The ILO and the future of work

1. The history and the mission of the ILO

The effectiveness of the ILO, the role it can play and its ability to respond to the demands that are put upon it depend on major world events: economic crisis, social conflicts, war and in recent years globalization policies which are inimical to ILO values. But in all these extreme situations, the ILO is an indispensable partner because of the balance it brings between state and markets, between society and individual and today between economic, social and environmental policies for sustainable development”.

This is a most significant sentence by which J. Somavia director of the ILO, summarises the experience of the Organization throughout the last Century (Lee, Rodgers, Swepston, Van Daele, 2009).

The centennial of the ILO in 2019 has been the occasion for many of us not only to remember the key role plaid by the organization in helping to achieve progress and social justice, but also to consider some teaching for the future of work which may be drawn from its long experience (Treu T., 2019). 

The history of the ILO is significant in many respects of the evolution of our discipline, because its activity and regulations have has been tested through the many dramatic and tragic events  which characterize last century. The fundamental principles of the constitution of 1919 have resisted to the turbulence of times.

They have been developed and adapted many times in response to the challenges of the events, while the ILO has been acting often in isolation and against the tide. In fact many decisions of the organization, particularly when they where anticipatory, have been taken against the opposition of dominant economic powers and of the established cultural and legal traditions. In addition they had to meet often the resistance of the national states, which have always reaffirmed, even when weakened by globalization, their exclusive competence in labor and social matters.

For a century the ILO has greatly contributed to frame and to diffuse among the countries of the world a set of international labor standards and social rights many of which have been embodied in the law and practice of what are considered the developed societies.

Initially its regulations have been mainly derived from the experience of the industrialized countries and shaped after the type of employment prevailing in their manufacturing. But the enlargement of its constituency in the process of time has confronted the ILO with the economic and institutional diversities of the developing world (Trebilcock, 2009; Supiot, 2010).

2. A basic principle: the universality of social rights

The need to reflect these diversities has been decisive for the choice of the ILO to emphasize the role of basic social rights and standards, as  fundamental instruments of promoting the universal cause of work and of meeting the needs of workers operating in a multitude of different conditions. The often detailed regulations present in the ILO conventions were proving inadequate or counterproductive, and inapplicable to the extreme diversity of the ILO constituent national members, even when the conventions were ratified.

For the same reason the ILO has adopted the view that some rights and labor regulations present in the acquis of member states should be recognized to all employees regardless of the legal status of their work contracts: and has started the search to identify those principles and rights which were most fit to reach the objective of granting “a common core expressing the universal principles of the dignity of human labor” (Trebilcock, 2009; Ghai, 2003).  

The concrete translation of these principles into the different legal systems was indicated as an essential policy objective to be pursued by the states, in order to provide a unifying basis for the fragmented jobs of the future and free them from the danger of deregulation.

This perspective was rather anticipatory, but in the following years was to become common and to attract the attention of modern labor lawyers, even though their application in the national legal system is still lacking or at most incomplete (Du Toi, 2015; Casale, Treu, 2018). 

The decision to adopt a universal core of social rights was widely discussed in the general assembly of the ILO in 1998. Fundamental objections were raised from opposite sides,  on one hand  by some developing countries which feared that it might be detrimental to their competitive position, and on the other by those who were afraid that shifting the emphasis on core rights and principles rather than on the specific regulations of the ILO conventions might open the way to a regression from hard law to soft guidelines (Alston, 2004;  Langille, 2005, Maupain, 2005). 

But this criticism may apply to all the instruments of the ILO which are not backed by direct sanctions. In fact the interventions of the Organization have always privileged promotional rather than imperative regulatory techniques, considering that the former are realistically more fit than the latter to approach the objectives proclaimed in the diversified and changing international scenario.

The issue discussed in that assembly is still open and has different implications in the changed context of present times.  The approach of basic rights and principles has proved to be important to meet the needs of the diversified types of workers originated by new technologies and operating in the globalized economic. But at the same time the guarantee of basic standards for these workers does not exclude the necessity of further measures aimed at protecting and promoting the conditions of standard employees which have represented the core workforce in advanced economies.

The approach followed by the ILO and the variety of working conditions present in the economies of its broad constituency has made evident to the governing bodies of the Organization the necessity to go beyond the regulations and the categories framed after the characters of the industrial workforce which are the original imprint of traditional labor law.

