Labour and social policies in Latin America during the COVID-19 pandemic and its recovery

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Acknowledgments I would like to thank Paul Cammack, Adam David Morton, Stuart Shields and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments on an earlier draft. Notes 1. James D. Wolfensohn & François Bourguignon, Development and Poverty Reduction: Looking Back, Looking Ahead (World Bank, 2004), p. 32. 2. Paul Cammack, ‘Neoliberalism, the World Bank, and the New Politics of Development’, in Uma Kothari & Martin Minogue (eds), Development Theory and Practice: Critical Perspectives (Palgrave, 2002), pp. 157–78; Paul Cammack, ‘The Mother of all Governments: The World Bank's Matrix for Global Governance’, in Rorden Wilkinson & Steve Hughes (eds), Global Governance: Critical Perspectives (Routledge, 2002), pp. 36–53; Paul Cammack, ‘The Governance of Global Capitalism’, Historical Materialism, Vol. 11, No. 2 (2003), pp. 37–59; and Paul Cammack, ‘What the World Bank Means by Poverty Reduction and Why it Matters’, New Political Economy, Vol. 9, No. 2 (2004), pp. 189–211. 3. Cammack, ‘Neoliberalism’, p. 178. 4. Cammack, ‘The Mother of all Governments’, p. 50. 5. Cammack, ‘What the World Bank Means by Poverty Reduction’, p. 197. Despite Stiglitz's somewhat acrimonious departure in January 2000, his legacy endures insofar as the logic of competition remains at the heart of World Bank political economy. The 2005 World Development Report, for example, states that that ‘a good investment climate encourages firms to invest by removing unjustified costs, risks, and barriers to competition’. What is required, therefore, is ‘an environment that fosters the competitive processes that Joseph Schumpeter called “creative destruction” – an environment in which firms have opportunities and incentives to test their ideas, strive for success, and prosper or fail’. World Bank, World Development Report 2005: A Better Investment Climate for Everyone (World Bank & Oxford University Press, 2004), p. 2. 6. Though the frame of reference for the central argument of this article is Cammack's scholarship on the governance of global capitalism, the utility of the analysis being presented certainly extends to fall within a variety of contemporary historical materialist scholarship. For example, the article could easily complement recent work on the ‘transnationalisation’ of the state. See William I. Robinson, A Theory of Global Capitalism: Production, Class, and State in a Transnational World (The John Hopkins University Press, 2004); and, for an application of the theory, William I. Robinson, Transnational Conflicts: Central America, Social Change, and Globalization (Verso, 2003). It could also serve as useful postscript to the analysis of the transnationalisation of the Mexican state by Adam David Morton, ‘Structural Change and Neoliberalism in Mexico: “Passive Revolution” in the Global Political Economy’, Third World Quarterly, Vol. 24, No. 4 (2003), pp. 631–53. However, I should stress that my research seeks to develop an approach that places investigatory primacy upon the study of ‘social form’ in capitalism and, as such, advances a different kind of dialectical analysis to that operationalised by Robinson, Morton and other contemporary theorists of ‘global economy’. By approaching the question of national reforms from a different methodological standpoint, the wider research of which this article is constitutive has arrived at qualitatively different conclusions to those of Robinson and others. For further clarification of this methodological distinction and why it is important, see the exchange between Andreas Bieler & Adam David Morton, ‘Globalisation, the State and Class Struggle: A “Critical Economy” Engagement with Open Marxism’, British Journal of Politics and International Relations, Vol. 5, No. 4 (2003), pp. 467–99; and Werner Bonefeld, ‘Critical Economy and Social Constitution: A Reply to Bieler and Morton’, British Journal of Politics and International Relations, Vol. 6, No. 2 (2004), pp. 231–37. 7. Mark E. Williams, Market Reforms in Mexico: Coalitions, Institutions, and the Politics of Policy Change (Rowman and Littlefield, 2001), p. 3. 8. See Nora Lustig, Mexico: The Remaking of an Economy (Brookings Institution, 1995); Gerardo Otero (ed.), Neoliberalism Revisited: Economic Restructuring and Mexico's Political Future (Westview Press, 1996); and Susanne Soederberg, ‘State, Crisis, and Capital Accumulation in Mexico’, Historical Materialism, Vol. 9, No. 1 (2001), pp. 61–84. 9. Here, I am paraphrasing Wolfensohn & Bourguignon, Development and Poverty Reduction, p. 2. 10. Joseph Stiglitz, ‘More Instruments and Broader Goals: Moving Toward the Post-Washington Consensus’, The WIDER Annual Lecture, Helsinki, Finland, 7 January 1998; and Joseph Stiglitz, ‘Towards a New Paradigm for Development Strategies, Policies and Processes’, Prebisch Lecture, UNCTAD, Geneva, 19 October 1998. 11. Joseph Stiglitz, ‘Distribution, Efficiency, and Voice: Designing the Second Generation of Reforms’, speech delivered during conference sponsored by the Brazilian Ministry of Land Reform and the World Bank, Asset Distribution, Poverty and Economic Growth, Brasilia, 14 July 1998. 