Chapter 1, the introductory chapter, outlines the development of psychotraumatology or traumatic stress studies, in which the author was also partly involved. It traces how it came about that the author Brave Heart and others have been presenting concepts on historical trauma since the early 2000s. An operationalized definition with two basic criteria and five consecutive criteria is presented. The following eight contexts from all parts of the world are presented and their selection justified. The first four are typical configurations of historical trauma because they fulfil all the criteria without exception. The last four historical traumas fulfil only some of the criteria, but are each particularly revealing, for example when it comes to the minimization of the victim narrative for political reasons. The method of the coupled scoping review for the book is explained and the target groups of readership are described.

This chapter explores the legal frameworks that govern employment testing in Australia, including federal and state anti-discrimination legislation, and evaluates their impact on employment testing in the country. Overall, despite the existence of legal protections for individuals from diverse demographic groups (e.g., culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, sex/gender, age), judicial scrutiny of discrimination in employment testing remains limited. Practical challenges, such as difficulties in gathering evidence of discrimination, and the prospect of limited financial compensation, may discourage legal action. Moreover, statistical evidence is neither widely used nor required to demonstrate discrimination, resulting in a regulatory environment where employment testing practices are often guided more by organizational discretion and international perspectives than by legal mandates. However, as hiring technologies continue to evolve, this chapter highlights the opportunity for stronger regulatory oversight and empirical rigor to ensure employment testing remains both equitable and legally defensible.

Employment testing is routinely performed in South Africa today, but this was not always the case. Turning its back on its apartheid history of racial segregation and discrimination, South Africa has developed a progressive legal system to thwart bias and promote fairness in employment testing. This chapter explores employment-related testing in the public and private sectors, beginning with an overview of South Africa’s apartheid history, followed by a discussion of how the current legal system addresses fairness. A distinctive aspect of South African law is that preferential treatment, including lower cutoffs and within-group norming for protected groups, is not only mandated but also widely practised as the norm rather than the exception. Our review concludes that South Africa has enacted an extensive legal framework to promote equality and prevent unfair discrimination.

Susser provides a thoughtful examination of what we mean by (digital) exploitation and suggests that regulation should constrain platform activities that instrumentalize people or treat them unfairly. Using a diverse set of examples, he argues that the language of exploitation helps makes visible forms of injustice overlooked or only partially captured by dominant concerns about, for example, surveillance, discrimination, and related platform abuses. He provides valuable conceptual and normative resources for challenging efforts by platforms to obscure or legitimate those abuses.

Selection processes in France are governed by a comprehensive legal and regulatory framework that prioritizes fairness, non-discrimination, and equal opportunity. French labor laws explicitly prohibit discrimination based on twenty-five criteria, including sex/gender, ethnicity, disability, and age. Despite these protections, disparities persist, fueling ongoing policy debates and legislative refinements. Regulatory bodies such as the Defender of Rights oversee compliance and promote unbiased hiring practices. However, implicit biases and structural barriers continue to influence employment decisions, challenging efforts to achieve true workplace equality. Employers must balance legal obligations, diversity objectives, and test validity while adapting to evolving EU regulations, such as the AI Act (2024). The introduction of diversity labels and corporate social responsibility initiatives reflects a proactive commitment to fostering inclusive workplaces. Yet enforcement challenges remain, as rising reports of workplace discrimination highlight persistent gaps. Several recommendations have been proposed to mitigate discrimination without compromising the quality and effectiveness of selection methods.

This chapter examines bias and fairness in employment testing in the Netherlands, addressing twenty key questions related to historical and cultural developments, legal frameworks, professional guidelines, and psychometric issues. Although equal treatment is a fundamental legal principle, perceptions of hiring discrimination remain widespread. The chapter explores demographic shifts that have shaped discussions on employment fairness and outlines the Dutch legal framework, focusing on the Equal Treatment Act and the role of the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights in handling discrimination complaints. It also highlights the relatively limited attention given to fairness in professional guidelines for practitioners. Furthermore, the chapter evaluates how psychological tests are assessed for bias, particularly through analyses of score differences, differential item functioning, and measurement invariance, while noting the scarcity of research on predictive bias. Emerging challenges, such as algorithmic bias, are also examined. Finally, the chapter discusses recent legislative efforts to promote fairness in employment testing, including a proposed law that was rejected in 2024.

