Nonstandard Employment Relations and Implications for Decent Work Deficits in Nigeria

Abstract

Nonstandard employment relations have become very common in most work Organisations in Nigeria. However, the implications of this form of employment relations as regards the International Labour Organisation's (ILO) decent work agenda are rarely investigated by the industrial and work sociologists. Conceptualizing nonstandard work within the context of casual, contract and outsourced work, the paper contends that this form of employment relations has been exacerbated by the growing incidence of youth unemployment in Nigeria. Using neoliberalism as a theoretical framework, the paper further contended that most work organisations in Nigeria are using this mode of employment to reduce labour cost so as to increase profit in line with the rule of free market economy at the expense of the improvised workers in violation of extant labour law. The paper argues that with this mode of employment relations, there are serious infractions and deficits of decent work in Nigeria.

Keywords: Nonstandard work, decent work, social protection, neoliberalism, right at work, social Dialogue