3. How to regulate the informal economy and informal employment

A major area where to ILO has tested the limits of its regulations has been the widespread phenomenon of the informal economy and of the multitude of informal jobs which are legally non  compliant with those regulations or borderline.

Here again this is still an open issue even though in a completely different scenario. In fact the most recent developments of the gig economy have accelerated the diversification of working patterns in ambivalent directions, not only combining aspects of freelance and subordinate status but also giving rise or favouring new forms of informality.

The ILO has been the first organization to be confronted with the task of formalizing the informal, to which many national legislators have been subsequently committed even though with uneven results (ILO Conference, 2014).

The research and the experience of the ILO suggest the necessity to face the many challenges of the informal world of work by adopting an integrated policy approach and by providing interventions which go beyond employment related measures. This set of interventions is required to combine different targets for influencing the economic context in which the informal economy develops, also due to the fact that this context comprises not only backward areas but also modern sectors affected by the new technologies (Villasmil Prieto, 2018). 

Some policy measures may be required in all these contexts, such as supporting legality and the formation of human capital, trengthening of social networks and all economic measures necessary to promoting a sustainable development.

Other initiatives need to be specific and related to the different types of informality or irregularity.  Among those the ILO has suggested the importance of removing the obstacles in the way of formalization and of growth of the activities in question: eg  the simplification of bureaucratic procedures for setting up and running a business, the forms of workers management, as well as measures to facilitate access to the instruments needed for this purpose; financial services, information and consultancy on business and employment opportunities;  advice on how to compete to public contracts; support for managerial training. 

In areas directly connected with employment, major interventions are required to improve inspection services which are almost everywhere understaffed, and to train their employees to the challenge of preventing and monitoring illegal and irregular activities, even though this intervention is in itself insufficient and needs to be supplemented by preventive measures and incentives to encourage irregular activity to emerge.

A specific kind of measure is necessary to contrast the forms of irregular employment common in decentralized  production processes (contracting and subcontracting) which are widespread even in advanced sectors of the economy. Many states member of the ILO have introduced forms of more or less extensive co-responsibility on the lead firms in these decentralized contractual arrangements, with penalties for non compliance with labor and social security standards on the part of the contractors and subcontractors (Treu, 2018).

The international experience the ILO shows that the processes of regularization of informal work need to be adapted to the specific economic and social context. They may require a gradual approach and possibly different degrees of harmonization  of the rules, aiming at the enforcement of the basic labour standards rather than at an unrealistic alignment to the wages of the established sectors of the economy. Acceptance of a certain degree of regulatory differentiation may be necessary to achieve effective results with the possibility of making improvements over time.

4. The principles of fair globalization: uneven implementation

At the beginning of this Century the ILO, like all the institutions and the collective actors of the world, was confronted with the two major factors of transformation of our societies, namely the explosion of globalization and of new digital technologies.

The ILO has been involved rather late in the issues of the internationalization of the economy; a delay which is rooted in the historic separation between the sphere of its competence with those of the WTO. 

This separation has been an major obstacle to promote common efforts in facing the negative and positive aspects of globalization. Indeed it has been detrimental to both institutions, because the WTO has become, also due to this separation, the main object of the social protest against globalization; and the ILO has been left to elaborate its social norms in isolation, without the links with and the sanctions of the international commercial treaties.

The expansion of international trades and their growing influence on the world economies made clear to the ILO that the international projection of the principles of the decent work agenda was a necessary step for adjourning its mission in the new global scenario.

Indeed the pervasive influence of globalized economies and even more of international finance was in itself challenging the traditional separation of the two spheres because it was altering the precarious balance by which national states had tried to conciliate for a century the economic imperatives with the social and personal interest of their citizens. The altering of this balance has exposed millions of people and of enterprises to the risks of global competition and to growing inequalities which appeared to be the dark side of globalization.

Following the explosion of the 2007 world crisis, the ILO general assembly of 2008 approved the document “social justice for a fair globalization”, which is the third major statement of principles and policies of the organization since the constitution of 1919.

Its fundamental assumption is that the basic tenet of the ILO whereby economic growth has to go hand in hand with social progress must be affirmed and effectively implemented also in international relations and trade. The objective to be pursued to this end implies the need to ensure a strong social dimension of globalization.

Accordingly the member states are committed to mobilize all available means of action necessary to promote a  globalization based on the universal principles of the decent work agenda .it is worth noticing that the document stresses to the same end the importance of promoting sustainable enterprises able to create good employment and income opportunities for all.