12. Principal authors of the Viewpoints reports have included Shahid Javed Burki, a former finance minister for Pakistan, former World Bank vice president for the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) region, and most recently the chief executive officer of Washington DC-based EMP Financial Advisors; Sebastian Edwards, a Chicago-trained economist, columnist for the Wall Street Journal, consultant to numerous international organisations and multinational firms, former World Bank Chief Economist for the LAC, and currently Henry Ford II Professor of International Business Economics at the Anderson School of Management, California; Guillermo E. Perry, former Colombian minister of finance and public credit, former Colombian senator and constitutional assemblyman, and director of LAC policy research at the Bank since 1996; and David de Ferranti, chair of the Rockefeller Foundation's finance committee, former director at the Rand policy research institute, and current Bank vice president for LAC. 13. This ‘unfinished’/‘second generation’/‘incomplete’ discourse is not confined to the Viewpoints series. See, for example, José Luis Guasch, Labor Market Reform and Job Creation: The Unfinished Agenda in Latin American and Caribbean Countries (World Bank, 1999); and Indermit S. Gill, Claudio E. Montenegro & Dörte Dömeland (eds), Crafting Labor Policy: Techniques and Lessons from Latin America (World Bank & Oxford University Press, 2002). Nor is it confined to World Bank reports for the LAC region – see, for example, United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Productive Development in Open Economies (ECLAC, 2004). 14. Shahid Javed Burki & Sebastian Edwards, Latin America after Mexico: Quickening the Pace, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 1996), p. 11. 15. Shahid Javed Burki & Sebastian Edwards, Dismantling the Populist State: The Unfinished Revolution in Latin America and the Caribbean, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 1996), p. 25. 16. The most explicit and, at the same time, accessible exposition of this ‘deep interventionist’ competition logic can be found in World Bank, Transition – The First Ten Years: Analysis and Lessons for Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union (World Bank, 2002). 17. Burki & Edwards, Dismantling the Populist State, p. 27. 18. See, for example, Juan Luis Londoño, Poverty, Inequality, and Human Capital Development in Latin America, 1950–2025, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 1996). 19. Shahid Javed Burki & Guillermo E. Perry, The Long March: A Reform Agenda for Latin America and the Caribbean in the Next Decade, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 1997). 20. Ibid., p. 57. 21. Shahid Javed Burki & Guillermo E. Perry, Beyond the Washington Consensus: Institutions Matter, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 1998). 22. Ibid., p. 25. 23. Ibid., pp. 34–6. 24. Shahid Javed Burki, Guillermo E. Perry & William Dillinger, Beyond the Center: Decentralizing the State, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 1999), pp. 1–7. 25. David de Ferranti, Guillermo E. Perry, Indermit S. Gill & Luis Servén, with Francisco H. G. Ferreira, Nadeem Ilah, William F. Maloney & Martin Rama, Securing our Future in a Global Economy, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 2000), pp. 1–12. 26. Ibid., p. 123. 27. Ibid., p. 125. 28. David de Ferranti, Guillermo E. Perry, Daniel Lederman & William F. Maloney, From Natural Resources to the Knowledge Economy: Trade and Job Quality (World Bank, 2002). 29. Ibid., p. 2. 30. David de Ferranti, Guillermo E. Perry, Indermit Gill, J. Luis Guasch, William F. Maloney, Carolina Sánchez-Páramo & Norbert Schady, Closing the Gap in Education and Technology, Latin American and Caribbean Studies (World Bank, 2003). 31. Ibid., p. 10. 32. David de Ferranti, Guillermo E. Perry, Francisco H. G. Ferreira & Michael Walton, Inequality in Latin America and the Caribbean: Breaking with History?, Latin American and Caribbean Studies Viewpoints (World Bank, 2004). 33. Nikki Craske, ‘Another Mexican Earthquake? An Assessment of the 2 July 2000 Elections’, Government and Opposition, Vol. 36, No. 1 (2001), pp. 40–1. 34. Vicente Fox Quesada, A Los Pinos: Recuento autobiográfico y politico (Editorial Oceano de México, 1999), pp. 112–3. 35. Ramón Muñoz Gutiérrez, Pasión por un Buen Gobierno: Administración por Calidad en el gobierno de Vicente Fox, en Guanajuato (Editorial Grijalbo, 2003), pp. 9–35, 57–62, and 23. Further evidence of Fox's politics can be found in his involvement with prominent Latin American ‘third way’ political forums, such as the Grupo Mangabeira and the Grupo San Angel. Fox's first foreign minister discusses this involvement, and the content of the resulting ‘Buenos Aires consensus’, in Jorge G. Castañeda, ‘Mexico: Permuting Power’, New Left Review, No. 7 (2001), pp. 17–32. Such forums have been criticised for espousing ‘the ultimate goal of a market society of possessive individuals’: see John Gledhill, ‘Some Conceptual and Substantive Limitations of Contemporary Western (Global) Discourses of Rights and Social Justice’, in Christopher Abel & Colin M. Lewis (eds), Exclusion & Engagement: Social Policy in Latin America (Institute of Latin American Studies, 2002), pp. 131–47. 36. The Mexican Employers' Confederation (COPARMEX) had been formed in 1929 by conservative, and predominantly Catholic, Monterrey-based industrialists united in their opposition to the social reformism of the Mexican government at this time and, in particular, to the newly adopted Federal Labour Law. COPARMEX went on to cultivate a number of voluntary organisations that would later provide support for the National Action Party (PAN) and form the neopanista wing of the party, to which Fox is most closely aligned. 37. Roderic Ai Camp, Mexico's Mandarins: Crafting a Power Elite for the Twenty-First Century (University of California Press, 2002), p. 269. 38. Ibid., p. 270. 