'Labour Law is a Subset of Employment Law' Revisited

This article revisits the arguments in Brian Langille’s seminal law review article, “Labour Law is a Subset of Employment Law.” Langille’s article was based upon two main claims: (a) that (individual) employment law should be understood as the “set” and (collective) labour law the “subset” of employment law (the primacy of employment law); (b) that “public values” have priority over “private values” in the regulation of work (the primacy of public values). These two claims were presented as mutually reinforcing in “Subset.” Drawing on specific examples from UK and Canadian law, this article endorses the first claim but rejects the second. Public and private values intersect in a multiplicity of ways. It is too reductive to accord primacy to the “public”or the “private.” Employment law has always been a hybrid discipline shaped by public and private law.