Author: Thomas Hastings
Co-Authors ⁄ Presenters: Jason Heyes
Hybrid forms of regulation: finding space for worker agency in labour law enforcement
State regulatory architecture and compliance approaches represent an under-researched area of labour geography. The following article argues that labour inspectorates and enforcement strategies for regulating sectors of the economy represent pertinent, under-researched institutional spaces in which worker agency can/does effect change and contribute to the upholding of labour standards. The following article explores this contention via empirical research with two contrasting industries reliant on domestic labour: wine production in South Africa and au pair work in Ireland. These cases are chosen, in part, to illustrate the case that opportunities to negotiate terms of control within regulatory architecture are relevant and possible in contexts of both the global ‘North’ and ‘South’.