Recent years have witnessed a rapidly growing interest in the use and construction of "qualitative" indicators of labour standards. This is likely attributable to several factors: the rise of "socially responsible" investment, ongoing debates on the effects of labour standards on international competitiveness, and the sense that traditional quantitative indicators of labour standards are too narrow in scope to adequately capture the wide-ranging and inherently qualitative nature of many aspects of labour standards. Qualitative indicators, while generally having numerical values, are based on such methods as grading by experts, the coding of legislation, and the coding of other textual sources addressing violations of a more de facto nature. Measuring compliance with labour standards is an undertaking intrinsically fraught with difficulty. For there are a number of possible sources of measurement error, both random and non-random, that are unique to such indicators, on top of those that affect qualitative and quantitative indicators alike. The growing use of qualitative indicators of labour standards thus raises a number of questions about comparative methods of construction as well as the appropriateness of particular methods for particular applications. This volume results from a seminar that was organized to address these and related questions.

Contents:
1. Unemployment, Labor Market Flexibility and Women as a Buffer Workforce
Introduction: defining labor market flexibility
Part 1. Evidence on the relationship between labor market flexibility and unemployment
Part 2. Unemployment and labour flexibility in Japan
Conclusion
2. Women's Integration into the Workforce
Introduction: the buffer, job segregation, and substitution hypotheses
Foreign workers in Germany as a buffer workforce
Women as a buffer workforce and the job segregation hypothesis in sectors and manufacturing industries
Comparing patterns of gender segregation
Conclusion
3. Industrial Relations and Labor Market Institutions
Introduction: combining high and low road strategies in Japan
Lifetime employment and nenko earnings in Japan: persisting institutions
Temporary employment as a stepping stone and buffer
Part-time employment from demand and supply sides
Women and unions
Conclusion
Appendix: Policies supporting the employment of mothers; Maternity leave policies; Child care provisions
4. Foreign Trade, Employment and Earnings
Introduction: skills bias and gender bias
Part 1. Foreign trade and men and women's employment
Part 2. Foreign trade and diverging gender wage gaps in Germany and Japan
Conclusion
5. German Reunification
Introduction: the question of convergence
Women's employment in East Germany and persisting inequalities
After the wall: women's high unemployment and demographic shocks
Conclusion

Recent years have witnessed a rapidly growing interest in the use and construction of "qualitative" indicators of labour standards. This is likely attributable to several factors: the rise of "socially responsible" investment, ongoing debates on the effects of labour standards on international competitiveness, and the sense that traditional quantitative indicators of labour standards are too narrow in scope to adequately capture the wide-ranging and inherently qualitative nature of many aspects of labour standards. Qualitative indicators, while generally having numerical values, are based on such methods as grading by experts, the coding of legislation, and the coding of other textual sources addressing violations of a more de facto nature. Measuring compliance with labour standards is an undertaking intrinsically fraught with difficulty. For there are a number of possible sources of measurement error, both random and non-random, that are unique to such indicators, on top of those that affect qualitative and quantitative indicators alike. The growing use of qualitative indicators of labour standards thus raises a number of questions about comparative methods of construction as well as the appropriateness of particular methods for particular applications. This volume results from a seminar that was organized to address these and related questions.