I am glad to send you the call for abstracts for the next IALLJ seminar, which will be held in Florence on May 5th on the topic ‘Sustainable Enterprise and Labour Law: a Comparative Perspective’. I kindly ask you to support this initiative by recommending young scholars submit abstracts in English, French, or Spanish.
The deadline for the submission is March 15th.

CALL FOR ABSTRACTS

Promoted by the International Association of Labour Law Journals (IALLJ)
The International Association of Labour Law Journals is promoting a Call for Abstracts in
connection with a seminar on May 5th, 2025, at the University of Florence (Italy). The all-day
workshop will start at 11.00h, and the selected papers will be presented in person or online,
according to the speakers’ choices and needs.
A panel of prominent scholars from the IALLJ membership will discuss the selected abstracts.
The Association’s journals may also select some papers for publication based on the abstracts
submitted. The authors can write in the language agreed upon with the journal selecting the
abstract.
Title: Sustainable Enterprise and Labour Law: a Comparative Perspective
The environmental crisis we are witnessing calls upon all scientific sectors to interrogate
themselves on the contribution the respective research and knowledge can provide to overturn the
process and foster a structural change that may, at the same time, guarantee economic and social
growth, full inclusion, progress and a fair distribution of wealth. Indeed, an enterprise, to be fully
sustainable, must equally succeed under three profiles: social, economic and environmental
sustainability.
Labour and social security norms and social partners can play a fundamental role in promoting or
supporting a more sustainable economy through the fair transition to enterprises' environmental
and social sustainability.
The issue is at the core of national, EU and international debates. To mention some of the most
relevant initiatives that aim to promote business sustainability by recognising an inseparable bond
between the social, economic and environmental dimensions: in 2023, the EU Commission
launched the Green Deal Industrial Plan; the International Labour Organisation has recently set up
an ILO Department of Sustainable Enterprises, Productivity and Just Transition; and the United
Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the International Labour Organization (ILO), the
International Employers Organization (IOE) and the International Trade Union Confederation
(ITUC) have promoted the Green Job Initiative.
However appreciable, all these initiatives have their critical points, not least in terms of protecting
the workers involved in the company renewal processes, which need to be addressed by labour
lawyers, also by relying on the comparative approach that can offer and spread good practices and
innovative and forward-looking approaches to labour law regulation.
The way to address the role of labour law and industrial relations practices can be twofold: on the
one hand, we must reflect on how labour law and industrial relations practices can support the
growth of sustainable enterprises; on the other hand, labour law and industrial relations practices
cannot lose their main focus and must directly address the challenges posed to workers’ rights
protection by business conversion. Eventually, the more virtuous norms and techniques
contemporary achieve both goals.

Under these stimuli, this call aims to energise the ongoing academic debate on environmental
employment law by inviting labour law scholars and researchers from other close disciplines to
reflect on the relationship between sustainable enterprises and labour law by applying the
comparative method. Both the theoretical and empirical approaches are welcome.
Contributions should fall in one or more of the following areas:
a) Individual employment. For instance, labour law reforms that can support sustainable business
practices; labour norms that contribute to promoting the threefold sustainable dimension of
enterprises (i.e. also workers’ rights); techniques to promote decent work in the circular economy;
control of national and global value chains from the social and environmental perspective; training
rights for the greening of jobs; legislative norms that promote the trade union representative’s
engagement.
b) Trade unions and industrial relations. For instance, collective bargaining clauses that address
sustainable transition processes, innovative organising strategies and possible alliances between
trade unions and environmental movements, and formal engagement of trade union representatives
at the company level to promote sustainability. Moreover, the fight against climate change will
lead to decisions that may have severe, often adverse, short-term effects on employees: stopping
certain types of production, changing production patterns, and reconstructing parts of the company
or the whole company. This may lead to problems of acceptability, which can only be achieved if
employees or their representatives somehow participate in the decision-making process.
c) Social security and active labour market policies. For instance, active employment policies are
specifically directed to tackle the fair transition of enterprises and specific public contributions
that support the enterprise's sustainability, with the constraint of maintaining jobs and ensuring
high employment standards.
Deadline for submission of abstracts: March 15
th
, 2025.

Abstract: maximum 10000 characters (spaces included). The abstract should focus on one or more
of the abovementioned topics, clearly describing the research objectives, the methodology and (if
necessary) an essential bibliography.
Languages: The abstracts (and papers) can be drafted in English, French or Spanish. However,
the Florence seminar will be held only in English.
Authors of selected papers will be notified by March 31st, 2025.
Contacts for submission: labourlawjournals@gmail.com
Academic organisers: Massimiliano Delfino (Federico II University of Naples), Guido Balandi
(University of Ferrara), Silvia Borelli (University of Ferrara), William Chiaromonte (University
of Florence), Emanuele Dagnino (University of Milan), Giulia Frosecchi (University of Florence),
Frank Hendricks (KU University of Leuven), Mariella Magnani (University of Pavia), Alan Neal,
(University of Warwick), Giuseppe Antonio Recchia (University of Bari), Manfred Weiss (Goethe
University of Frankfurt).