Los límites de la autonomía de las cláusulas laborales en los acuerdos de libre comercio

Over the last decades, regional free trade agreements have incorporated clauses designed to protect certain labour rights. This article analyses the scope and effectiveness of labour clauses in free trade agreements from a comparative perspective, with a view to determining whether they constitute an autonomous regulatory framework in substantive, formal and functional terms. To this end, the structure and structural limits of the clauses are examined through the main models: those of a promotional nature characteristic of agreements signed by the European Union, models with elements of economic coercion, such as those concluded by the United States and Canada, and new experimental mechanisms such as the Rapid Response Labour Mechanism or the rebalancing clause. In light of the research, it is argued that these clauses enjoy substantive autonomy, but their practical application is subject to commercial logic and state will.