantly on a number of occasions since 1920. The most recent legal change in the form of the Works Constitution Reform Act marks a controversial swing in favor of works council formation and...

This pioneering comparative study of Japanese and American labor law reveals a labor-relations system superficially resembling our own but shaped by an entirely different culture, and with a marked impact on Japan's economic success. Among Gould's findings are that the Japanese have adopted...

In this paper, we examine and compare the impact of American and Japanese labor law on the relative bargaining power of the labor and management within the context of the new global economy based on information technology. We begin by providing a simple economic definition of bargaining power...

In the event of a legal strike affecting the provision of some public services and the public and parapublic sectors, the parties in the dispute must ensure that the activity is partly maintained due to its critical nature. In other words, the legislator sometimes compels them to provide...

Widespread adoption of mandatory representation votes and express protection of employer speech invite employer anti-union campaigns during union organizing, including employer-held captive audience meetings. Therefore, the problem of whether and how to restrict employers’ captive audience...

Hoffman Plastics, the poster child of immigration gone wrong, is popularly viewed as a case that imposed penalties unique to immigrant workers. The Supreme Court decision in Hoffman Plastics can relieve an employer that illegally fires an undocumented worker from owing back pay for violations of...

Multiemployer collective bargaining relationships between unions and employer associations easily devolve into legalized cartels. Once unions establish themselves as the bargaining representative for employers’ employees, the employers have much to gain from banding together as an association,...

The National Labor Relations Board's (NLRB's) 2004 Brown University decision held that graduate student teaching and research assistants were not employees, and therefore, were not protected by the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Deciding whether individuals are employees as defined by the...

The Supreme Court’s recent decisions interpreting the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) in the employment context generally prioritize arbitration over workers’ labor law rights. The majority in Epic Systems upheld mandatory individual employment arbitration agreements despite their conflict...