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Theoretical and Practical Foundations on the People with Disabilities
Labor Law in Romania
Diana- Mihaela Malinche1
Abstract: Labor law is one of the most important issues of law both national and international level. In this
study we will examine the area of labor law and social security labor law by profiling the study of this field in
the segment of socio- professional protection and integration of people with disabilities at national level. The
economic changes as well as the social changes that have occurred in our country during the last years had a
significant impact over the population, especially among people with disabilities. In order to reduce the
impact of economic fluctuations over the people with disabilities, the Romanian authorities complied to the
international requirements and actively promotes social policies to ensure the integration of the disadvantaged
people in the community and preventing the emergence of social barriers that restrict the implication of the
affected people to social life. The implication of Romanian st ate in t he socio- professional insertion of
disadvantaged pe ople can be considered a preventive form of social protection designed to avoid social
initiation as well as avoiding the complete disruption of social relations between societies and people with
disabilities.
Keywords: labor law; social security labor law; people with disabilities; integration; social protection
1. Introduction
In order to collect and interpret the necessary data for the preparation of the present research, we will
use the “content analysis” research method, taking into account the theoretical concepts of labor law at
national level as well as the legislative provisions adopted over the time in order to consolidate the
people with disabilities acces on the labor market and, implicitly, their socio- professional integration
in the society. Content analysis is considered to be “a set of qualitative and quantitative research
techniques, both verbal and nonverbal communication for the objective description and systematic
identification and description of the content of the manuscript and/ or of the attentive content, in order
to draw conclusions about the individual and society communication itself, as a process of societal
inter-action”. (Chelcea, 2007, p. 573) As a matter of course, we intend to make a correlation between
the general law and labor law and the measures adopted by the law maker to support and develop the
social inclusion of people with disabilities. Moreover, labor law has been frequently used to establish
workplaces between people with disabilities and asylum seekers in order to support their social
insertion as well as to eliminate all kinds of discrimination between the social classes.
This produces a particularly complex phenomena of working conditions in optimum conditions, with
benefits for both the employers and the employees with disabilities. In order to achieve this objective,
the Romanian state significantly contributes to socio- professional inclusion of people with
1 Master Student, Faculty of Law, Danubius University of Galati, Romania , Address: 3 Galati Blvd., Galati 800654,
Romania, Tel.: +40372361102, Corresponding author: diana.malinche@yahoo.com.
ISSN: 2067 – 9211 The Youth of Today - The Generation of the Global Development
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disabilities, providing both the legal and the financial support necessary for the provision of
professional activities by this social class, as we will see in this study. The social measures promoted
by the Romanian authorities in view of the socio- professional insertion of people with disabilities that
we will present in this paper, prove to be extremely useful for the societies, as we will observe. By
means of this measure, the social and professional situation of the affected persons is improved, on the
one hand, and the potential of the social policy is appreciated in the interest of the community, on the
other hand. In order to achieve this objective, the Romanian state established for the first time, by
Ordinance no. 14/ 2003 the National Authority for People with Disabilities (ANPD). One of the main
contributions of the ANPD is the application of national strategies for the special protection of the
people with disabilities, as well as approving all the necessary nor mative powers for the development
and application of the strategy. The first protection strategy for people with disabilities was funded by
the National Authority for People with Disabilities in 2003's and included in its content a national
action plan for the 2003- 2006 timeframe. By mea ns of the action plan with long- term objectives,
there were proposed “reforms of the system of protection of people with disabilities, focusing on the
evacuation and individualization of intervention, restructuring of residential institutions, creation of
alternative services, consolidation of the parentage between public and private institutions and
increasing the competencies of local authorities. The main objective of the national strategy was the
creation of a continuous integrated protection and support system for people with disabilities, through
the reform of the central institutions administration and the institutional reform of the field, in view of
the increasing the life quality of the affected people.” (Neamţu, 2003, p. 962) The focus of the
strategies development for protecting the people with disabilities has been manifested in recent years
as national strategy named “A barrier- free society for people with disabilities in the period 2015-
2020”. Thus, through the a doption of this strategy, the Romanian State is obliged to mobilize all the
financial, social, legislative available resources to prevent the marginalization, discrimination and
violation of people with disabilities rights. As highlighted in the above, in the present, the socio-
professional insertion of people with disabilities as well as the impr ovement of their living conditions
was convinced.
In support of my assertion, the results obtained after the “A barrier- free society for people with
disabilities in the period 2015- 2020” national strategy implementation highlighted the fact that “There
are a million people suffering by a form of disability. Of these, between 100 and 190 million people
face an important functional limitation. It is argued that the number of people with disabilities will
increase in the future, among the factors that cause the global phenomena of population aging, the
increase in average lifetime and the exposure of non- incurable diseases.”1 In order to have an insight
view into this issue, we mention that we had chosen to investigate this topic because we considered
that society’s interest in socio- professional integration of people with disabilities is far too low to be
important.
Although benefiting from additional means of protection from the Romanian state, people with
disabilities are often discriminated by the members of the society who filter their medical conditions
through the prism of hostile stereotypes transmitted at national and international level even during the
Holocaust, German practices of pure breed conservation is a representative exa mple in this case.
Through this research we intend to highlight the lack of interest of the Romanian society regarding the
socio- professional integration of disadvantaged social categories as well as highlighting the benefits
1 The Romanian Government (2015). Narrative Strateg A barrier- free society for people with disabil ities in the period 2015-
2020, p. 17.