Legal Framework and Collective Bargaining in the Implementation of Minimum Wage in the Rivers State Civil Service

This paper argues that eliminating employment discrimination is a prerequisite for achieving the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) Decent Work Agenda and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 8 (SDG 8) in Nigeria. Drawing from the ILO’s Decent Work Indicator Framework, the paper explores how entrenched gender bias, weak labour administration and poor policy enforcement undermine fair wages, job security, and social protection, thereby hindering inclusive economic growth. It further highlights the crucial role of trade unions particularly the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) and their affiliates in combating inequality through collective bargaining, advocacy, and social dialogue. However, trade unions themselves face internal gender disparities that limit their representative capacity. The paper proposes a coordinated approach involving legal reform, capacity-building, integration of equality clauses into collective agreements, and international solidarity among unions. These strategies are essential to dismantle systemic discrimination, strengthen labour institutions and advance a non-discriminatory, equitable, and productive work environment that upholds the dignity and rights of all Nigerian workers.

ABSTRACT Increasing rates of non-standard employment have led to increases in workers lacking union representation and avenues for collective bargaining. Workers engaged in non-standard employment may benefit from worker-led approaches to advocate for fair working conditions. This study aimed to understand factors that impact the success of worker-led movements to improve working conditions and/or advocate for workers’ rights through a multi-case study analysis. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 12 participants from four unique cases of worker-led movements from Canada, New Zealand, and Australia. Coding and analysis used an iterative process guided by thematic analysis, and a combination of inductive and deductive approaches informed our findings. Participants identified common challenges, including employer resistance to organising efforts, the inherent precarity present in their work, and economic and legal challenges. Three key themes to facilitate action were also identified: (1) equitable internal structures focused on sharing power, (2) engagement of strategic allies, and (3) capacity building through worker education. These findings offer novel insights on the unique needs of workers engaged in non-standard work that is temporary, casual, or precarious in nature. This study provides important considerations for future worker-led movements and can serve as guidance for labour organisations and other community groups.

Trust is about being vulnerable to another party, confident that openness will not be exploited. Matters of trust in industrial relations are poorly researched, especially in the Swedish context. This study enhances our knowledge and understanding of trust in industrial relations by exploring how social partners in Sweden perceive and experience trust. Drawing on qualitative data, the study shows how interpersonal/interactional-based trust is established through formal and informal channels, is stabilised by institution-based trust and the long tradition of collective bargaining, as well as mutual recognition of differing perspectives. Trust places higher demands on good personal behaviour, emphasising integrity and benevolence.

The article examines how the steady increases in the statutory minimum wage (SMW) following the end of the Troika adjustment programme in 2014 have impacted the wage distribution and collective bargaining dynamics in low-pay economic sectors in Portugal. It aims at contributing to the literature on the SMW pay equity effects by specifying the mechanisms through which SMW rises shape collective bargaining, wage compression and wage spillovers. Using a mixed-methods research design that combines statistical data from Quadros de Pessoal with semi-structured interviews with social actors and government officials, it shows that wage compression and spillovers are contingent on the institutional and structural features of low-pay sectors, such as exposure to price competitiveness or reliance on the state along a neo-corporatist logic. Moreover, the evidence suggests that spillovers are curtailed when SMW increases are not accompanied by the reinforcement of other labour market institutions.

Marshall Steinbaum of University of Utah reviews “Monopsony in Labor Markets: Theory, Evidence, and Public Policy” by Brianna L. Alderman and Roger D. Blair. The Econlit abstract of this book begins: “Explores the law and economics of wage-fixing agreements, no-poaching agreements, noncompete terms in labor contracts, unions and collective bargaining, mergers that affect labor markets, and wage discrimination.”

