Working Paper & Studies

A new relationship - between work and legal protection: Rethinking the concept of the "employee" in the age of digitalisation

This paper aims to adopt the perspective of employers, trade unions and society at large in examining ways in which the status of "employee" might change in a service and knowledge society. The traditional concept of the "employee" is rooted in the capitalist industrial society-and this type of society, owing to the forces of globalisation and digitalisation, is no longer predominant.
The point of departure is a critique of the core criterion of the prevailing concept of the employee: personal dependency. What we need is an up-to-date vision of both employees, within the dynamic nature and growing diversity of work in the digital age, and social protection not based on employment, but for workers as citizens.