RAHVUSVAHELISE TÖÖORGANISATSIOONI STANDARDID JA NENDE MÕJU EESTI TÖÖSEADUSANDLUSELE KAHE MAAILMASÕJA VAHEL
LABOUR STANDARDS OF THE INTERNATIONAL LABOUR ORGANIZATION AND THEIR IMPACT ON ESTONIAN LABOUR LEGISLATION BETWEEN THE TWO WORLD WARS

Summary/Abstract: The Republic of Estonia became a member of the International Labour Organization (ILO) in October 1921. Between the two world wars the International Labour Organization approved 67 labour standards, of which 22 conventions or one third were ratified by Estonia. Thus it can be argued that Estonia was not very active on the ratification of international standards. The list of conventions approved by the Estonian Parliament included the conventions that dealt mostly with working time, protection of children and women, unemployment and safety of work. // In the early years of membership the number of conventions ratified by Estonia was rather impressive. Estonia ratified 14 conventions out of the 16 adopted by the first three international labour conferences in 1919, 1920 and 1921. This activity was not entirely voluntary, as one of the prerequisite for Estonian membership was the obligation to ratify the conventions approved by the first three labour conferences. Nevertheless, Estonia did not ratify two very important instruments – the Hours of Work (Industry) Convention (Convention 1), 1919, and Maternity Protection Convention, 1919 (Convention 3). This does not mean that provisions of these international labour standards were not taken into account in drafting Estonian national laws. Afterwards Estonia ratified only 8 ILO conventions. // Estonia accepted the need to make investments into the social sphere, in order to modernize the existing social legislation and to introduce the new laws based on international labour standards, but under the internal political and economic pressure the government had to consider social policies, which took into account local circumstances. Part of the desire to promote labour standards was absorbed by self interest. Employers opposed the laws dealing with reduction of working hours, paid vacation, old age and unemployment insurance because they were required to cover the costs of implementing the acts. The Estonian government was worried that wide-ranging social legislation would be a heavy burden on the economy as it would raise labour costs and result in Estonia’s low competitiveness. Employees’ social pressure was weak, because they had no strong organization to protect their interests. Therefore, in Estonia there was no cooperation between employees and employers, as formally demonstrated at the international level at the ILO labour conferences. The employers did not accept the employees as an equal partner for negotiation. // Although Estonia adopted a relatively small number of international labour standards, a lot of requirements of the rest of the international standards were taken into account in the drafting of national labour laws. For examples, in 1931 the 8-hour working day law was introduced. In 1934 the parliament adopted the law that established paid leave for the industrial workers. In 1940 the right for paid leave was extended to all employees (excluding seasonal workers)...

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