Since the mid-1970s developed countries have been experiencing dramatic changes in their labor markets, and social security institutions have been adjusting themselves accordingly in an attempt to overcome the economic crisis and adjust to the demands of the international competitiveness. The result of these changes is the growth of the so-called atypical jobs in which labor rights are reduced or withdrawn. This article discusses how the liberal policy of labor market flexibility is affecting and changing labour relations in Spain. If it grows in Europe weakening the social forces that consolidated labor rights and dismantle the market structure, its power has been much more severely experienced in Spain due to its late democratization. The article also makes a parallel with the institutions of the labor market in Brazil, another country of late democratization whose history in many aspects converges with that of Spain. Based on a literature review and considering the importance of the historical, cultural and political specificities of each context, I argue that labor market changes in both countries have been played out following a model of flexible capitalism in which competitive adjustment initiatives are based on breach of employment commitment and low wages.
Labor relations; Spain; Brazil