Flexibility Clauses

By means of illustration, a useful list of flexibility devices is found in the Handbook of procedures relating to international labour Conventions and Recommendations.

1. Clauses laying down modified standards for named countries. These have not been used recently by the Conference.

2. Adoption of a Convention laying down principles together with (or later supplemented by) a Recommendation giving guidance on technical and practical details of implementation.

3. Definition of standards in broad wording -- for example, fixing aims of social policy which leaves it to national conditions and practices, often after consultation of employers' and workers' organizations, to determine the methods of application (laws, regulations, collective agreements, etc.).

4. Division of Conventions into Parts or Articles, the obligations of only some of which need to be accepted at the time of ratification, thus allowing future cumulation of obligations as social legislation and ability to implement develop.

5. Division of Conventions into alternative Parts, the extent or level of obligation varying according to which Parts are accepted.

6. Clauses allowing (sometimes temporarily) acceptance of a specified lower standard by countries where, for example, no legislation on the subject in question existed prior to ratification or where the economy or administrative or medical facilities are insufficiently developed.

7. Clauses allowing exclusion of, for example, specified categories of occupations or enterprises or sparsely populated or undeveloped areas.

8. Clauses allowing separate acceptance of obligations in respect of persons employed in specified economic sectors.

9. Clauses designed to keep abreast of advances of medical science by referring to "the most recent edition" of a reference work, or keeping a matter under review in the light of current knowledge.

10. Adoption of an optional Protocol to a Convention, either enabling ratification of the Convention itself with increased flexibility or extending the obligations of the Convention.

11. Clauses in a Convention which partially revise an earlier Convention, by introducing alternative and more modern obligations, while leaving the Convention open to ratification still in its unrevised form.