OUTSOURCING – AN ATTEMPT TO FIND A DEFINITION OF THE NOTION WITHIN THE SCOPE OF POLISH LABOUR LAW

Abstract

This article constitutes an attempt to find a definition of the notion of ‘outsourcing’ that would be useful within the scope of Polish labour law. For this purpose, in the first place, the examples of use of the term ‘outsourcing’ within European Union law and Polish law have been presented along with assessments of those usages from the perspective of usefulness for building a general definition of the notion. Subsequently, the most significant literary definition of the notion have been divided into groups of concurrent views, and a definition that would be the most useful from the perspective of Polish labour law, considering its material and subjective scope, has been suggested. Later, a number of criteria characterising the contract of outsourcing have been indicated. Those criteria would also allow to distinguish a contract of outsourcing from a contract of mandate. As the last step, a new definition of the term ‘outsourcing’ within the scope of labour law has been proposed.