Context: The dairy sector contributes 24.3% to Colombia's livestock GDP, with Northern Antioquia serving as the country’s primary specialized dairy basin. This production system characterized by small-scale family producers organized into cooperatives faces critical structural challenges: trade liberalization (due to Free Trade Agreements in 2026), rural labor shortages, and a crisis of generational succession. While quantitative studies have previously characterized its productivity and competitiveness, there is limited research regarding how actors co-create value, and which formal and informal institutional configurations shape their economic practices. Methods: This qualitative study employs a sequential design grounded in two systematic literature reviews. Fifteen theoretical codes were derived across three core constructs: Value Creation, Institutional Framework, and Competitive Advantage. Data collection involved 24 semi-structured interviews with producers (small, medium, and large), processors, and cooperative representatives, complemented by 10 non-participant farm observations. A directed qualitative content analysis was conducted, combining deductive and inductive coding with methodological triangulation to ensure analytical rigor and credibility. Results: The analysis yielded 2,438 codifications. The central finding is the marked predominance of informal institutions over formal ones at a ratio of 2.4:1 (376 vs. 157 codifications), demonstrating that shared values, interpersonal trust, and generational tradition constitute the primary regulatory framework for economic behavior. Ten unanticipated themes emerged, notably: family structure as a source of competitive advantage (347 mentions), time/continuity as a dimension of value (206 mentions), and democratic participation in cooperatives as a mechanism for co-creation (154 mentions). Co-occurrence analysis revealed that cooperatives function as hybrid institutional spaces that bridge the formal-informal divide, mitigating institutional voids through volume aggregation, collective bargaining, and the provision of specialized technical services. Conclusions: This study offers four theoretical contributions: (1) it empirically documents the institutional predominance of the informal in traditional agro-industrial chains, extending institutional theory to the family-based dairy context; (2) it identifies emerging dimensions of value (temporality and ethics) previously overlooked in the literature; (3) it conceptualizes "economies of family scope" as an alternative source of competitive advantage that challenges traditional Porterian assumptions; and (4) it characterizes the cooperative model as an effective mechanism for reducing institutional voids. These findings have significant implications for public policy, suggesting that strategic interventions must align with, rather than oppose, existing informal institutional frameworks.

Negotiating Knowledge: The Complex Relationship between Collective Bargaining and Academic Freedom

Persistent industrial unrest in Nigerian federal universities has raised critical questions about the effectiveness of collective bargaining frameworks, particularly the role of renegotiation in sustaining labour peace. This study examines the influence of renegotiation practices on industrial harmony, using the 2009 Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN)–Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) Agreement as an empirical reference point. Although the Agreement contains a mandatory three-year renegotiation clause, repeated failures by successive governments to honour this provision have coincided with recurrent nationwide strikes and systemic instability in the university sector. Anchored on a descriptive survey design, the study collected quantitative data from 386 academic staff across six federal universities representing Nigeria’s geopolitical zones, complemented by qualitative insights from ASUU officials. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics, Pearson Product Moment Correlation, and multiple regression techniques. The findings reveal a strong and statistically significant positive relationship between renegotiation practices and industrial harmony (r = 0.721, p < 0.05). Regression results further indicate that agreement implementation (β = 0.401) and renegotiation timeliness (β = 0.346) are significantly stronger predictors of industrial harmony than collective bargaining effectiveness alone. The study concludes that industrial harmony in Nigerian universities is driven less by the existence of bargaining structures and more by the credibility, predictability, and enforceability of renegotiation processes. By integrating Dunlop’s Industrial Relations System Theory with Follett’s Conflict Management Theory, the study advances contemporary labour relations discourse and provides empirical evidence that institutionalized renegotiation frameworks are critical for sustainable industrial peace. The findings offer policy-relevant insights for reforming Nigeria’s higher education labour governance and are applicable to other public-sector bargaining contexts in developing economies.

This paper examines the positive obligations of States Parties to the European Social Charter (ESC) to secure migrant workers’ collective bargaining rights and analyses their interaction with European Union (EU) law. It sets out the Charter framework, notably Article 5 on the right to organise and Article 6 on collective bargaining, read together with Article 19§4(b) on equal treatment in trade union membership and in the enjoyment of the benefits of collective bargaining, and analyses its interpretation in the supervisory practice of the European Committee of Social Rights (ECSR). The paper addresses both formal legal conformity and effective implementation in practice, with particular attention to discriminatory effects and structural impediments that may undermine the practical and effective exercise of these rights. It then examines the interaction between ESC obligations and EU internal market freedoms, as illustrated by the Viking and Laval judgments, and considers whether subsequent EU instruments, including Directive (EU) 2022/2041 on adequate minimum wages, reinforce collective bargaining as a policy objective. It concludes that, notwithstanding areas of convergence, ESC standards retain autonomous normative force and require practical and effective protection of migrant workers’ collective bargaining rights.

