Conciliation in labour disputes between problems of effectiveness of workers’ rights and prospects for the future in the Italian civil procedure system

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is not only to provide a clear and concise timeline of the key developments that conciliation in labour disputes has witnessed over time (starting from the mini-reform of Legislative Decree No 80/1998, the 2001 Foglia Commission, the 2002 Vaccarella Commission, Law No 183/2010, the 2012 Fornero Reform and the Jobs Act 2014) but also to examine the critical issues that have surfaced in relation to the legislation passed in the matter, especially with reference to the issue of the effectiveness of workers’ rights. The study has concluded that the use of conciliation in litigation can be a valid tool capable of amicably resolving a legal dispute, alleviating the workload of the courts and facilitating early resolution through alternative paths. Conciliation, like arbitration, can be viewed as a mechanism that offers a possible way out of the gridlock in labour law litigation and the huge backlog of cases before the courts in order to provide citizens with effective justice. That said, recourse to conciliation in Italy is very limited in practice owing to a series of reasons at various levels that serve to discourage any interest in it. This paper has sought to identify those obstacles as objectively as possible, bearing in mind however that recourse to alternatives to the courts does not appear to be an integral part of the Italian legal tradition. The final part of this paper outlines what future developments might look like, specifically in the direction of negotiations along the lines of the US model.