The diffusion of the principles of fair globalization in the following years has been promoted by a variety of instruments and strategies. Parallel principles were adopted by other international institutions: the United Nations which approved the Global compact of shared value and the Guiding principles on the responsibility of transnational corporations, the OECD which approved the Guidelines for multinational enterprises. Social rights and standards have been introduced by the European Convention on human rights and by the European charter of fundamental rights.

Another important instrument to connect global trade with social rights has been the so called generalized system of preferences (GSP) by which a country recognizes preferential treatment on tariffs or on other benefits to developing countries on the condition that they respect certain social standards.

A major source of international social regulation have been the social clauses included in international trade and investment agreements (Vogt, 2014; Perulli, 2018).

These social clauses have not only grown in number so as to become a common trait of these agreements, but have acquired great substantive and procedural complexity.

The rationale of the various systems of international social regulation has been interpreted differently. While originally the promotion of social rights in international trade was seen as an instrument to regulate competition, according to a broader vision, present already in the ILO document on fair globalization, it was considered as a means also to promote a sustainable growth. This wider approach has influenced to a different extent the contents of trade agreements and contributed to insert the social clauses in the same chapter with the clauses on sustainable development and on environmental protection.

The same evolution is reflected in the terminology adopted by these clauses  which has changed from labor standards to human rights at work.

The diffusion and the impact of these forms of international social regulation, in particular of the social clauses, have been objects of many analysis and comments, to which I have myself contributed (Treu, 2018; Compa, 1993; Bellace, 2014; Perulli, 2018).

The evidence is partial also due to the scarce transparency of the sources and indeed of the entire negotiation process of trade agreements. But the accredited results on the efficacy of these instruments are at best uneven and variable according to the national contexts.

The ILO reports indicate that the most widely implemented parts of the labor chapters of the treaties, particularly by developing countries, are those concerning capacity building programs, exchange of good practices, promotional activities, social and public communication. More uncertain is the impact of the procedures of the social clauses on the actual improvement of labor standards.

In fact, in spite of the importance attributed to the procedural aspects of the treaties and of the social clauses, these procedures, and in particular the instruments of enforcement, are the weakest links of the agreements. This weakness is only in part procedural, because it reflects the fact that the entire process of enforcement depends on the initiative of the negotiating states and indeed of their bureaucracies.

The ILO has been involved in the implementation of these clauses but mainly with promotional functions as those mentioned above .Recently some agreements ,like the CETA, have entrusted to the ILO a significant task of monitoring, fact finding and mediation. The ILO could contribute more directly to the enforcement of these clauses if it could be indicated as arbitrator by the parties to the treaties, but some proposals advanced to this extent have not been accepted.

Indeed also the role in these procedures of the major social stakeholders, beginning with the labor unions and the ONG, has been so far limited. Even though the experience of some international cases has demonstrated that the initiative of these collective actors can greatly increase the effectiveness of the clauses and compensate for the inertia of the states (Treu, 2018).

5. The role of the national states: protectionism and legitimate defence of social standards

The difficulties in implementing social standards in international trade and the weakness of the ILO, even more than that of other international institutions, are part of a wider problem which has to do with the role and the strategies of the national states vis a vis globalization and it’s regulation.

This has been always a contested area, even more so in recent years when the recurrent international crisis and turbulences have shown the fragility and the negative aspects of globalization.

The slowing down of growth and the increase of inequalities have obscured the good economic performances of the past; have caused to reconsider the excessive optimism concerning the future of globalization and confirmed the need of specific regulation. More worrying is the fact that protectionist reactions have grown in many states, including some of those traditionally devoted to free trade and lately among the various sovranistic governments which have come to power in  Europe. These reactions have resulted in a series of measures introduced unilaterally by many states which have imposed limits to the flow of international trades and denounced bilateral and multilateral treaties.

The democratic states, D. Rodnik reminds us, have the right, and I may add the duty, to defend their values and the welfare of their citizens from the negative influence of the global markets. The borders between these legitimate reactions and protectionist measures unduly restricting commerce may not be easy to identify and should be a matter of public discussion and of open deliberation.

The principles indicated in the ILO document on fair globalization can offer a valuable guideline for national decision making in this respect, because they have been built on the basis of a wide process of international consultation according to the established method of the Organization  and they have taken into account the opposing reasons, economic and social, involved in the regulation of international relations.

