Innovative labour regulation: Lessons from Geneva’s Co-Enforcement Model

Labour inspections face mounting challenges in the 21st century, including globalisation, digitalisation, and workplace fissuring, which have been associated with rising psychosocial risks. At the same time, neoliberal policies have curtailed inspectorates’ capacity for enforcement, weakening the compliance with employment standards. In response, a growing number of jurisdictions have experimented with “co-enforcement” — a collaborative strategy in which state agencies and other institutions, particularly trade unions and employers’ association, share information, and coordinate actions to ensure compliance with labour laws and collective agreements. Yet, the concept of co-enforcement remains underdeveloped in the literature, limiting both comparative and theoretical understanding of these innovative strategies for addressing the challenges posed by labour market restructuring.

This presentation addresses this gap by developing a typology of co-enforcement and highlighting the pivotal role trade unions play in the joint execution of inspections to tackle contemporary regulatory challenges. Drawing on the case of the Joint Company Inspection (Inspection paritaire des entreprises, IPE) in Geneva, Switzerland, we demonstrate how social partners plays a crucial role in this co-enforcement model, while also evaluating the limits of this innovative strategy and its effectiveness in ensuring compliance. Our findings advance the theoretical understanding of co-enforcement and provide empirically grounded evidence on the potential and constraints of union-led hybrid regulatory models in liberal yet coordinated labour markets.

This seminar is hosted by the ILO Research Project ‘Improving compliance with labour protection’. Alessandro Pelizzari and Aris Martinelli are working with Dr. Prof. Nicolas Pons-Vignon and Dr. Jacqueline Kalbermatter from the the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland (SUPSI) on a research project funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation, titled “Innovative Labour Inspection Strategies to Protect the Health and Safety of Workers”, which focuses on labour inspections in Switzerland.

Agenda

• Introductory words by Caroline Fredrickson (ILO Research Department)
• Presentation by Aris Martinelli and Alessandro Pelizzari, University of Applied Sciences and Arts Western Switzerland, Faculty of Social Work(HETSL|HES-SO) and Jacqueline Kalbermatter (University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland, SUSPI)
• Moderator: Fabiola Mieres (ILO Research Department)

About the speakers

• Aris Martinelli

Aris Martinelli holds a PhD in Socio-economics from the University of Geneva, Switzerland and is a research fellow at the Social Work and Health School in Lausanne. His research lies at the intersection of political economy and the sociology of work, focusing on global economic transformations, their impact on firms and working conditions, and the emerging forms of market regulation.

• Alessandro Pelizzari

Former trade unionist at UNIA in Geneva, Alessandro Pelizzari holds a PhD in sociology from the University of Geneva, Switzerland, and is currently Director of the Social Work and Health School in Lausanne, forming part of the University of Applied sciences of Western Switzerland.

• Jacqueline Kalbermatter

Jacqueline Kalbermatter is a Senior Researcher in the SNSF research project ‘Innovative Labour Inspection Strategies to Protect the Health and Safety of Workers’ at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts of Southern Switzerland (SUPSI). She holds a PhD from the University of Fribourg, Department of Sociology, Social Policy, Social Work.