Employment Tribunals and the civil courts: isomorphism exemplified

Corby, Susan and Latreille, Paul L. (2012) Employment Tribunals and the civil courts: isomorphism exemplified. Industrial Law Journal, 41 (4). pp. 387-406. ISSN 0305-9332

Abstract

This article traces the evolution of Employment Tribunals (ETs) in Great Britain over the last 50 years from distinctive and comparatively informal bodies to their proposed merger with the ‘ordinary’ civil courts. This reflects the tendency of an organisation to become similar to another organisation where both are in the same organisational field: institutional isomorphism. Such isomorphism occurs because of coercive pressures by the body controlling the organisation’s resources, in this case government. Such isomorphism occurs also because of mimetic pressures; in this case the relatively newly established ETs have adopted the paradigm of the long-established civil courts, and because of normative pressures due to the common values held by judges in ETs and judges in the civil courts arising from their common legal training, legal apprenticeship and role socialisation. The article then argues that this isomorphism has contributed to the juridification of employment relations.

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