Multilevel Tools for Protection of Social Rights: a Hypothesis

The article analyses the usage of multilevel tools (such as cooperation among international organizations, regional instruments, activities of regional and national courts and private subjects’ actions) in the social rights’ protection field. A closer look is given at the cooperation among international organizations (the ILO and the IMF, the World Bank Group, the OECD, the WTO and the UN) and at one of regional collaboration models within the sphere of workers’ rights protection: the North American Agreement on Labour Collaboration (NAALC). Within the scenario where balance between political and judicial powers is no longer affected only at national level but should be considered also from multilevel perspective, the redefinition of the role and responsibility of regional and national courts plays an important role in the protection of fundamental social rights. It is worth mentioning the mutual influence between the CJEU and the ECtHR in their fight against discrimination. On a national level, the role of national Constitutional Courts in the field of fundamental social rights is analyzed in different countries (Asia, Europe and South America). Finally, the article studies the adoption of transnational instruments by private actors – companies and trade unions – that collectively or individually try to protect social rights at work. Two specific instruments have been chosen: transnational company agreement and code of conduct.