View source for Social:Labour is not a commodity

"'''Labour is not a commodity'''" is the principle expressed in the preamble to the International Labour Organization's founding documents. It expresses the view that people should not be treated like inanimate commodities, [[Social:Human capital|capital]], another mere factor of production, or [[Social:Human resources|resources]]. Instead, people who work for a living should be treated as human beings and accorded [[Philosophy:Dignity|dignity]] and respect. Paul O'Higgins attributes the phrase to John Kells Ingram, who used it in 1880 during a meeting in [[Place:Dublin|Dublin]] of the British Trades Union Congress.<ref>O'Higgins, P., [https://academic.oup.com/ilj/article-abstract/26/3/225/664238 'Labour is not a Commodity' — an Irish Contribution to International Labour Law'] (1997) 26(3) Industrial Law Journal 225-234</ref>
== Law ==
* Clayton Act 1914, which gave trade unions in the {{wipe|United States}} the freedom from paying penalties from courts for organising and taking [[Social:Collective action|collective action]]
* Versailles Treaty, establishing the International Labour Organization, Article 427
* Declaration of Philadelphia 1944, reestablishing the ILO under the {{wipe|United Nations}} and reaffirming the first principle that labour is not a commodity

== See also ==
* [[Finance:Commodity|Commodity]]
* [[Finance:Fictitious commodities|Fictitious commodities]]
* [[Finance:Labor theory of value|Labor theory of value]]
* [[Philosophy:Criticism of capitalism|Criticism of capitalism]]

== References ==
{{reflist}}

== External links ==
* International Labour Organization, [https://web.archive.org/web/20180807001520/http://blue.lim.ilo.org/cariblex/pdfs/ILO_dec_philadelphia.pdf Declaration of Philadelphia] (1944)

[[Category:Human resource management]]



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