Several European countries and some American states and cities have debated legislation limiting after-hours contact. In the United States the measures have been introduced in a handful of jurisdictions and have mostly not passed. The idea is live in American discussion and largely absent from American law.
government
C-SPAN
The proceedings of both chambers of Congress are televised gavel to gavel, unedited, without commentary, and have been since 1979 in the House and 1986 in the Senate. Committee hearings, floor debate, procedural votes. The legislature is broadcast as it happens, including the parts nobody would choose to show.
The works council
Der Betriebsrat. A German works council must be heard before any dismissal, and the employer must give it the reasons. A dismissal issued without that consultation is void. Not contestable — void.
The ordinance
German regulation is issued as a Verordnung derived from an enabling statute, which is itself derived from constitutional competence. Every rule can be traced upward to the provision that authorised it. The chain of derivation is formal and checkable.
The ombudsman
German banks, insurers, energy suppliers and public bodies maintain ombudsman schemes: free, binding on the company up to a threshold, and available before any court is approached. A complaint has somewhere to go that is not a lawsuit.
EDGAR
Every filing every US public company makes to the Securities and Exchange Commission is published on a free public database. Annual reports, quarterly results, executive compensation, insider share sales, material events. No subscription, no registration, no reason required. A competitor, a journalist or a private individual reads the same file on the same day.
CAFE standards
American fuel economy standards had to be imposed by Congress in 1975, after the oil embargo, because the market was not producing them. Efficiency in American vehicles arrived as regulation rather than as a design value, and it has been contested at every revision since.
Sunshine laws
Every US state has its own open records statute, and most require public bodies to hold their meetings in public, with advance notice of the agenda. The name is the argument. The default position is that the business of public bodies is visible, and closing a session requires a stated legal reason on the record.
Written in blood
The phrase American pilots use of the Federal Aviation Regulations. Almost every rule traces to a crash. The NTSB investigates, issues findings, recommends, and the rule follows. The regulation is not derived from a theory of safe flight. It is derived from the accidents that already happened.
Arbitration before the strike
Schlichtung. German collective bargaining runs through an agreed sequence: negotiation rounds, a declared failure, then arbitration by a neutral chair before any strike. The escalation path exists so that escalating requires passing through something first.