No abstract available Copyright / Dissertation (LLM)--University of Pretoria, 2012. / Mercantile Law / unrestricted

Many beginner educators leave the profession within the first three years following their appointment. The security of educators, and especially that of the beginner educator is threatened from many angles. Beginner educators experience this threat very intensely and this weakened feeling of security they experience, has important implications for their role as educators. There are, however, many legal determinants that protect educator security and oppose each threat directly. This research falls within the field of Education Law and the security of beginner-educators is studied from this angle. The study focuses on the protection of security as offered by law determinants and the real experience of threats by beginner educators. In the research, law determinants such as the Constitution, education law, labour law and case law, as protectors of security, were studied. Using a qualitative study the experience and perceptions of a selection of participants was analysed. The participants, from different types of schools in a certain geographical area, were identified. During the analysis two aspects emerged that influence security. The first aspect is the beginner educator‟s lack of knowledge of the mechanisms that protect security and the second aspect was beginner educators‟ real experience of threats. Beginner educators‟ lack of security is the result of their lack of knowledge of the mechanisms that protect security. The findings of this research propose that more emphasis is placed on the legal aspects concerning the protection of security of educators during their training and that beginner educators are empowered to face threats of security and overcome it. / MEd (Education Law), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Many beginner educators leave the profession within the first three years following their appointment. The security of educators, and especially that of the beginner educator is threatened from many angles. Beginner educators experience this threat very intensely and this weakened feeling of security they experience, has important implications for their role as educators. There are, however, many legal determinants that protect educator security and oppose each threat directly. This research falls within the field of Education Law and the security of beginner-educators is studied from this angle. The study focuses on the protection of security as offered by law determinants and the real experience of threats by beginner educators. In the research, law determinants such as the Constitution, education law, labour law and case law, as protectors of security, were studied. Using a qualitative study the experience and perceptions of a selection of participants was analysed. The participants, from different types of schools in a certain geographical area, were identified. During the analysis two aspects emerged that influence security. The first aspect is the beginner educator‟s lack of knowledge of the mechanisms that protect security and the second aspect was beginner educators‟ real experience of threats. Beginner educators‟ lack of security is the result of their lack of knowledge of the mechanisms that protect security. The findings of this research propose that more emphasis is placed on the legal aspects concerning the protection of security of educators during their training and that beginner educators are empowered to face threats of security and overcome it. / MEd (Education Law), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Current policy to extend early childhood education by placing grade R in public primary schools is politically, economically and educationally motivated. Quality education in grade R has definite long term economic advantages and could ensure equal educational opportunities. The educator is a key factor in this issue and her perception of her work life determines to a large extent the success of the initiative. The work fulfilment of the grade R educator is approached in this research from a labour law perspective and was conducted in the field of Education Law. The philosophic base of Education Law is found in the German educational term geborgenheit, which refers to the safety and security of all role players in education. The experience of security is regarded as a prerequisite for work fulfilment. The Constitution, education legislation, labour law, relevant case law and the common law were studied as legal determinants for work fulfilment. A qualitative enquiry into educators’ perceptions of their work life was conducted amongst participants in a specific area, which included schools from different socio–economic and cultural backgrounds. The essence of the findings is that, in spite of the existence of legislation which in principle should provide for physical and psychological security, educators still experience insecurity and therefore a lack of work fulfilment because of the ineffective implementation of law and policy. Widespread ignorance regarding the nature of quality education in grade R exists and the insistence on educator centralised teaching limits the work fulfilment of especially well–trained educators. Awareness of the advantages of a play based, whole–child approach has to be developed. This approach, as well as knowledge of legal determinants, promote work fulfilment, since both serve the best interests of the child as well as the educator. / Thesis (M.Ed.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2011.

Current policy to extend early childhood education by placing grade R in public primary schools is politically, economically and educationally motivated. Quality education in grade R has definite long term economic advantages and could ensure equal educational opportunities. The educator is a key factor in this issue and her perception of her work life determines to a large extent the success of the initiative. The work fulfilment of the grade R educator is approached in this research from a labour law perspective and was conducted in the field of Education Law. The philosophic base of Education Law is found in the German educational term geborgenheit, which refers to the safety and security of all role players in education. The experience of security is regarded as a prerequisite for work fulfilment. The Constitution, education legislation, labour law, relevant case law and the common law were studied as legal determinants for work fulfilment. A qualitative enquiry into educators’ perceptions of their work life was conducted amongst participants in a specific area, which included schools from different socio–economic and cultural backgrounds. The essence of the findings is that, in spite of the existence of legislation which in principle should provide for physical and psychological security, educators still experience insecurity and therefore a lack of work fulfilment because of the ineffective implementation of law and policy. Widespread ignorance regarding the nature of quality education in grade R exists and the insistence on educator centralised teaching limits the work fulfilment of especially well–trained educators. Awareness of the advantages of a play based, whole–child approach has to be developed. This approach, as well as knowledge of legal determinants, promote work fulfilment, since both serve the best interests of the child as well as the educator. / Thesis (M.Ed.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2011.

