RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN SOCIAL-POLICY IN THE NEW EUROPEAN UNION

This paper assesses the recent progress and future direction of labor policy in the European Community, now the European Union. The authors show that most of the mandates foreshadowed under the December 1989 Co mmunity Social Charter have now been enacted into law. They analyze th e possible costs, as well as the benefits, of these first-phase mandat es and show the link between these adjustment costs and the Community' s policy of providing subsidies to its poorer member states. They also demonstrate how the new Treaty on European Union, agreed to at Maastr icht in December 1991, has increased the scope for Community-level lab or market regulation.