La clausula de conciencia desde la perspectiva profesional

Abstract

From an institutional perspective and previous to the analysis of French legislation, this paper defines the conscience clause as a legal clause which is implicit in the contracting of work in the field of journalism. According to the clause, the economic effects of the cessation of the previously existing work relation in that field stemming from the unilateral will of the worker are equivalent to those that stem from the extinction of the relationship due to the will of the employer. This takes into account certain presuppositions which are typified by Law with reference to the conscience of the informer. From a historical perspective thls notion belongs to the three stages which have been produced with regard to the juridical understanding of the realm of information: enterprisalistic, professionalistic and universalistic stages. After these preliminary considerations, the author then analyses the juridical nature of the clause which -although it proceeds from a legal origen and has an application which is both necessary and identified within the informative labor relation- does not be long to the structural framework of a fictio iuris as is claimed by the majority of writers, but rather defines an intellectual and moral right in terms of the nexus between a particular cause and sorne juridical effects. That particular cause is the very conscience of the informer, the nexus is the professional ethos of the field of information (whose central duty is precisely that of informing), and the effects are more complex than those which arise with regard to simple compensation, since they have repercussions bearing upon the very efficacy of the right to information. The paper then concludes with the utilization of the ideas clearly expressed before, in order to intepret systematically the Spanish juridical framework as it applies to contracting in the field of information.