Recently, South African company law underwent a dramatic overhaul through the introduction of the Companies Act 71 of 2008. Central to company law is the promotion of corporate governance: companies no longer are accountable to their shareholders only but to society at large. Leaders should direct company strategy and operations with a view to achieving the triple bottom-line (economic, social and environmental performance) and, thus, should manage the business in a sustainable manner. An important question in company law today: In whose interest should the company be managed? Corporate governance needs to address the entire span of responsibilities to all stakeholders of the company, such as customers, employees, shareholders, suppliers and the community at large. The Companies Act aims to balance the rights and obligations of shareholders and directors within companies and encourages the efficient and responsible management of companies. The promotion of human rights is central in the application of company law: it is extremely important given the significant role of enterprises within the social and economic life of the nation. The interests of various stakeholder groups in the context of the corporation as a “social institution” should be enhanced and protected. Because corporations are a part of society and the community they are required to be socially responsible and to be more accountable to all stakeholders in the company. Although directors act in the best interests of shareholders, collectively, they must also consider the interests of other stakeholders. Sustainable relationships with all the relevant stakeholders are important. The advancement of social justice is important to corporations in that they should take into account the Constitution, labour and company law legislation in dealing with social justice issues. Employees have become important stakeholders in companies and their needs should be taken into account in a bigger corporate governance and social responsibility framework. Consideration of the role of employees in corporations entails notice that the Constitution grants every person a fundamental right to fair labour practices. Social as well as political change became evident after South Africa's re-entry into the world in the 1990s. Change to socio-economic conditions in a developing country is also evident. These changes have a major influence on South African labour law. Like company law, labour law, to a large extent, is codified. Like company law, no precise definition of labour law exists. From the various definitions, labour law covers both the individual and collective labour law and various role-players are involved. These role-players include trade unions, employers/companies, employees, and the state. The various relationships between these parties, ultimately, are what guides a certain outcome if there is a power play between them. In 1995 the South African labour market was transformed by the introduction of the Labour Relations Act 66 of 1995. The LRA remains the primary piece of labour legislation that governs labour law in South Africa. The notion of industrial democracy and the transformation of the workplace are central issues in South African labour law. The constitutional change that have taken place in South Africa, by which the protection of human rights and the democratisation of the workplace are advanced contributed to these developments. Before the enactment of the LRA, employee participation and voice were much-debated topics, locally and internationally. In considering employee participation, it is essential to take due cognisance of both the labour and company law principles that are pertinent: the need for workers to have a voice in the workplace and for employers to manage their corporations. Employee participation and voice should be evident at different levels: from informationsharing to consultation to joint decision-making. Corporations should enhance systems and processes that facilitate employee participation and voice in decisions that affect employees. The primary research question under investigation is: What role should (and could) employees play in corporate decision-making in South Africa? The main inquiry of the thesis, therefore, is to explore the issue of granting a voice to employees in companies, in particular, the role of employees in the decision-making processes of companies. The thesis explores various options, including supervisory co-determination as well as social co-determination, in order to find solutions that will facilitate the achievement of employee participation and voice in companies in South Africa. / LLD, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

The widening of access to Higher Education (HE) with a concomitant call for more accountability in the HE sector locally and globally, has altered the former elitist status of the university and impacted the professional standing, autonomy, and working conditions of lecturers negatively. Lecturers are increasingly held to account for providing quality teaching and delivering employable graduates. Yet their work environment has been characterised by poor support, dwindling resources, lack of recognition and reward for teaching efforts and excellence, and absence of legal protection when failing to fulfil the undefined yet high accountability expectations in their teaching-related work. This state of affairs has had an inevitable influence on lecturers’ perceived security in their labour environment. The overarching purpose of this study was therefore to generate guidelines to improve the existing juridical foundation for accountability of South African (SA) HE lecturers with a view to enhance their security in their employment context. In order to assist in the fulfilment of this central purpose, the study aimed to develop understanding of how lecturers perceive their accountability and security in light of diverse teaching-related responsibilities and vagueness in terms of expected conduct; and the protection (or lack of protection) of their rights and professional status. An international perspective on these issues was imperative to shed some light on how regulation elsewhere could improve practices in the SA context. While SA lecturers are equally entitled to all the rights stipulated in the Bill of Rights, they are also subject to and accountable for upholding the provisions of the SA Constitution and derived labour legislation relevant within the HE environment. The founding values of the Constitution, namely equality, human dignity and the protection of human rights and related freedoms, form not only the basic standard for measuring lecturer