Labour and Social Policy are no longer neatly parcelled into the domain of the International Labour Organization, with debates and policy issues now occurring in diverse fora. Other organizations and other actors are now increasingly involved. Challenges in this area abound for all employers and it is only through active collaboration and coordination that business can effectively respond to such challenges.

The speed of change in today’s world means that employers have to be able to respond quicker and more effectively to new challenges and policy issues. In the past number of years the IOE has engaged in more and more activities in the international and regional fora where employer interests are represented. While the ILO continues to be the IOE’s main arena, in recent years the IOE has developed deeper relationships with a number of other relevant international organizations and has strengthened its ties with a range of these, in particular with the World Bank, UNDP and the UN Secretary-General’s Office. It is our hope for the coming years that we can continue to build on and develop these relationships and enhance the current work that the IOE does in the interests of its members as it remains vitally important to member federations to have a strong and vibrant IOE to tackle the debates at the international level, before they re-emerge at national level.

For most employers’ organizations today, there seems to be an avalanche of work of the very pressing kind that requires an immediate response. Consequently, for many, events at the international level can and do take a back seat. This is not unusual as in any organization, particularly smaller ones, it is difficult to see beyond the day-today issues. This, however, does not limit the importance of keeping an eye on the bigger picture, as many of the policy issues that employer organizations are eventually faced with will emerge at the international level first and need to be tackled there, before they re-emerge at national level.

Issues at the international level can often seem abstract and possibly even irrelevant to employers at the national level. However, in today’s globalized world, issues transcend national borders and, increasingly, trade unions and NGOs are operating across borders, with international involvement in domestic disputes. Moreover, there is a growing trend to extend more formative structures to this form of cooperation. Many NGOs and trade unions are increasingly looking to the international institutions as a mechanism to resolve issues.The current debate on Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), where international standards are being heavily propagated by some, is an example of this.

The bottom line is that engagement in the work of the ILO by employers, be they from the developed or developing world, has never been more relevant. The interconnectedness of labour and social policy debates wherever they are occurring is widely understood, as too is the need for that to be coordinated from an employers’ perspective. Here the IOE plays a unique role in working to ensure that the representative global voice of business is heard whilst also helping members in responding to the international debates.