39. Roderic Ai Camp, Politics in Mexico: The Democratic Transformation (Oxford University Press, 2003), p. 183. 40. Poder Ejecutivo Federal, Plan Nacional de Desarrollo, 2001–2006 (Poder Ejecutivo Federal, 2001). 41. Ibid., pp. 21–2, my translation. 42. Secretaría del Trabajo y Previsión Social, Programa Nacional de Política Laboral, 2001–6 (Secretaría del Trabajo y Previsión Social, 2001). 43. Ibid., p. 112, my translation. 44. The discursive correspondence between the Fox government's policy documents and World Bank, World Development Report 2005: A Better Investment Climate for Everyone, is striking: ‘An investment climate that encourages growth creates sustainable jobs and opportunities for microentrepreneurs – the key pathways out of poverty for poor people, pathways that will become more crowded with coming demographic changes (p. 19). … It also encourages people to invest more in their own education and skills to take advantage of better jobs in the future. There is thus a two-way link between skills and jobs, with an improved investment climate complementing efforts to improve human development (p. 33). … There are, however, short-term costs due to changes in job characteristics and greater labour mobility in a modern, productive economy. This reinforces the importance of looking at labour market policies in the context of broader strategies, including efforts to foster a more skilled and adaptable workforce and to help workers cope with change’ (p. 142). 45. Gustavo Castro Soto, ‘The World Bank in Mexico’, Chiapas al Día, No. 236, 22 March 2001, http://www.ciepac.org/bulletins/ingles/ing236.htm, accessed on 31 January 2005. 46. ‘Directivos del Banco Mundial se reúnen con presidente de México y reafirman confianza en la economía del país’, World Bank press release, 20 January 2003. 47. See Dan Morrow (Lead Researcher), ‘Mexico: Country Assistance Evaluation’, Operations Evaluation Department, World Bank, 28 June 2001; and the author's interview with a Senior Operations Officer, Colombia and Mexico Country Management Unit, International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (World Bank Group), Mexico City, 1 December 2003. 48. Other Mexican officials present at the meetings included: Carlos Gadsen (Director General of the National Institute for Federalism and Municipal Development); Angel Gurría (Minister of Finance and Public Credit); Rodrigo Morales (Director of the Centre for Economic Investigation); Ricardo Ochoa (a Director General in the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit); Moises Pineda (now an executive at the World Bank); Cecilia Ramos (former Minister for Economic Affairs in the Mexican Embassy to the UK, and now a representative of Mexico at the World Bank); and Eduardo Sojo (the Presidential Coordinator of Public Policy). 49. Marcel M. Giugale, Olivier Lafourcade & Vinh H. Nguyen (eds), Mexico: A Comprehensive Development Agenda for the New Era (World Bank, 2001). 50. World Bank Comprehensive Development Secretariat, ‘Comprehensive Development Framework: Implementation Experience in Low- and Middle-Income Countries – Progress Report’, 26 April 2002, p. 59. 51. See Marcel M. Giugale, ‘A Comprehensive Development Agenda for the New Era: Synthesis’, in Giugale et al., Mexico: A Comprehensive Development Agenda, p. 3. 52. Ibid., pp. 15–16; also William F. Maloney, with Gladys Lopez-Acevedo & Ana Revenga, ‘Labor Markets’, in Giugale et al., Mexico: A Comprehensive Development Agenda, pp. 511–36. 53. World Bank, ‘Memorandum of the President of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and International Finance Corporation to the Executive Directors on a Country Assistance Strategy of the World Bank Group for the United Mexican States’, Report No. 23849-ME, Colombia–Mexico–Venezuela Country Management Unit, Latin America and the Caribbean Region, 23 April 2002; Ulrich Lächler (Lead Researcher), ‘Mexico: Enhancing Factor Productivity Growth’, Country Economic Memorandum, Report No. 17392-ME, Mexico Department, Latin America and the Caribbean Region, World Bank, 31 August 1998; and World Bank, ‘Memorandum of the President of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the International Finance Corporation to the Executive Directors on a Country Assistance Strategy Progress Report of the World Bank Group for the United Mexican States’, Report No. 22147-ME, Colombia–Mexico–Venezuela Country Management Unit, Latin America and the Caribbean Region, 21 May 2001. 54. Morrow, ‘Mexico: Country Assistance Evaluation’. 55. Ibid., p. iii. 56. ‘Memorandum to the Executive Directors and the President’, 28 June 2001, in Morrow, ‘Mexico: Country Assistance Evaluation’. 57. World Bank, ‘Memorandum of the President of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and International Finance Corporation to the Executive Directors on a Country Assistance Strategy of the World Bank Group for the United Mexican States’, p. 1, emphasis added. 58. Ibid., pp. 43–50. 59. Ibid., p. 22, emphasis added. 60. Official Diary, Poder Ejecutivo Secretaría de Relaciones Exteriores, 6 December 2001. 61. Gillette Hall (Lead Researcher), Estrategia Desarrollo de los Estados del Sur de México, Vols. I and II (World Bank, 2003). 62. ‘México necesita combatir la pobreza en el sur para consolidar su prosperidad económica’, World Bank press release, No. 2004/012/MEX, 25 September 2003. 63. Olivier Lafourcade cited in ‘World Bank Team Offers Policy Menu’, http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/LACEXT/MEXICOEXTN/0,,contentMDK:20018971∼menuPK:338416∼pagePK:141137∼piPK:141127∼theSitePK:338397,00.html (accessed on 31 January 2005). 