Abstract

Contract law has experienced great changes in recent years. The goal of striking a balance between the parties to the contract was at the heart of different concerns. And the doctrine of contractual solidarity encouraged this tendency to moralise the relations between the contracting parties. Labour law has not not remained in the margins of this development. Indeed, in Cameroonian and French law, relations between employer and employee have evolved into the consideration by each party of the interests of the other. In this regard, despite the subordination that governs the employment contract, the conventional obligations of the parties have been strengthened. Cameroonian and French legislators have implicitly recognised the existence of contractual solidarity in labour law by consecrating the obligation of reclassification and by expanding the realm of alternatives to dismissal for economic reasons. One wonders whether the influence of this doctrine in employment law is compatible with the first foundations of the employment contract, in particular subordination. To this question, an affirmative answer is required. Subordination remains the foundation of the employment contract. However, the moral vision of the relationship requires parties to see each other as partners motivated by the desire to do everything possible to satisfy their respective interests. This implies that each party takes into account the interests of the other party, and makes his task easier. The superior interest of the contract requires this. Without this solidarity between the parties, they cannot make wise choices and employment contracts remain an unfinished phenomenon.