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mgr Barbara Surdykowska
ORCID: 0000-0003-4569-1274

Legal adviser at the Expert Office of the National Commission of the NSZZ “Solidarność” trade union and an expert of the Social Dialogue Council. She deals, among others, with issues of workers’ social se­curity, collective bargaining, the transnational dimension of industrial relations and the impact of digitalisation on the working environment. She is an expert in the CEE­CAW project (Challenges for Organising and Collective Bargaining in Care, Administration and Waste Manage­ment sectors in Central Eastern European Countries). The issues discussed in this paper were presented at the XXII International Conference in Commemoration of Prof. Marco Biagi, held in 2025 in Modena.

 
DOI: 10.33226/0032-6186.2026.1.5
JEL: K31, J24, J83, O33

The paper reports the findings of a large nationwide sur­vey This paper analyses the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on collective bargaining through the lens of Walton and McKersie’s behavioural theory of labour negotiation. The authors identify four key sub-processes of bargaining distributive bargaining, integrative bargaining, attitudi­nal structuring and intra-organisational bargaining and indicate how AI may reshape each of them. The article highlights both the potential of AI to support fair social dialogue and the risks of deepening inequalities and dehu­manising negotiation processes. It emphasises the current absence of AI as a tool on the side of trade unions, which in turn underscores the need to strengthen institutional safeguards protecting workers’ interests. The analysis con­cludes that the consequences of integrating AI into collec­tive bargaining depend not on the technology itself, but on the principles of transparency, co-governance and the ethical implementation of AI systems.

Keywords: artificial intelligence; trade unions; collective bargaining
DOI: 10.33226/0032-6186.2025.1.6
JEL: K31, K33

The paper outlines the possibility of protecting workers' rights under the existing Alien Tort Statute (ATS) in US federal law. The background to the comments on the ATS is the Nestle, Inc. v. Doe decision in 2021, which has been described as "closing the window of hope" that had been attached to the possibility of bringing claims against transnational corporations for failing to respect fundamental rights at work. Undoubtedly, the ruling itself was a major disappointment for many human rights and labour rights campaigners and activists. However, the judgment (mainly because of its complex reasoning and dissenting opinions) has provoked a reaction in the form of proposals for new legislative solutions, and it is possible that it will become the seed from which a new, useful tool for the realisation of human rights at work will grow. The paper addresses the question of which work-related rules can be considered part of 'customary international law'.

Keywords: labour rights; international labour law; redress; transnational corporations
DOI: 10.33226/0032-6186.2023.1.4
JEL: K31, J47

The paper deals with the work of immigrants in detention centers in the US and the possibility of qualifying this work as forced labor. The main issues addressed in the paper are the amount of wages received by detainees in the centers, the question of whether this labor is voluntary, the conditions under which it is performed and, finally, whether detainees in detention centers are entitled to labor-related collective rights, that is, the right to organize and effectively negotiate working conditions and wages. The idea is to present the ongoing discussion in the US on whether detainees in immigration detention centers fall under two fundamental federal regulations: The Fair Labor Standard Act (FLSA), which includes a federal minimum wage guarantee, and the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), which includes a guarantee of the right to organize and a prohibition on discrimination based on workers' organizing or union activity.

Keywords: Labor; immigration detention centers; forced labor