작업장 온열환경 관리 법제의 비교법적 고찰

Objectives: The Ministry of Employment and Labor has revised the articles regarding management of the thermal environment in the workplace. Currently, two types of regulations exist together with indoor workplaces as the scope of application. It appears that the time has come to discuss regulations. In this study, we aim to identify the feasibility of and problems with the current system through a comparative legal review of workplace thermal environment management laws from around the world. We suggest directions for improving South Korea's workplace thermal environment management laws. Methods: For the several selected countries, we analyzed the classification and content of obligations stipulated for the thermal environment, the presence or absence of specific measures for thermal environment management, legal status and content, and the scope of application of thermal environment provisions and measures. The investigated content was classified according to Zweigelt-Kotz's legal theory. Results: In some countries, employers' obligations for regulating the thermal environment are broadly divided into two types: results and actions. The scope of application of provisions and measures on the thermal environment was extensive, with most of the selected countries targeting general workplaces. Conclusions: In the case of South Korea, restricting and classifying target workplaces and imposing separate obligations to manage a workplace thermal environment goes against global practices, and stipulating legal orders and separate action obligations in guidelines does not conform to the characteristics of South Korea's legal system, meaning that improvement is needed.