The Impact of International Labour Standards on Ukrainian Labour Law Reform

The relevance of the topic is determined by the need for a systematic understanding of how International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions have influenced the formation and reform of Ukrainian labour law throughout the entire period of the country's ILO membership. Although domestic legal scholarship has paid considerable attention to particular aspects of this interaction, a holistic retrospective study of the uneven influence of successive generations of ILO conventions on the institutions of the Labour Code has remained outside the focus of researchers, which determines the purpose of this article. The purpose of the article is to identify and periodize the influence of ILO conventions on the formation of key institutions of Ukrainian labour law, taking into account the chronology of their ratification and the content of the obligations undertaken, and to assess the systemic character and completeness of the implementation of the relevant standards. To achieve this purpose, the historical-legal method (for periodizing Ukraine's ratification activity), the formal-legal (dogmatic) method (for establishing the content of the conventions' provisions and the corresponding norms of the Labour Code), the comparative-legal method (for juxtaposing conventional standards with national regulation), and the systemic method (for assessing the coherence of labour legislation as an integral system) were applied. It is established that the influence of ILO conventions on the Labour Code is uneven in time and depth: conventions of the first ratification period (the 1950s–1960s) performed a norm-forming function, laying down the basic institutions of maximum working time, equal remuneration, and non-discrimination; conventions of the second period (the 1970s to the early twenty-first century) mostly confirmed already settled regulation or revealed partial discrepancies, in particular in the approach to grounds for dismissal; a separate group of recent conventions (Nos. 155, 170, 183 and 190) demonstrates a systemic delay in ratification, which in certain cases exceeds thirty years. It is shown that the constitutional status of ratified international treaties (Article 9 of the Constitution of Ukraine, Article 8¹ of the Labour Code) gives such analysis not only doctrinal but also practical legal significance. Prospects for further research are linked to the transition from a fragmentary to a strategically oriented policy of implementing international labour standards under Ukraine's European integration commitments.