Labour market segmentation in Southern Africa and its impact on vulnerable workers

Abstract

This article considers how the regulative functions of labour law have been developed within the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region and seeks to identify instances of legal segmentation. The authors provide an overview of the demographic nature of the informal economies in SADC Member States, drawing the conclusion that the labour law mechanisms employed in the region substantially contribute to the legal segmentation of the regional economies. This has occurred despite the constitutionalization of labour law in the SADC region.

Introduction: Worldwide patterns of legal segmentation in employment law

“…The four regional studies in this Special Issue reveal large geographical, political, socio-economic and legal-cultural discrepancies, across and -to a varying degree -within the regions, as made apparent by the studies of selected Asian countries (Cooney 2022) and the SADC region (Fourie and van Staden 2021). Nevertheless, as will be shown, the regional studies also share an astonishing number of observ ations or results.…”

“…The regional studies of the global South (Cooney 2022;Fourie and van Staden 2021;Bensusán Areous 2022) also address non-standard forms of employment, such as fixed-term and part-time contracts and agency work. In line with our stance on legal segmentation, they focus on regulation that explicitly excludes workers from coverage or (full) protection, and thus confirm that large segments of the labour market are not protected.…”