The events of the recent years, marked by continuous turbulence and recurrent crisis, have clearly demonstrated the precariousness of the rules governing international relations and indeed the inherent fragility of the whole globalization process.

The health emergency caused by COVID has shown with dramatic evidence a further critical aspect of globalization, i.e. the fact that the intensity and dimensions of international exchanges of goods and people have been the major vehicle of diffusion of the virus.

The breaking down of the supply chains caused by the pandemic   has blocked entire sectors of world production which they had greatly contributed to boost.

The implications of the pandemic not only on the economy but on all aspects of our lives are uncertain. This crisis may not lead to the end of globalization, but the signs are visible that the speed and dimensions of its growth will be reduced.  A possible consequence may be that the range of international commerce and of production will be reduced to more restricted areas, possibly within regions of variable size according to economic and geopolitical variables (Treu, 2020).

This sort of regionalized globalization will impact not only on the material dimensions of the traffic but also on the institutions and the social actors involved in the government of the processes events. The European Union will be required to respond to this evolution using its institutions and experience of economic and social governance to influence the future trends of world trade according to the principles of fair globalization.

The threat posed by the world pandemic has increased the defensive reactions of national states, from the closing of their borders, to the imposition of strict controls and limitations to the movement of people and goods, to the reinforcement of public and private health systems of prevention and cure.

The measures taken by the various states have been different also in the relatively homogeneous space of Europe, and this diversity has contributed to different performances of the nations in the control and fight of the health crisis. This divergence goes against the goals pursued since the foundation of the European community and may prove to be negative for the welfare of the Europeans as it has been experienced in other social and economic fields. That is why many experts and representatives institutions like the EESC are advocating the need to promote a direct initiative of the European Union in the matter of public and private health which has been so far outside the Union competences.

This initiative should be connected and integrated with the vast body of European rules already existing in the field of health and safety of work. Various European  states, including Italy, have taken detailed measures to prevent contagion and to guarantee safety in the workplaces, usually according to special protocols agreed with the social parties unions and then sanctioned by legislative and administrative regulations. These measures have been framed with the objective to counter the general risk of contagion taking into account the forms and content in which it is transformed or specified in the various working environments.

For the same reasons a similar combined approach will be necessary in the regulation of international relations, whatever the forms and the intensity in which they will continue. The techniques and procedures used in the practice of social clauses may be useful, but they will have to be adapted in order to face the different risks of contagion involved in the international traffic and to protect the health and safety of the million of people concerned.

Joint efforts by national states and by international institutions will be needed in order to find common standards which can respond to the general and specific risks for health provoked by the pandemic, suitable to be recognized and applied by all the participants in international trades. The ILO and the World Health organization will have to use their expertise and their international experience, with the participation of all the stakeholders, in developing these common standards.

6. The human centred agenda: investing in people’s capabilities and in the institutions of work

The most recent contribution of the ILO on how to respond to the great transformations brought about by the digital and the green transition is given in the report “work for a brighter future” produced by the Global commission on the future of work, composed of experts coming from different geographical regions and having different professional and governmental experience.

The main political message of the report is a strong appeal to seize the opportunities offered by technological advances and by the greening of the economy to promote the main objectives long promised by democratic societies and promoted by the ILO: economic security, equal opportunities and social justice. A second message indicates that forging a new path toward this end requires committed action by governments, workers and employers organizations directed to reinvigorate a social contract aimed at putting people and the work they do at the center of economic and social policy and of business practice

The three pillars of action which compose the “human-centred agenda” proposed by the commission build on the major strategic guidelines elaborated in the history of the ILO, but are renovated by a vision which at includes specific suggestions and raises open questions.

Some of them are particularly relevant and challenging for the present debate on the role of labor law and of social policies.

A most significant innovation, which is far from formal, is that all the three pillars of the agenda are worded not in terms of regulatory standards and of protective rules, as is usually the case in these documents, but in terms of investments: investments in people’ capabilities, in the institutions of work, in decent and sustainable work.

This wording corresponds to the approach followed by the ILO that considers labor standards and regulations as part of more complex policy package finalized to pursue the main strategic objectives of employment, social protection, social dialogue and rights at work; all of which are inseparable and mutually supportive and where the role of the international standards are a useful means of achieving all of them.

In line with this vision the first recommendation of the report is to establish a universal labor guarantee including fundamental rights to all workers regardless of their contractual arrangements or employment status; and is named under the title “increasing investments in the institutions of work”.

