Freedom of expression and the right to criticize are important prerequisites in the Swedish labor market. In fact, the freedom of expression is regulated in a long chain of protection, and not at least for the public employees which have the ECHR’s protection and the Swedish constitution embedded in their employment contracts. For the private employees, on the other hand, the legal situation looks completely different. A private employee does not receive equal opportunities to invoke the ECHR or the Swedish constitution when criticizing the employer. The main purpose of this paper is thus to investigate the legal situation for each sector, after which the legal situation must be compared and discussed in light of the duty of loyalty.  As the right to criticize has become a major issue for discussion, Sweden received a whistleblower regulation in 2017 which came to protect workers from reprisals. Nonetheless, a couple of years have passed, and a new EU-directive has been introduced with a number of new requirements. In December 2021, Sweden will introduce a more comprehensive whistleblower regulation and replace the current regulation. The second purpose of this paper is accordingly to investigate the new protection and examine the possible impact of the protection in each sector.  The conclusions of the paper were not entirely easy to summarize. What is clear is that there is no uniform protection in the sectors, and the enhanced protection may result in a smaller gap between the sectors, despite different interests.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-26T20:23:00Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Cristiane Maria Freitas de Mello.pdf: 814956 bytes, checksum: b0e04d3332d5cd3010f5271cc77b1b72 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-08-12 / This study aims to investigate the freedom of expression of the employee on social networks, focusing on the right to criticism and its impact on the employment contract, notably with reference to the image of the employer, because there is no law that concerns this complex discussion. The deductive method was used, and by reason of incipient discussion about the topic in Brazil, the foreign doctrine and jurisprudence has been studied with use of the comparative method. By reason of multiple laws of several derivations, this study extended to other areas of legal sciences as Constitutional, Civil and Labor law, aiming to show the connection between freedom of expression, Democratic State, as a finalistic political formula, and human dignity. Adopting this interdisciplinary perspective, it can be shown how natural persons and business' entities are bound to constitutional laws that define rights and guarantees, and can yield the assertion of the labor rights claims that are nonspecific in the company scope. Since the worker, in his special situation of subordination, has several duties that impose restrictions on his freedom of expression, the obligations of fidelity and loyalty were also studied. By reason of absence of primacy among rights to honor and image, and right of freedom of expression. It was deduced that the need for implementing the method of weighing between the principles of the factual case and preserving the essential core principle that does not prevail, even in social networks. Therefore, the reasonable exercise of the right of criticism in social networks without abuse and without the use of excessive and insulting terms is, in principle, given the importance of freedom of expression in a democratic state. This right however, does not protect either crimes of libel, defamation and slander, or the criticisms aiming to disseminate strategic information, by instances from the organization structure, methods of production or sensitive data of the company / O presente estudo busca investigar a liberdade de expressão do empregado nas redes sociais, mormente o direito de crítica e sua repercussão no contrato de trabalho, especialmente quanto à imagem do empregador, pois não existe no ordenamento jurídico pátrio qualquer normativo que verse sobre essa complexa discussão. Para tanto, foi utilizado o método dedutivo e, em razão do incipiente debate no Brasil acerca do tema, o método comparativo, com verificação da questão na doutrina e jurisprudência estrangeira. Em razão da pluralidade de normas de diversas derivações, a pesquisa se estendeu por outras áreas das ciências jurídicas, como Direito Constitucional, Civil e Trabalhista, visando evidenciar a conexão entre a liberdade de expressão, o Estado Democrático de Direito, enquanto fórmula política de caráter finalístico, e a dignidade da pessoa humana, para assim concluir pela vinculação dos particulares às normas constitucionais definidoras de direitos e garantias e pela afirmação dos direitos inespecíficos trabalhistas no âmbito da empresa. Como o trabalhador, na sua especial situação de subordinação, está sujeito a uma série de deveres que supõem restrições ao exercício de sua liberdade de expressão, foram estudadas as fronteiras do direito de crítica, com aprofundamento nos deveres de boa-fé e, consequentemente, de lealdade e fidelidade. Em razão da ausência de primazia dos direitos à honra e à imagem sobre o direito de liberdade de expressão, porque são igualmente tutelados pelo texto constitucional, deduziu-se pela necessidade de aplicação do método de ponderação entre os princípios no caso concreto de colisão, com a preservação do núcleo essencial do princípio não prevalente, ainda que no âmbito das redes sociais. Logo, o exercício razoável, ou seja, sem abusos, sem a utilização de termos excessivos e insultuosos, do direito de crítica nas redes sociais é, em princípio, pleno, dada a importância da liberdade de expressão no Estado democrático. Tal direito, contudo, não protege os crimes de injúria, difamação e calúnia, nem as críticas tendentes a divulgar informações sobre a organização e os métodos de produção da empresa ou dados sigilosos