Industrial Accidents and Occupational Diseases: Some Empirical Findings for the Netherlands, Belgium, Germany & Great Britain

This paper, which has been composed within the framework of the’ shifts in governance’ project, contains an impression of first empirical data that was collected on industrial accidents and occupational diseases in four european countries: the netherlands, belgium, germany and great britain. The analysis so far is modest: we just looked for data on the incidence and scope of work injury in those countries. In a next phase these data could be used to analyse the effectiveness of various compensation systems, such as tort law and private insurance on the one hand and no-fault compensation funds and social security on the other. This paper addresses seemingly simple questions, such as: what exactly are the sources of compensation for work injury in each of those countries? and how much do these sources of compensation pay out in cases of industrial accidents or occupational diseases? it will be very difficult, however, to answer these questions, as in all four countries under review here the compensation system consists of several different layers