64. The term ‘official’ here refers to those unions that were given privileged political access to state resources under the PRI and, as a result, were able to broaden membership and defeat their adversaries within the labour movement. The dominant position of these ‘state-corporatist’ unions remained unchallenged until the 1980s and the onset of neoliberal restructuring. 65. Lächler, ‘Mexico: Enhancing Factor Productivity Growth’, pp. 91–2; Graciela Bensusán, ‘A New Scenario for Mexican Trade Unions: Changes in the Structure of Political and Economic Opportunities’, in Kevin J. Middlebrook (ed.), Dilemmas of Political Change in Mexico (Institute of Latin American Studies and Center for US–Mexican Studies, 2004), pp. 261–5; see also James G. Samstad, ‘Corporatism and Democratic Transition: State and Labor During the Salinas and Zedillo Administrations’, Latin American Politics and Society, Vol. 44, No. 4 (2002), pp. 1–28. 66. Giugale, ‘A Comprehensive Development Agenda for the New Era’, p. 15. 67. Maloney, with Lopez-Acevedo & Revenga, ‘Labor Markets’, p. 513, emphasis added. 68. This follows the typology of Mexican labour unions in Bensusán, ‘A New Scenario’, pp. 237–85. Bensusán's third type is ‘movement unionism’, which refers to those unions that are insistent about their opposition to neoliberalism and openly seek to challenge the state. 69. Abascal was quoted as follows in La Jornada, 26 May 2001: ‘In effect, there is a shared vision about the necessity to modernize labor legislation. We are in agreement with the modernization of this legislation, but we are in agreement with everyone: national and international investors, the World Bank, and workers. Everyone is in agreement because it is necessary to do it’ (my translation). 70. Kevin J. Middlebrook, ‘Mexico's Democratic Transitions: Dynamics and Prospects’, in Kevin J. Middlebrook (ed), Dilemmas of Political Change in Mexico (Institute of Latin American Studies and Center for US–Mexican Studies, 2004), p. 36. The UNT stress in their counter-proposal for labour reform that ‘the choice is not flexibility versus justice’, and neither is it between ‘productivity and the profit of the firm versus the rights of workers’ – see Unión Nacional de Trabajadores, ‘Por un Nueva Ley Federal del Trabajo para la reestructuración productiva y la transición democrática’, Trabajadores, No. 30 (2002), my translation. The compulsion to make this clear testifies to the extent of the UNT's suspicion as regards the Fox government's for labour The the state to to workers is that which from being market not that which from or Mexico Labor and a of the Mexico Labor the United and the Center of the See ‘Por un Nueva Ley Federal del Trabajo para la reestructuración productiva y la transición Secretaría de y Programa Nacional de del Desarrollo, (Secretaría de y 2002). World Bank, Country Economic and for Report Mexico and Country Management Unit, Latin America and the Caribbean Region, 30 July 2002, p. 16. See Ramos de and in Policy The First of Vicente Center for International Development at University No. 2001). Fox his efforts at public support a and the on on two in See Ramos de pp. the for reform was the of in the form of a ‘The New Public Jornada, 28 March 2001). For a of see Secretaría de y First of and of the Financial Reforms’, 7 May 2001. See ‘The Political of in Mexico’, in and S. (eds), and in Latin America University Press, pp. The term was by Guillermo with reference to the of in and Carlos in A key of these was the in which ‘the the of a the of the & Latin America 2003), p. the between Fox and do not here for et al., out that their as for their own to the of the of and to policy in a by market (p. have Fox with to his own the has an of in the see Camp, Politics in p. ‘a study of the that the on a of the time with for Fox has had an with prominent and and de de had a with Carlos which Fox had to a that the of Guanajuato in Fox's to for president his de as to the and his of his with the See Mexico: as It Vol. No. (2002), pp. For Fox had to at the that the reforms would further of a to the during meetings a See La Jornada, 14 December 2000 and 21 December La Jornada, 6 April 2001. La Jornada, April 2001. During 2002, a reform to the development the Federal of and to Public a reform to the of the and the of the See Secretaría de y ‘The Executive to the Economic for had been a of the Grupo San Angel with Fox and had public of support for the government July 2003). and Mexico & Report, January ‘The of Vicente Fox is ‘the president will to in Los but be changes from his like other but be a political in July 2003). The a Years: The and Fox as a somewhat of an 2003). See Nacional a la y de los de la Nacional de México, 2004). as to the number of to the Ministry for the there were 28 2003), there were Labor & 2003). Mexico Labor & December and La Jornada, December 2003. in December 2003. quoted in March For a further of the of reform under Fox, see ‘The of The Political Economy of Reform in Mexico’, Capital & Class, No. pp. La Jornada, December See, for example, World Bank, ‘Memorandum of the President of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and International Finance Corporation to the Executive Directors on a Country Assistance Strategy of the World Bank Group in with the United Mexican States’, Report Colombia and Mexico Country Management Unit, Latin America and the Caribbean Region, April and M. at an Vol. No. 1 (2004), pp. but other example, the on the Strategy key for growth within the the of barriers to the climate for and labour See the The for growth and Report from the Group by for Official of the 2004).

