This article introduces the special issue on ‘Collective redress in labour law’. Even the best labour code in the world would be practically useless without procedural rules to enable its enforcement. The contributions in this special issue show that, while the mechanism of collective redress certainly functions with mixed results and often is underused in practice, it is nevertheless a valuable tool in the enforcement toolbox, where available. It might be particularly useful for some groups of workers, such as those who lack individual means for asserting their employment-based rights in their own name. While not an answer to all problems, and undoubtedly, not sufficient to close the justice gap for many European workers on its own, collective redress, if adequately constructed, could complement and improve existing enforcement mechanisms in both national and EU labour law.

本文介绍了“劳动法中的集体救济”这一专刊。如果没有程序规则来执行，即使是世界上最好的劳动法也几乎毫无用处。本期特刊中的贡献表明，虽然集体补救机制的运作效果好坏参半，而且在实践中经常未得到充分利用，但它仍然是执法工具箱中的一个有价值的工具（如果有的话）。它可能对某些工人群体特别有用，例如那些缺乏以自己的名义维护基于就业的权利的个人手段的工人。虽然不能解决所有问题，而且毫无疑问，单靠集体补救措施不足以弥补许多欧洲工人的正义差距，但如果构建得当，