The Personal Employment Contract: (Oxford Labour Law)

This book is an analytical study of the current English law of traditional contracts of employment and of other personal employment contracts. Concentrating on the common law basis of individual employment law, it takes full account of relevant British and European Community legislation up to and including the Employment Act 2002, and considers the impact of the Human Rights Act 1998 and of the developing law of human and social rights more generally. In this work the author has up-dated and built upon his earlier treatise on the Contract of Employment published in 1975. The present work takes account of the very considerable amount of case-law, legislation and legal writing which has affected the law of the contract of employment since the earlier treatise was written. However, the present work aims to do more than providing a second edition of The Contract of Employment. It addresses a wider range of employment relationships than the previous work did; in fact, it argues for and is constructed around a whole new category of employment contracts, which includes not only contracts of employment but also other "personal employment contracts", a concept which the author articulates and justifies.Within that novel conceptual framework, many of the major features of the law of employment contracts are re-examined and presented in unfamiliar and challenging terms. Thus, the employer is re-conceptualized as the "employing enterprise", the bilateral structure of employment contracts is re-evaluated, and new explanations are advanced for the functioning of the law of termination of employment contracts and of remedies for wrongful termination.

Table of Contents:
1: Definition and Parties 2: Formation and Structure 3: Content and Construction 4: Performance and Breach 5: Variation 6: Suspension 7: Lawful Termination by the Employing Enterprise 8: Wrongful Termination by the Employing Enterprise 9: Termination other than by the Employing Enterprise 10: Changes in the Enterprise and Transfer of Employment

About the Author :
Mark Freedland has been a Tutorial Fellow of St John's College Oxford since 1970, a University Reader since 1994 and a Professor since 1996. He is a barrister and a Bencher of Gray's Inn. He is currently the Director of the Oxford University Institute of European and Comparative Law

Review :
`Review from previous edition The great strength of this excellent work lies in its analysis of issues.' Australian Journal of Labour Law `This is yet another distinguished addition to the series Oxford Monographs on Labour Law ... a detailed and analytical treatment of one of the central and most problematic areas of doctrine ... not a second edition but a complete reconceptualisation with a new title.' Industrial Relations Journal `The high level of abstraction and the detailed and carefully constructed arguments used throughout the book are perhaps the greatest source of its strength.' Industrial Relations Journal `... the significance of a work such as this is its capacity to shape judicial conceptions and views of the purpose and scope of contracts in the employment sphere irrevocably. This book is certain to become influential in the law schools; it deserves to be influential in practice long before the students of today take their places on judicial benches.' Industrial Relations Journal `This book updates and builds upon the author's earlier book on the contract of employment published in 1976. It makes interesting reading from an academic standpoint.' International Company and Commercial Law Review `... stimulating throughout ... This is a book of interest to a wide audience. Clearly it will have immense appeal to those interested in the theory of the contract of employment and related contracts. It also has much to offer those in legal practice. Someone constructing a case in a problematic area stands to gain much from the consistently penetrating analysis. The author's knowledge and understanding of the law in this area is extraordinary and he has produced a stimulating and frequently provocative work of outstanding scholarship.' Industrial Law Journal `This book provides an excellent and thought-provoking analysis of the current trends and tensions.' The Cambridge Law Journal `The strength of this book is that it engages in a series of important debates which will cause lawyers interested in the field to reconsider and reassess their own assumptions, and to ponder anew the significance of the set of contractual relationships which still lie at the heart of the labour law.' The Cambridge Law Journal