ABSTRACT Nowadays, organisations need to operate with economic, social and environmental goals in mind. Indices objectively quantify such goals; hence, an organisation can develop and compare policies based on future index values. We propose a system dynamics‐based model of a manufacturing company that frames its operations in terms of a set of easily interpretable sustainability performance indices. These include environmental aspects, such as greenhouse gas emissions; social aspects, such as access to collective bargaining; and economic aspects, such as return on investment. To compare these diverse indices and enhance explainability, the model ensures dimensional and structural consistency while comparing them to a benchmark. We demonstrate the structural realism and flexibility of our model using sustainability data from a multinational company and through a scenario analysis. The results show that production management strategies can improve between 1% and 8% overall sustainability performance at the cost of increasing CO 2 emissions by roughly 4%.

ABSTRACT This article examines the suppression of labor movements in Malaysia, the Philippines, and Indonesia from 1945 to the 1980s through comparative historical analysis. Drawing on newly declassified diplomatic archives, intelligence documents, and internal party records, it demonstrates that the decline of organized labor resulted from deliberate strategies of containment implemented through collaboration between local state elites and external Cold War powers. The analysis reveals three interconnected mechanisms: the exploitation of colonial-era structural divisions, the direct ‘sanitization’ of radical labor leadership through security operations, and the juridification of labor relations through restrictive legislation that replaced collective bargaining with state-mediated arbitration. These mechanisms generated three distinctive models of state-labor relations: Malaysia’s ethnic-based containment, the Philippines’ fragmented co-optation and repression, and Indonesia’s violent suppression followed by corporatist integration. This study contributes to Cold War historiography by decentering the superpower narrative and foregrounding local agency in the Global South. It demonstrates that Southeast Asia’s economic development was predicated on the systematic political exclusion of organized labor, with the contemporary weakness of labor movements representing the enduring legacy of these deliberate historical processes.

ABSTRACT The effectiveness of labour regulation depends not only on the formal articulation of rights, but on the institutional arrangements through which those rights are enforced and distributed across workers. This is particularly salient for regulations governing working time and employee availability, where outcomes are shaped by power relations in the workplace and persistent gendered divisions of paid and unpaid labour. The introduction of right‐to‐disconnect (R2D) legislation in several European countries provides a valuable opportunity to examine how procedural labour rights operate across different industrial relations systems and how they generate gender‐differentiated outcomes. Rather than constituting a single policy model, R2D provisions vary substantially in their reliance on collective bargaining, firm‐level discretion and individual characteristics. Using data from the European Social Survey between 2010 and 2022 and exploiting the staggered introduction of R2D policies in France, Belgium, Spain, Ireland and Portugal, this study estimates effects on subjective wellbeing among employees in teleworkable occupations. Applying a dynamic difference‐in‐differences approach, the analysis identifies modest average improvements in wellbeing in countries where R2D provisions are embedded within stronger industrial relations systems. Gendered analyses show that these benefits accrue more consistently to men than to women, highlighting how digital labour regulation may interact with unequal distributions of paid and unpaid work.

Abstract High income inequality has been a hallmark of Chile’s political economy for decades, even centuries. The purpose of this article is to explore a ‘forgotten’ strand in the Chilean debate, that is to say, the role of the union’s power as a countervailing force against high income inequality. Mainstream interpreters have sidelined this approach. Using the Power Resources Approach, it is argued here that Chilean income inequality can be related to fluctuations in organisational power and the lack of an inclusive wage-setting system (e.g. industry-wide collective bargaining). This analysis is based on a deductive approach using relevant literature and two official datasets. In addition to the original investigation, a Propensity Score Matching model is conducted. It is found that changes to the labour code, in 1979, and the imposition of a radically decentralised industrial relations system adversely affected workers’ ability to achieve a large share of incomes.

