The construction of workers’ rights consciousness through legal intermediations: the case of employment discrimination in Belgium

Lejeune, Aude; Orianne, Jean-François

doi:10.1177/1358229114548141

Article (Scientific journals)

The construction of workers’ rights consciousness through legal intermediations: the case of employment discrimination in Belgium

Lejeune, Aude; Orianne, Jean-François

2014 • In International Journal of Discrimination and the Law, 14 (4), p. 221-243

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https://hdl.handle.net/2268/171833

DOI
10.1177/1358229114548141

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Keywords :

consciousness; discrimination; intermediation; lawyering; litigation; workplace

Abstract :

[en] Through their different encounters with union, court, and government equality agency lawyers, workers report diverse understandings of their personal experience of injustice in the workplace. This paper examines workers’ experiences of discrimination and the role legal professionals play in litigating these issues in Belgium. Bringing together legal and rights consciousness studies and the sociology of intermediation and tracking different stages in the construction of discrimination cases, from the moment when a future litigant describes an event as an injustice to the moment when the judge recognises a discriminatory behaviour (or conversely, dismisses a case), we suggest several possible empirical explanations of the way in which interactions with legal intermediaries affect workers’ rights consciousness. Because we refer to socio-legal studies from common law countries, this paper also calls into question how best to import these studies to assist in analysing legal mobilisations and legal consciousness in continental Europe.

Disciplines :

Sociology & social sciences

Author, co-author :

Lejeune, Aude ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Institut des sciences humaines et sociales > Institut des sciences humaines et sociales

Orianne, Jean-François ; Université de Liège - ULiège > Institut des sciences humaines et sociales > Sociologie de l'action publique et des problèmes du travail

Language :

English

Title :

The construction of workers’ rights consciousness through legal intermediations: the case of employment discrimination in Belgium

Publication date :

December 2014

Journal title :

International Journal of Discrimination and the Law

ISSN :

1358-2291

eISSN :

2047-9468

Publisher :

SAGE

Volume :

Issue :

Pages :

221-243

Peer reviewed :

Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi

Available on ORBi :

since 05 September 2014

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16 (10 by ULiège)

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