conduct, but also the legal basis for challenging policy, system or conduct that might threaten constitutional or labour rights. Yet, despite the existing juridical foundation for the regulation of accountability and rights protection of SA lecturers, comprising the SA Constitution, general labour and HE legislation, there is an absence of HE-specific teaching-related accountability regulation, resulting in lecturer insecurity regarding expected conduct, professional recognition and support, and accountability expectations in their teaching-related work. In comparison, a number of Australian legal imperatives, including the Commonwealth of Australia Learning and Teaching Council’s standard for quality teaching with corresponding quality indicators, provide for more clearly defined teaching-related accountability regulation. In addition, the Mission Based Compacts, the Threshold Standards, and the national Modern Award for the Higher Education Industry, afford Australian lecturers the protection of HE-specific rights relevant to enhance security in their unique work environment. These legal imperatives proved to be significant for informing the improved juridical foundation for lecturer teaching-related accountability in the SA context to enhance the security of the SA lecturer. With a focus on the development of in-depth understanding of the phenomena of lecturer accountability and security via the perspectives and interpretations of lecturers themselves, the empirical study was grounded in an inductive qualitative methodology from an interpretive-phenomenological perspective. To ensure richness of descriptive data, lecturers actively involved in undergraduate teaching at three different local, and one Australian university, were purposively selected to participate in semi-structured individual and focus group interviews. The analysis and interpretation of the interview data included a comparative component to explore perceptions of lecturer accountability regulation and security protection in an Australian context with a view to identify inadequate legal provisioning for these phenomena in the SA HE environment. From the data analysis and interpretation, seven meaningful themes were identified, associated with either lecturer accountability or lecturer security. The findings offered not only a clear delineation of internal and external lecturer teaching-related accountability, but also a comprehensive definition of lecturer professional security that was found wanting in all legal sources and other literature studied for this thesis. Moreover, in realisation of the primary aim of this study, twelve significant guidelines are presented to establish an improved juridical foundation for lecturer accountability that will enhance lecturer security in the SA Higher Education context. Amongst these are: the development of a clear delineation of teaching-related roles and responsibilities articulated for different academic post levels; the establishment of a professional HE teaching-oriented career path affording professional recognition via a professional body for lecturers, and requiring continuous professional teaching development; and the development of minimum conditions of employment unique to the work of the HE lecturer. / PhD (Education Law), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

Recently, South African company law underwent a dramatic overhaul through the introduction of the Companies Act 71 of 2008. Central to company law is the promotion of corporate governance: companies no longer are accountable to their shareholders only but to society at large. Leaders should direct company strategy and operations with a view to achieving the triple bottom-line (economic, social and environmental performance) and, thus, should manage the business in a sustainable manner. An important question in company law today: In whose interest should the company be managed? Corporate governance needs to address the entire span of responsibilities to all stakeholders of the company, such as customers, employees, shareholders, suppliers and the community at large. The Companies Act aims to balance the rights and obligations of shareholders and directors within companies and encourages the efficient and responsible management of companies. The promotion of human rights is central in the application of company law: it is extremely important given the significant role of enterprises within the social and economic life of the nation. The interests of various stakeholder groups in the context of the corporation as a “social institution” should be enhanced and protected. Because corporations are a part of society and the community they are required to be socially responsible and to be more accountable to all stakeholders in the company. Although directors act in the best interests of shareholders, collectively, they must also consider the interests of other stakeholders. Sustainable relationships with all the relevant stakeholders are important. The advancement of social justice is important to corporations in that they should take into account the Constitution, labour and company law legislation in dealing with social justice issues. Employees have become important stakeholders in companies and their needs should be taken into account in a bigger corporate governance and social responsibility framework. Consideration of the role of employees in corporations entails notice that the Constitution grants every person a fundamental right to fair labour practices. Social as well as political change became evident after South Africa's re-entry into the world in the 1990s. Change to socio-economic conditions in a developing country is also evident. These changes have a major influence on South African labour law. Like company law, labour law, to a large extent, is codified. Like company law, no precise definition of labour law exists. From the various definitions, labour law covers both the individual and collective labour law and various role-players are involved. These role-players include trade unions, employers/companies, employees, and the state. The various relationships between these parties, ultimately, are what guides a certain outcome if there is a power play between them. In 1995 the South African labour market was transformed by the introduction of the Labour Relations Act 66 of 1995. The LRA remains the primary piece of labour legislation that governs labour law in South Africa. The notion of industrial democracy and the transformation of the workplace are central issues in South African labour law. The constitutional change that have taken place in South Africa, by which the protection of human rights and