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29 Indus. L.J. (Juta) 22 (2008)
Workers with Care Responsibilities: Is Work-Family Integration Adequately Addressed in South African Labour Law

handle is hein.journals/iljuta29 and id is 28 raw text is: Workers with Care Responsibilities: Is Work-Family Integration Adequately Addressed in South African Labour Law? LISA DANCASTER* & MARIAN BAIRD** 1 INTRODUCTION A number of economic, social and demographic changes in different countries have contributed to the emergence of work and family in- tegration as an issue of serious concern for individuals, societies, orga- nizations and governments. The same changes have also contributed to the development of research in this field. Responses by governments to assist employees to combine their employment with their caregiv- ing responsibilities exhibit different patterns globally. To some extent this may be a result of an overarching legal framework that compels action on the part of governments to implement work-family mea- sures in their legislation. For instance, countries in the European Union (EU) are compelled by EU directives to implement certain work-fa- mily measures in public policy. There are also different policy imperatives that underlie the intro- duction of work-family measures in the legislation of different coun- tries. These include addressing issues related to unemployment, gender inequality, low fertility, retention of mature age employment and/or increasing caregiving provisions to deal with an ageing or increasingly unwell population in need of greater care. These underlying policy concerns impact on the type of work-family measures introduced in different countries and account, in part, for variations in work-family provisioning cross-nationally.1 This article examines legislative measures to reconcile work and fa- mily responsibilities in different national contexts and, in relation to this, considers the relative inadequacy of labour legislation that addresses the combination of paid work and caregiving in South Africa. The argu- ment presented here is for increased state intervention in work-family policy in South Africa. Contemporary issues in South Africa's social, economic and political context necessitate the importance of finding * Senior Researcher, Health Economics & HIV/AIDS Research Division, University of KwaZulu-Natal. I would like gratefully to acknowledge funding received from the Faculty of Economics & Business Scholarship, University of Sydney for Phd research that has contributed to this article. I would like to thank Clive Thompson for comments on an earlier draft of this article. ** Associate Professor, Work & Organisational Studies, Faculty of Economics & Business, University of Sydney. 1 Den Dulk L (2001). Work-Family Arrangements in Organisations: A Cross-National Study in the Netherlands, Italy, the United Kingdom and Sweden Amsterdam Rozenberg.

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