ILO- role and ongoing relevance

The International Labour Organisation (ILO) was founded in 1919 at the post-war Peace Conference in Paris as Part XIII of the Treaty of Versailles, it remains the only surviving major creation of the Treaty. The ILO became the first specialized agency of the UN in 1946 and seeks promotion of social justice and internationally recognized human and labour rights (Sim, 2002).

The ILO has a unique tripartite structure with workers and employers participating as equal partners with governments in the work of its governing organs (Swepston, 1994). Its tripartite structure makes the ILO unique amongst world organizations in that employers’ and workers’ organizations have an equal voice with the governments in shaping its policies and programmes (Sheperd, 2002). It remains unique, even though international bodies have increasingly been forced to involve non-governmental bodies in their policy formation processes (Lee, 1994).

The ILO was established in a world which was ravaged by war...