Outsourcing of Employment Relationships and Co-Determination

In a “standard firm” (Mückenberger 1985), the “standard employment contract” (Sydow/Wirth 1999) has a large number of protection and participation rights. While still used as a reference point for both – labour law and human resource management – these standards prove to be attenuated for more flexible employment relationships in practice.

Using the example of network organization and the deployment of third-party personnel, we describe these "bounderless labour relations" (Apitzsch 2006, Klein-Schneider/Beutler 2013, Hertwig/Kirsch/Wirth 2016), in particular outsourcing of employment relationships and the decreasing fit of the protection instruments under labour law, especially in the area of co-determination (Däubler 2015, Deinert 2014, Rieble 2014, Günther & Böglmüller 2015).

With reference to considerations of power and exchange theory (Matiaske 1998, Nienhüser 2014), possibilities are explored to what extent the reformulation of the “concept of employee” and the reorganisation of co-determination can also guarantee “labour standards for improved well-being” for those employees who have previously been on the margins of the labour market.

• Publikations Hanau
• Publikations Matiaske
• Publikations Weingärtner