The aim of this chapter is to interrogate what, if anything, is gained by reformulating labour law as a field of reflexive law and governance. The tradition of Oxford labour law scholarship stretching back to Kahn-Freund has not of course typically deployed the terminology of ‘reflexive law’, though it has been preoccupied—as reflexive law scholarship is—with labour law’s regulatory techniques. At its simplest, the reflexive turn in labour law is an attempt to speak to concerns about the effectiveness of the traditional regulatory techniques of labour legislation and administrative regulation in the context of changes in the institutional landscape, and changes to regulatory objectives in the areas of industrial relations and social policy. What has changed since the heyday of, respectively, collective laissez-faire and statutory intervention, as the dominant techniques of labour market regulation, and how convincing is ‘reflexive law’ in its attempt to explain or rationalise the new forms of governance or law-making within the UK labour market, and more generally with reference to the social and employment policy of the European Union (EU)? This requires a three-fold investigation: first is reflexive law descriptively an appropriate means by which to understand the range of regulatory techniques being adopted across the field of employment and industrial relations: how accurate a description of regulatory change are theories of reflexive law, or related discourses of ‘responsive’, ‘new’ or ‘experimentalist’ governance? Second, is it right, normatively, to adopt or advocate a reflexive approach to regulation, to the extent that such an approach may well eschew a substantive content for labour law? Can a reflexive approach be inherently ‘neutral’ as to (regulatory or labour market) outcomes? What of those criticisms of reflexive regulation which contend that the rise of reflexive (labour) law runs in parallel to and indeed reinforces the neoliberal turn in economic policy making? Third, is there empirical evidence to show that a reflexive approach to regulation works in practice? Is it true to claim—as theorists of reflexive law, responsive regulation or new governance do—that regulatory interventions in the labour market are more likely to be successful in achieving their objectives if they avoid direct prescription of substantive social or distributive outcomes, and instead engage in what one might call ‘second-order’ regulation by creating frameworks within which social actors such as employers can negotiate?

