Fundamental principles and realities of practice: work health and safety in low- and middle-income countries

This article sets out to explore whether the amendment to the ILO’s 1998 Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work which, in June 2022, added a ‘safe and healthy work environment’ to the principles and rights already included, might help to address conditions leading to the disproportionate burden of work-related death, injury and disease estimated to occur in low and middle-income countries (LMICs). It does so by drawing on the findings of an extensive review of the literature to examine evidence for the influence and operation of (a) global and national regulatory standards and interventions; and (b) private standards and their role in influencing practices in export-oriented work. It situates its examination of this evidence in relation to the economic, social and regulatory contexts in which work and its poor outcomes for safety and health are experienced in many LMICs, and hence in relation to the challenges that confront the effective utilisation of regulatory action. The article argues that these contextual challenges are formidable, and evidence of the operational means of securing sustainable improvements to work health and safety in the face of them remains incomplete. But it concludes that the 2022 amendment could contribute a useful driver for the considerable strategic orchestration and leadership required to achieve such effective utilisation if, within the ILO, there were a tripartite consensus concerning its desirability.