Working Paper No. 3 - Globalization and Decent Work: Options for Panama

Focusing on Panama and globalization, this paper opts to suggest how Panama could integrate itself better to a fairer globalization. Panama can benefit from economic growth, greater social cohesion, and higher standards of living brought by globalization, but so far these benefits have been unequally shared, which are hindering its development. The International Labour Organization uses decent work to address globalization where both economic growth and social development go hand in hand for the successful development of a country. Thus, this paper uses the case of Panama to show that policy integration requires both these issues to have equal importance to promote decent work and questions whether openness and economic growth are related or if there are better strategies at hand. It proposes strategic policies pertaining to promoting agriculture and industry, education and training, labour market policies, social protection, and social dialogue that could ultimately benefit Panama more thoroughly from globalization.