Bibliography

Effectiveness of Active Labor Market Tools in Conditional Cash Transfers Programs: Evidence for Argentina

In low-income and middle-income countries, such as those in sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, the COVID-19 pandemic has had substantial implications for women's wellbeing. Policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have highlighted the gendered aspect of pandemics; however, addressing the gendered implications of the COVID-19 pandemic comprehensively and effectively requires a planetary health perspective that embraces systems thinking to inequalities. This Viewpoint is based on collective reflections from research done by the authors on COVID-19 responses by international and regional organisations, and national governments, in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa between June, 2020, and June, 2021. A range of international and regional actors have made important policy recommendations to address the gendered implications of the COVID-19 pandemic on women's health and wellbeing since the start of the pandemic. However, national-level policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have been partial and inconsistent with regards to gender in both sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America, largely failing to recognise the multiple drivers of gendered health inequalities. This Viewpoint proposes that addressing the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on women in low-income and middle-income countries should adopt a systems thinking approach and be informed by the question of who is affected as opposed to who is infected. In adopting the systems thinking approach, responses will be more able to recognise and address the direct gendered effects of the pandemic and those that emerge indirectly through a combination of long-standing structural inequalities and gendered responses to the pandemic.

Democracy and the Left: Social Policy and Inequality in Latin America

Among active labour market programmes, job training is popular in Latin America as an attempt to help the labour market insertion of disadvantaged youth, and also as a way of providing skills to low-income groups to enable them to deal with the challenges of globalisation. This paper summarises the findings from the first rigorous set of evaluations of job training programmes in Latin America that were made in the context of a project undertaken by the Office of Evaluation and Oversight at the Inter-American Development Bank. This research was complemented by two independent impact evaluations of similar training programmes in Chile and Colombia. The paper reports the results of two evaluations with an experimental design (the Dominican Republic and Colombia), one with a natural experiment (Panama), and four non-experimental evaluations (Argentina, Chile, Peru, and Mexico). Overall, in contrast to the evidence for developed countries, the results suggest that employment effects range from modest to meaningful – increasing the employment rate by about 0 to 5 percentage points – although higher and significant for some groups, such as women in Colombia and Panama – with an impact of 6 to 12 percentage points in the employment rate. In most cases there are larger and significant impacts on job quality, measured by getting a formal job, having a contract, and/or receiving health insurance as a benefit.

“Decent Work” is International Labour Organization’s (ILO) umbrella strategy to promote the “quality of work/job” for all, which is aimed at more productive, well-remunerative and better quality jobs. However, the prevalence of informal employment and growing “informalization” of jobs indicate a general deterioration in the quality of work. The present study, based on a primary survey of employees in banking sector, shows that the “decent work” framework has had limited influence on the growing non-standard forms of employment (NSFE) in India. Even in a sector like banking, which is considered more formal and regulated, jobs fell short of “decent work” criteria. This article explores various indicators that have been used to gauge “quality of jobs” from the literature and shows how the prevailing NSFE in the Indian banking sector lack almost all of them. Analysis of the primary data shows that workers in NSFEs have lower levels of job satisfaction and receive low wages and minimal or no training. The findings of the study confirm that NSFEs do not ensure basic labour rights and decent standard of living and are also not desirable when compared to permanent jobs.