Trade unions play a critical role in labour law, in representing workers, negotiating terms and conditions of employment by collective bargaining, lobbying for stronger legislation to improve working conditions and enhance job security, and assisting in the enforcement of legal rights before courts and tribunals. Employers are often hostile to trade unions, and workers need legal protection from the consequences of such hostility. In this Chapter we consider the legislation designed to protect workers from exclusion, blacklisting, discrimination, and victimization because of their trade union membership and activities. We also examine the right not to be a trade union member, as well as the purpose and implications of such a right.T

This chapter explores bias and fairness in employment testing in Türkiye across governmental and private sectors. It distinguishes fairness – equal opportunity, transparency, and uniform outcomes – from bias, especially in relation to predictive validity. The chapter situates these issues within Türkiye’s cultural, ethnic, and socioeconomic landscape, examining how historical and regional factors shape perceptions and practices. Key legal and regulatory frameworks, such as Turkish Labor Law and constitutional mandates, are reviewed to highlight protections for equal treatment. It also evaluates bias detection methods, including differential item functioning, sensitivity reviews, and predictive bias analyses, and discusses challenges from emerging technologies such as the use of artificial intelligence in personnel selection. The chapter underscores the need for strong validity evidence and proactive strategies to promote fair and equitable hiring in Türkiye.

The case highlights how White privilege penetrates the welfare system in unsuspecting ways. Public assistance programs, like TANF, play an important role in helping families face economic crises. However, the way these programs are implemented can block already vulnerable populations from getting the help they need. White privilege is a CRT tenet that can impact the experiences of welfare recipients. According to CRT, whiteness can perpetuate advantages for White individuals and conversely convey burdens for people of color. Understanding White privilege can help workers to understand some of the unique reasons why individuals end up on public assistance in the first place, and how implicit biases impact the way people of color receive or do not receive benefits.

In this and the following chapter we explore the importance of context for social work practice. Ife et al. suggest that context is vital because it impacts on how social workers understand the issues they are working with and how they will respond. Social work does not exist in a vacuum. Therefore, we focus on a number of powerful social forces that shape our social contexts. These consist of far-reaching (sometimes global) social structures and discourses. Social structures, as noted in Chapter 1, are the enduring social patterns, divisions and institutional arrangements that can give rise to inequality and harm. Discourses, on the other hand, are sets of ideas or language about a particular topic with shared meanings and assumptions that reflect and reinforce particular power relations. In other words, discourses are never neutral descriptions of reality, but actively justify certain asymmetric social structures; in turn, these structures promote discourses favourable to their maintenance.

Use Case 4 in Chapter 7 explores the regulation of MDTs in the context of employment monitoring under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the Equality Acquis, the Platform Work Directive (PWD), and the Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA). Article 88 GDPR serves as a useful foundation, supported by valuable guidance aimed at protecting employees from unlawful monitoring practices. In theory, most MDT-based practices discussed in this book are already prohibited under the GDPR. Additionally, the EU’s robust equality acquis can effectively address many forms of discrimination in this sector. The AIA reiterates some existing prohibitions related to MDT-based monitoring practices in the workplace. However, a core challenge in employment monitoring lies in ensuring transparency and enforcement. There has long been a call for a lex specialis for data protection in the employment context, which should include a blacklist of prohibited practices or processing operations, akin to the one found in the PWD. Notably, processing and inferring mind data should be included among the practices on this blacklist.

‘Decolonization’ of research and teaching in EU law constitutes a starting point for examinations of EU law which can open up the world of European legal integration to a new generation of Black scholars and audiences, both across Europe and beyond. In this contribution I suggest what this starting point could look like – what happens when we take colonialism as the starting point for our interaction with EU law? How does a decolonial approach amend the purpose, principles and practice that inform our research and teaching in EU law today? I propose that relevant purposes include excavation, correction, dissemination and diversification. The principles that underlie this purpose include pro-democracy, intentionality and internationality while the practice of decolonizing research and teaching in EU law would focus on identifying omission, using empirical study to create new understanding of systems and working in collaboration with Black scholars.