This wording suggest that the guarantees provided by labor standards are not only a means of protection but also an investment in people and that they must be conceived more than a static set of rules but rather as an institution of work which may evolve so as to include new rights and which may be enriched by collective agreements.

This conception represents a useful tool of analysis for understanding the transformations of work in the present digital era and for guiding us in the research of suitable forms of regulation.

The disruptive effects of the new technologies have so profoundly altered the forms of employment on which labour law has been built as to make inadequate not only the traditional rules applied to it, but also the categories on which our discipline is founded, beginning with the contract of subordinate work (Eurofound,  2018; Hepple, Veneziani, 2009; Ales, Deluert, Kenver, 2017). 

The uncertainty in the categorization and regulation of the varieties of work present in the modern labour markets has affected not only the interpreters but also the courts, the social partners and even the legislators.

The result is that the formerly compact body of labour law has become diversified due to a multitude of modifications of the established legal patterns introduced by various sources of law. The attempts to reflect the diversity and fluctuations of work in the digital era have not only introduced variations within the individual types of employment thus destroying their unity but also produced partial forms of osmosis of regulations between the different types.

The different, often divergent, positions concerning the possible regulations of the many atypical forms of employment and lately platform-based work are a matter of unresolved debate in most legal systems. We all are involved (Araki, Laloum, 2018; Weiss, 2018).

The debate is still open but the proposals advanced by the ILO, in the decent work agenda and lately in the report of the global commission, to identify and implement a universal guarantee for all types of employment, seem to indicate a most convincing policy perspective. Similar principles appears to be adopted with different variations in some legal systems with respect to platform-based workers, e.g. by the French and Italian legislators, and by many judges in civil and common law systems.

A common trend in these solutions is that they focus on a number of essential rights and protection, to be granted to these workers, even without providing a legal definition of their forms of employment, and at the same time that they abandon the all-or-nothing logic inherent in the traditional legal categories.

This general line of policy will require further analysis and specifications adapted to the different employment and business situations, as the ILO suggests and now is indicated also by the European Commission.

This is an open field of research for jurists and lawmakers who are called to identity principles and criteria suitable for guiding these specifications. As I have discussed in other occasions (Treu, 2017 e 2018) the main criteria to be followed should consider on one hand people’s needs to enjoy fair working conditions and adequate protection, and the other the environment in which they operate, including the new forms of organization of work present in the smart factories and the innovations introduced by the diffusion of the smart work.

The speed and variety of these innovations may suggest to leave to collective bargaining the task of specifying the regulations best suitable to the workers needs and to the work environment and of identifying both the characters of the various forms of employment and the borders between them (a similar solution is adopted by the Italian legislation in the decrees. 81/2015 and 34/2020).

The report of the ILO commission gives another important suggestion in this matter by proposing to establish an international governance system for digital labor requiring the platforms  which organize the work of their clients to respect minimum rights and protection for them.

The new digital work activities may be organized  in a great variety of forms, from types of organization  which control and direct employees with equivalent although different intensity than that common in traditional subordination, to extremely loose business relations which may leave significant margins of autonomy to the platform client while at the same time indirectly determine the conditions of work and of life of the same client.

This variety makes extremely difficult to identify the concrete characters of each type of arrangement and match them with the appropriate regulation; precisely this difficulty accounts from the persistent uncertainty of the regulatory solutions adopted by the various legal systems.

The digital platforms, when they act as an employer, and they are often recognized as such, are the most concrete and unitary object of regulation. Imposing on them the duty to grant fundamental rights and protections to their clients/ workers, as the ILO proposes, is the most effective way to guarantee that these rights and protections actually reach all these clients/workers.

This technique of regulation has been used with good results in many legal systems and recently by a directive of the European Union in the case of temporary employment agencies. Future research should be  devoted to adapt the requirements and rules applied to these agencies and for the operation of the digital platforms and for the regulations of their relations with the clients/ workers taking  into account to the multifaceted characters of digital work.

7. Expanding time sovereignty: work life balance and smart working

The second pillar of action proposed by the ILO report is titled rather emphatically “expanding time sovereignty”.

Appropriately it includes not only the theme of working time flexibility, with the specification that real choice and control on working schedule should be guaranteed, but also it stresses the need to achieve a better balance between work and personal life.