Differences that Matter: Social Policy and the Working Poor in the United States and Canada. Dan Zuberi. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006. During most of the 1980s and 1990s, the future of social assistance-better known as welfare-dominated North American policy debates more than poverty and social inclusion. More recently, scholars and policy-makers have increasingly debated the status of the working poor, which is largely distinct from the issue of social assistance. In Differences That Matter, University of British Columbia sociologist Dan Zuberi assesses the impact of social and labour policy on the fate of the working poor in Canada and the United States. More specifically, he explores the life and working conditions of hotel workers in Seattle and Vancouver, two cities with a lot in common. The two pairs of hotels studied also belong to the same chain, which reduces the organizational differences between them. This is a crucial issue, as Zuberi stresses the role of broad social policy structures affecting the lives of hotel workers and their families in each country. Because these workers operate in a similar organizational and economic environment, it is easier to identify how cross-national differences in labour and social policy impact the working poor. Derived from a Ph.D. dissertation defended at Harvard University, Differences that Matter is based on the seventy-seven interviews Zuberi conducted. These interviews with Vancouver and Seattle's hotel workers generated evidence about the positive role of Canada's more progressive social and labour policies, which include work training programs, universal public health insurance, comprehensive unemployment benefits, and pro-union labour regulations. According to Zuberi, hotel workers in Vancouver are better off on average than their Seattle counterparts, who have more limited access to social policy resources like health insurance and unemployment benefits. Furthermore, Zuberi points to the positive impact of urban infrastructures like parks and community centres on the lives of hotel workers and their families. After comparing the impact of labour, social policy, and urban policies on the lives of hotel workers in Vancouver and Seattle, Zuberi offers a set of broad policy recommendations aimed at improving the fate of the working poor in Canada and in the United States. Differences That Matter confirms the traditional progressive belief that comprehensive public policies can make a positive difference in citizens' lives, especially the most vulnerable ones. Considering this, it is not surprising that Zuberi formulates policy recommendations that support progressive taxation, welfare state expansion, and the liberalization of restrictive unionization regulations in the United States. Praising more generous Canadian social and labour policies, he would like the United States to develop a more comprehensive welfare state, among other things. Overall, Differences That Matter is a well-researched, stimulating book offering a unique look at the relationship between social policy and urban poverty in North America. Although it does not feature an extensive discussion of ethnic relations, the book stresses the positive role of particular labour, social, and urban programs in the social and economic inclusion of immigrants. …

Book Review: Are immigrants poorer than natives? Which categories of immigrants are poorer? Do immigrants’ poverty patterns follow the traditional welfare state regime typology? Can institutions–particularly social rights in terms of access to welfare provision and the labour market–explain the variation in immigrants’ poverty levels? These are the fundamental questions that Beatrice Eugster analyses in her new book.

This paper analyzes the dynamics of the labor market in Latin America during the COVID-19 pandemic. After a decade of a virtuous circle of growth with the creation of formal jobs, the pandemic has had an considerable impact on the region’s labor market, generating an unparalleled increase in the proportion of the inactive population, considerable reductions in informality, and, in contrast, smaller fluctuations in formal jobs. In this context, the formal sector, given its lower flexibility, became a "social safety net" that preserved the stability of employment and wages. Based on the findings presented in this paper, it is projected that, starting in 2021, informality will grow to levels higher than those of the pre-COVID-19 era–with 7.56 million additional informal jobs–as a result of the population returning to the labor market to compensate for the declines in incomes. According to the simulations presented, postponing or forgiving income tax payments and social security contributions conditional on the generation of formal jobs could reduce the growth of informality by 50 to 75 percent. Achieving educational improvements has the potential to reduce it by 50 percent.

In accordance with the author´s intention, and in accordance with the constitutional framework, the article analyzes the wages and social insurance in Russia, unjustified super differentiation in wages, which excludes financial participation of low-income workers in the compulsory social insurance, who should be included in the system of compulsory social insurance without any conditions and restrictions. The author analyzes the state of wages, the necessity of state regulation of wages, the basic state guarantee on wages — minimum wages and salaries in Russia, with the aim to determine the conceptual basis for legal regulation of the wages in Russia in the interests of its population, in particular, it is argued that consumer demand is the main and only engine of the market economy and it has to be moderately in advance of the production capabilities. The author draws the attention to the use of state and contractual regulation of labour, as it is objectively necessary and socially justified if public and private regulation of labor relations in the sphere of remuneration are correctly interrelated. The main purpose of contractual regulation of remuneration should be the improvement of the situation of workers on the basis of the agreement between the parties to social partnership. For its part, the state should not interfere with the balance and supply of labour in the labour market, the formation of a natural price for labour. According to the author, it is necessary to constitutionalize the concepts of “decent work” and “decent wages”, “compulsory social insurance”. “Decent work” and “decent wage” should be recognized at the constitutional level as the principles of work organization.