As the popularity of women’s professional sporting leagues in Australia grows, so too does community discourse surrounding financial investment in women’s sport. In particular, the Women’s Australian Football League (AFLW) has been subject to several Collective Bargaining Agreements (CBAs) since its inception, outlining updates to the conditions of player contracts (e.g. salary). Implementing a netnographic approach, this study investigates attitudes toward the AFLW through Facebook user responses to news reports concerning the widely publicised 2022 CBA amendment. Our analysis revealed contradictory perspectives on investment in women’s football, emphasising the role of social media as a platform for both challenging and promoting stereotypical gender ideologies, which may act as an important reflection of broader societal attitudes toward women’s football and financial equity. The findings have important implications for relevant sport governing bodies regarding the importance of considering social media commentary in the promotion of women’s sport.

ABSTRACK THE EFFECT OF COLLECTIVE AGREEMENTS AND WORK MOTIVATION ON THE PRODUCTIVITY OF MAXIM DRIVERS IN KUPANG CITY By Adelita Throci Kaho Supervised by Rolland E. Fanggidae dan Yonas Ferdinand Riwu This study aims to describe collective bargaining agreements, work motivation, and driver productivity, as well as to determine the effect of collective bargaining agreements and work motivation on the productivity of Maxim drivers in Kupang City. This study uses a quantitative approach with an associative research type. Data collection techniques were carried out by distributing questionnaires to 96 Maxim drivers in Kupang City as respondents. The collected data was then processed and analyzed using SPSS statistical software. The data analysis techniques used in this study included descriptive analysis and inferential analysis. The results of the study based on descriptive analysis show that the achievement values of collective bargaining agreements and work motivation are in the high category, while the achievement value of Maxim driver productivity in Kupang City is in the very high category. The results of inferential analysis show that: (1) Collective bargaining agreements have a significant effect on driver productivity; (2) Work motivation has a significant effect on driver productivity; and (3) Simultaneously, both variables have a significant effect on driver productivity in Kupang City with an adjusted R square value of 0.856, which shows that the percentage contribution of the independent variable (X) to the dependent variable (Y) is 85.6%, and the rest is influenced by other variables not included in this study. Keywords: Collective Labor Agreement, Work Motivation, Productivity.

In 2022 Illinois voters were faced with a ballot measure asking them whether they supported adding a Workers' Rights Amendment (WRA) to the state constitution. Despite countervailing forces that might have made passage difficult, the amendment passed. We explore whether support for collective bargaining rights and union protections followed a predictably partisan pattern in Illinois, or whether support for the amendment was shaped by arguments, endorsements, or other voter demographics. Fielding a survey experiment with a representative sample of 1,000 Illinois voters, we find that Democrats were more likely to support the WRA in general, but that Republicans were more likely to support it following exposure to rights-based arguments emphasizing better pay, benefits, and conditions for workers. We also find that Democrats were more likely to support it following exposure to public sector union endorsements, but that private sector endorsements did not sway Republicans. More broadly, these findings suggest future opportunities to influence potentially skeptical audiences when it comes to ballot measures related to the labor movement.

ABSTRACT This study examines the rapid and extraordinary rise of the Confederation of Public Servants Trade Unions (Memur-Sen) in the context of state corporatism. While it has been common for mainstream labor organizations to establish and develop clientelist relations with the ruling political party or parties, those between the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and Memur-Sen have been beyond the boundaries of mainstream unionism and have reached the point of integration. Memur-Sen has acted in absolute partnership with the AKP and has monopolistic power over the collective bargaining system, which no other public employee confederation has ever had.

Strategic purchasing of oncology drugs to improve affordability and access to cancer care in India.

This paper argues that despite recent scholarly accounts arguing the contrary, an asymmetry between 'the market' and 'the social' continues to exist in the EU legal order. This asymmetry manifests itself, in particular, in the case law, which - more as the rule than as the exception - underprotects the values of the European Social Model and overvalues economic freedom. A new frontier of negative economic integration is being crossed in the interpretation of Article 16 EUCFR (the freedom to conduct a business), while social fundamental rights are overlooked and misunderstood. Furthermore, despite the (politically driven) post-Brexit renaissance of Social Europe over the past decade, the constitutional scope of positive social integration through European-level collective bargaining (cf. EPSU) and legislation (cf. EU Minimum Wages) has been constrained. This paper argues that the resulting imbalance is contrary to the identity of the EU legal order as laid down in the Treaties and the Charter, which reflects an attachment to ‘social democracy’, and that it is for the Court to correct, as it is largely of its own making