Book Review: EU Employment Law: From Rome to Amsterdam and beyond
| DOI | 10.1177/1023263X0301000404 |
| Author | Tonia Novitz |
| Date | 01 December 2003 |
| Published date | 01 December 2003 |
| Subject Matter | Book Review |
10 MJ 4 (2003) 405
Book Reviews
Jeff Kenner, EU Employment Law: From Rome To Amsterdam And
Beyond, Hart Publishing, 2003, 593 pages, paperback, € 45 and Sìofra
O’Leary, Employment Law at the European Court of Justice: Judicial
Structures, Policies and Processes, Hart Publishing, 2002, 316 pages,
hardback, € 32,50.
Scholars have long recognized the importance of the architectural framework within
which the employment law of the European Union (EU) has been constructed.1 This is
the tradition upon which Jeff Kenner builds in his text on EU Employment Law, as he
considers how the constitutional evolution of the EU has affected national labour laws
and has shaped the creation of EU legal norms. He pays close attention to the ‘economic
and social imperatives of European integration’, considering the ways in which these
have intertwined and at times conflicted. Sìofra O’Leary, in her monograph on
Employment Law at the European Court of Justice, also acknowledges the importance
of these two themes. In addition, both authors identify practical, logistical problems that
could be addressed through constitutional reform.
§ 1. Constitutional issues addressed by Kenner and O’Leary
Kenner’s book carefully traces the development of the ‘social dimension’ of EU law.
The book consists of twelve chapters, the first of which relates the embryonic
‘Emergence of the Social Dimension’. The second chapter addresses the Community’s
introduction of a ‘New Deal’ and a ‘human face for the Community’. Kenner goes on to
consider carefully two ‘catalysts for action’, namely, in Chapter 3 the Single European
Act and in Chapter 4 the Community ‘Social Charter’. He then analyzes, in Chapter 5,
1. P. Davies, ‘The Emergence of European Labour Law’, in W. McCarthy (ed.), Legal Intervention in
Industrial Relations; Gains and Losses, (Blackwell, 1995); and B. Bercusson, European Labour Law,
(Butterworths, 1996).
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