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed different challenges to human kind in political, economic and social fields. One topic that should be addressed is the situation of women in labor market policies during the COVID-19 pandemic in Latin America. According to the International Labour Organization, the employment of women in the Americas decreased between 2019 and 2020 by 9.4 percent due to the effects of COVID-19- compared to 7.0 percent in the case of men- which represented the highest globally decline in all regions. This data has to be taken into consideration by public, private and social sectors to find optimal solutions to face this situation. Furthermore, a critical analysis should be made in order to identify the issues that have caused the problem and that may represent future risks. In this regard, the Critical Legal Feminist Theory may offer an interesting perspective of how the ideology, authorities and law should be reconsidered to explore new horizons for women in the society. Certainly, an inclusive dialogue is of core importance to understand how women are experiencing the labor market situation and policies, include their opinions and suggestions in labor law aimed at reinforcing women’s human rights, including the rights to health and work, as well as to include additional indicators to evaluate the results of labor policies.

Die Suid-Afrikaanse ekonomie was reeds voor die COVID-19-pandemie in 'n benarde posisie. Dagloners en andere in die informele ekonomie was struktureel selfs meer kwesbaar vir so 'n eksogene skok. Die doel van hierdie oorsigstudie was om die impak van die COVID-19-pandemie op die lewensomstandighede van dagloners op die navorsingsagenda te plaas. 'n Oorsig van tersaaklike elemente uit die enigste nasionaal verteenwoordigende databasis van dagloners, afkomstig vanuit die Blaauw (2010) studie, in Suid-Afrika, was die vertrekpunt. Daarna is die jongste beskikbare navorsingsinligting oor veranderinge in die daglonermark gebruik om die moontlike kort-, medium- en langtermynimpak van die pandemie te bespreek. In 2008 was die dagloners in die Wes-Kaap en Gauteng se loonvlakke hoër as dié van die dagloners in die res van Suid-Afrika. Selfs dagloners in hierdie twee provinsies was steeds kwesbaar met lae en onsekere inkomstevlakke. Sedert 2008 het makro-ekonomiese faktore en 'n derde golf van oorgrensmigrasie 'n verdere verswakking in dagloners se posisie meegebring. Die vraag na hul arbeid het verminder en reële lone het in verskeie stede gedaal. Die COVID-19-pandemie het dagloners op die kort termyn voor hongersnood te staan gebring. Die talle mense wat vanweë die pandemie hul formele werk verloor het of nog gaan verloor sal die daglonermark onder verdere druk plaas. Die minimum loonvlak waarvoor dagloners bereid is om te werk, sal selfs verder daal. In die lang termyn kan duisende van die leerlinge wat hul skoolopleiding te midde van die pandemie staak ook dagloners word, met rampspoedige gevolge vir die maatskaplike bestel in Suid-Afrika.

PurposeThis paper aims to review the situation of decent work (DW) and quality of work life (QWL) in the context of Nepal.Design/methodology/approachThe paper is based on a literature survey. Institutional arrangements for DW and QWL are studied in connection with current labor legislations, national policy documents, and company policies and initiatives. The status of DW and QWL is described, examining national policy documents published by the Government of Nepal, National Planning Commission, labor legislations, International Labor Organization (ILO) and other relevant literature.FindingsAt present, although the country has been successful in reducing the number of people under the poverty line, there are challenges in meeting the DW goals. In the case of QWL, since there is rising dissatisfaction among employers and employees in the present economic and political circumstances, they are interested in short‐term benefits.Research limitations/implicationsThere are a number of factors affecting DW and QWL. In this paper only national economic and social conditions, poverty level, employment situation and income generation are considered for analysis. The analysis of the QWL situation is done only on the basis of published information rather than using primary sources of information.Practical implicationsThe findings of this study will have a number of implications in understanding and improving the level of current institutional arrangements in order to ensure DW and QWL. The observations made in this paper can add some value in the process of formulation of national policy for, and regulation of DW. The issues discussed will have substantial implication for the development and framing of new labor laws and policies.Originality/valueThe paper focuses on DW and QWL for the first time in the Nepalese context. This is an original contribution by the authors to familiarize readers with the situation of DW and QWL in Nepalese organizations.