Abstract
The contract of employment has often been described as a relational contract (Bird, 2005; Boyle, 2007; Brodie, 2011). Indeed, the contract of employment possesses many features that are frequently highlighted in descriptions of relational contracts: it is likely to be long term, to require cooperation from both parties, and to depend for its successful performance on flexibility and adaptation to changing circumstances. There have even been occasional judicial references to the relational character of the contract of employment: Lord Steyn, in Johnson v Unisys Ltd [2001] ICR 480 said: ‘it is no longer right to equate a contract of employment with commercial contracts. One possible way of describing a contract of employment in modern terms is as a relational contract.’ (at [16]) Ian Macneil, the originator of the idea of relational contracts (Macneil, 1978), often refers to the contract of employment as an example of a relational contract or, more precisely, at the relational end of the spectrum of exchange relationships between the polarities of discrete and relational contracts. For example, he describes employment as ‘an extremely relational contract, no matter how strenuously a party tries to make it discrete’ (Macneil, 1985, p. 492).
I am grateful to Aline van Bever for help with this paper.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Arthurs, H (1985) ‘Understanding Labour Law: The Debate over “Industrial Pluralism”’ Current Legal Problems 83
Beale, H and T Dugdale (1975) ‘Contracts between Businessmen: Planning and the Use of Contractual Remedies’ 2 British Journal of Law and Society 45
Bird, R C (2005) ‘Employment as a Relational Contract’ 8 University of Pennsylvania Journal of Labor and Employment Law 148
Blau, P M (1964) Exchange and Power in Social Life (New York: Wiley)
Boyle, M (2007) ‘The Relational Principle of Trust and Confidence’ 27(4) Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 633
Brodie, D (2011) ‘How Relational Is the Employment Contract?’ 40 Industrial Law Journal 232
Campbell, D (ed.) (2001) The Relational Theory of Contract: Selected Works of Ian Macneil (London: Sweet & Maxwell)
Campbell, D and H Collins (2003) ‘Discovering the Implicit Dimensions of Contracts’ in Campbell et al. (2003), pp. 25–50
Campbell, D and D Harris (1993) ‘Flexibility in Long-Term Contractual Relationships: The Role of Co-Operation’ 20 Journal of Law and Society 166
Campbell, D, H Collins and J Wightman (eds) (2003) Implicit Dimensions of Contract: Discrete, Relational and Network Contracts (Oxford: Hart Publishing)
Collins, H (1999) Regulating Contracts (Oxford: Oxford University Press)
Collins, H (2003a) ‘Introduction: The Research Agenda of Implicit Dimensions of Contracts’ in Campbell et al. (2003), pp. 1–24
Daintith, T (1986) ‘The Design and Performance of Long-term Contracts’ in T Daintith and G Teubner (eds,) Contract and Organisation (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter), p. 164
Eccles, R (1981) ‘The Quasifirm in the Construction Industry’ 2 Journal of Economic Behaviour and Organisation 335
Eisenberg, M A (1995) ‘Relational Contracts’ in J Beatson and D Friedmann (eds), Good Faith and Fault in Contract Law (Oxford: Clarendon Press)
Fox, A (1974) Beyond Contract: Work, Power and Trust Relations (London: Faber)
Freedland, M R (2003) The Personal Contract of Employment (Oxford: Oxford University Press)
Gudel, P J (1998) ‘Relational Contract Theory and the Concept of Exchange’ 46 Buffalo Law Review 763
Guest, D E (2004) ‘The Psychology of the Employment Relationship: An Analysis Based on the Psychological Contract’ 53 Applied Psychology: An International Review 541
Macaulay, S (1963) ‘Non-Contractual Relations in Business’ 28 American Sociological Review 45
Macneil, I R (1978) ‘Contracts: Adjustment of Longterm Economic Relations Under Classical, Neoclassical and Relational Contract Law’ 72 Northwestern University Law Review 854–905
Macneil, I R (1980) The New Social Contract (New Haven CT and London: Yale University Press)
Macneil, I R (1985) ‘Relational Contract: What We Do and Do Not Know’ Wisconsin Law Review 483–525
Macneil, I R (1986) ‘Exchange Revisited: Individual Utility and Social Solidarity’ 96 Ethics 567–93
Marks, A (2001) ‘Developing a Multiple Foci Conceptualization of the Psychological Contract’ 23 Employee Relations 454
Morrison, E W and S Robinson (1997) ‘When Employees Feel Betrayed: A Model of How Psychological Contract Violation Develops’ 22 Academy of Management Review 226
Roehling, M V (2004) ‘Legal Theory: Contemporary Contract Law Perspectives and Insights for Employment Relationship Theory’ in J A-M Coyle-Shapiro et al. (eds), The Employment Relationship: Examining Psychological and Contextual Perspectives (Oxford: Oxford University Press), p. 65
Rousseau, D M (1989) ‘Psychological and Implied Contracts in Organizations’ 2 Employee Responsibility and Rights Journal 121
Rousseau, D M (1995) Psychological Contracts in Organizations: Understanding Written and Unwritten Agreements (Thousand Oaks CA: Sage)
Smith, C A, D W Organ and J P Near (1983) ‘Organisational Citizenship Behaviour: Its Nature and Antecedents’ 68 Journal of Applied Psychology 653
Speidel, R E (2000) ‘The Characteristics and Challenges of Relational Contracts’ 94(3) Northwestern University Law Review 823
Stone, K V W (2001) ‘The New Psychological Contract: Implications of the Changing Workplace for Labor and Employment Law’ 48 UCLA Law Review 519
Teubner, G (1993) Law as an Autopoietic System (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing)
Teubner, G (2011) Networks as Connected Contracts, H Collins (ed.) (Oxford: Hart Publishing)
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2013 Hugh Collins
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Collins, H. (2013). The Contract of Employment in 3D. In: Campbell, D., Mulcahy, L., Wheeler, S. (eds) Changing Concepts of Contract. Palgrave Macmillan Socio-Legal Studies. Palgrave, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-137-26927-0_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-137-26927-0_4
Publisher Name: Palgrave, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-57430-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-26927-0
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawLaw and Criminology (R0)