the democratisation of the workplace are advanced contributed to these developments. Before the enactment of the LRA, employee participation and voice were much-debated topics, locally and internationally. In considering employee participation, it is essential to take due cognisance of both the labour and company law principles that are pertinent: the need for workers to have a voice in the workplace and for employers to manage their corporations. Employee participation and voice should be evident at different levels: from informationsharing to consultation to joint decision-making. Corporations should enhance systems and processes that facilitate employee participation and voice in decisions that affect employees. The primary research question under investigation is: What role should (and could) employees play in corporate decision-making in South Africa? The main inquiry of the thesis, therefore, is to explore the issue of granting a voice to employees in companies, in particular, the role of employees in the decision-making processes of companies. The thesis explores various options, including supervisory co-determination as well as social co-determination, in order to find solutions that will facilitate the achievement of employee participation and voice in companies in South Africa. / LLD, North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015

The widening of access to Higher Education (HE) with a concomitant call for more accountability in the HE sector locally and globally, has altered the former elitist status of the university and impacted the professional standing, autonomy, and working conditions of lecturers negatively. Lecturers are increasingly held to account for providing quality teaching and delivering employable graduates. Yet their work environment has been characterised by poor support, dwindling resources, lack of recognition and reward for teaching efforts and excellence, and absence of legal protection when failing to fulfil the undefined yet high accountability expectations in their teaching-related work. This state of affairs has had an inevitable influence on lecturers’ perceived security in their labour environment. The overarching purpose of this study was therefore to generate guidelines to improve the existing juridical foundation for accountability of South African (SA) HE lecturers with a view to enhance their security in their employment context. In order to assist in the fulfilment of this central purpose, the study aimed to develop understanding of how lecturers perceive their accountability and security in light of diverse teaching-related responsibilities and vagueness in terms of expected conduct; and the protection (or lack of protection) of their rights and professional status. An international perspective on these issues was imperative to shed some light on how regulation elsewhere could improve practices in the SA context. While SA lecturers are equally entitled to all the rights stipulated in the Bill of Rights, they are also subject to and accountable for upholding the provisions of the SA Constitution and derived labour legislation relevant within the HE environment. The founding values of the Constitution, namely equality, human dignity and the protection of human rights and related freedoms, form not only the basic standard for measuring lecturer conduct, but also the legal basis for challenging policy, system or conduct that might threaten constitutional or labour rights. Yet, despite the existing juridical foundation for the regulation of accountability and rights protection of SA lecturers, comprising the SA Constitution, general labour and HE legislation, there is an absence of HE-specific teaching-related accountability regulation, resulting in lecturer insecurity regarding expected conduct, professional recognition and support, and accountability expectations in their teaching-related work. In comparison, a number of Australian legal imperatives, including the Commonwealth of Australia Learning and Teaching Council’s standard for quality teaching with corresponding quality indicators, provide for more clearly defined teaching-related accountability regulation. In addition, the Mission Based Compacts, the Threshold Standards, and the national Modern Award for the Higher Education Industry, afford Australian lecturers the protection of HE-specific rights relevant to enhance security in their unique work environment. These legal imperatives proved to be significant for informing the improved juridical foundation for lecturer teaching-related accountability in the SA context to enhance the security of the SA lecturer. With a focus on the development of in-depth understanding of the phenomena of lecturer accountability and security via the perspectives and interpretations of lecturers themselves, the empirical study was grounded in an inductive qualitative methodology from an interpretive-phenomenological perspective. To ensure richness of descriptive data, lecturers actively involved in undergraduate teaching at three different local, and one Australian university, were purposively selected to participate in semi-structured individual and focus group interviews. The analysis and interpretation of the interview data included a comparative component to explore perceptions of lecturer accountability regulation and security protection in an Australian context with a view to identify inadequate legal provisioning for these phenomena in the SA HE environment. From the data analysis and interpretation, seven meaningful themes were identified, associated with either lecturer accountability or lecturer security. The findings offered not only a clear delineation of internal and external lecturer teaching-related accountability, but also a comprehensive definition of lecturer professional security that was found wanting in all legal sources and other literature studied for this thesis. Moreover, in realisation of the primary aim of this study, twelve significant guidelines are presented to establish an improved juridical foundation for lecturer accountability that will enhance lecturer security in the SA Higher Education context. Amongst these are: the development of a clear delineation of teaching-related roles and responsibilities articulated for different academic post levels; the establishment of a professional HE teaching-oriented career path affording professional recognition via a professional body for lecturers, and requiring continuous professional teaching development; and the development of minimum conditions of employment unique to the work of the HE lecturer. / PhD (Education Law), North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2015