The conditions of work created by the new flexible forms of work organization  which are often more demanding than in the past and the new aspirations of the employees have stimulated an increased demand of quality of working life. In response to this demand various measures have been introduced by legislators and more often by collective agreements, not only for improving health and safety at work but also for promoting a better work life balance (Treu, 2018).

The report stresses the fact that revising this balance is made more necessary than in the industrial era also in order to address the pressure that comes from the blurring of boundaries between work and personal life made possible by the digital technologies as exemplified by the diffusion of smart working.

Indeed these problems are being considered in various ways by legislators and social actors. Many states have introduced specific regulations aimed at preventing any use of digital devices able of violating the employees privacy and finalized to guaranteeing the right of the employees to disconnect, i.e. to cease to be available on line in certain time of the day and night.

The search for a better work life balance has been promoted by the legislation of many countries with various measures (family and parental leaves) and by an extensive activity of collective regulation at the national and decentralized company levels which have introduced a variety of personal and family friendly working arrangements. This kind of contractual welfare which is directed to supplement the public welfare, has expanded its scope be providing many benefits aimed at promoting the wellbeing of people at work (care services for children and aged relatives of workers, support to children education, supplementary pensions, medical prevention and assistance, now intensified to meet that impact of the pandemic).

The number of these welfare agreements has been growing (in Italy company wide agreements are counted by the thousands) also because they have been supported by considerable fiscal advantages.

The impact of digital technologies on the organization of production has changed, among other aspects of work, the arrangements of working time.

The diffusion of the various forms of smart working, now accelerated by the pandemic, is a major aspect of a new conception of working time made possible by digital technologies.

Those forecasts which envisage an irrelevance of time in the future of work are probably illusory and dangerous; but the abolition of physical distances in the execution of work made possible by these technologies will imply new ways of organizing work and of evaluating its performance. These implications are still undefined like those of other aspects of digitalization.

The smart working presents a variety of possible utilizations. The simplest and widely used version, which consists in delocalizing  the activity outside the place of work, often to the employees premises, does not imply any innovation;  and it may have negative impact on family life, particularly on women who have increased difficulties in reconciling this type of work with their commitment to the family, as demonstrated during the COVID lockdown.

But some experiences, particularly in technologically advanced firms, show that smart working may be instrumental to changes of the organization of work and of the  production which can allow more space to workers autonomy and participation, and contribute to develop Human Resource practices based on mutual trust among the parties.

Indeed the application of this type of work to a large part or even to the majority of the workforce, which is envisaged particularly in many service activities, may imply a deep transformation of the structures of the firms and of the relations between those workers and managers who continue to operate within these structures and the “new outsiders “.

8. The individualization of work and the future of collective action: reduction of working time?

A similar evolution would equally impact on the activities of workers representatives ,and on the functioning of collective labor relations, which has been negatively affected by many adverse factors, including the impact of globalizations and of the new technologies (Pedersini, 2014).

The organizations of collective interests, beginning with the unions, are also confronted with the process of individualization which has invested many aspects of our societies and which is to be emphasized by the various transformation of the working patterns. Meeting the challenge posed by this process to the established fabric of our society requires a reappraisal of the balance between collective and individual interests in many social activities, including the various forms of industrial relations.

The social parties have just begun to face this problem by reframing the content of some collective agreements in order to leave room for the various individual interests present in the groups once homogeneous and now differentiated of workers represented by them.

The ILO report, being aware of the problem, urges the social parties to use their convening power to bring diverse interests to the table, underlining that this is also a way to strengthen their representative legitimacy.  At the same time the report calls on the public institutions to ensure the collective representation of workers and employers through the social dialogue as a public good which deserves to be supported.

The impact of the digital revolution on the future quantity of jobs is still controversial. But it is certain that the impact will be profound on the quality and on the distribution of work.  The awareness of this problem should determine, as the report clearly mentions, two major areas of policy for the future of work: more and better finalized  investments in education and training, and reinforced active labor policies to support people in the transitional labor markets of the future. Whatever the possible impact of technologies, the key challenge is to innovate public and social policies as to make them effective in influencing the use of technologies in the directions mentioned.

With respect to working time it is significant that the digital threat has reopened, at least in Europe, the debate not only on work time flexibility but also on the reduction of working time. 

The recent German collective agreement of the metalworking industry has recognized the right of workers to reduce temporarily their weekly working time to 28 hours and the parallel right to return to the number of hours previously worked. The employers in exchange are allowed greater flexibility in the distribution of  the weekly working time. Other collective agreements, particularly in the sectors most exposed to the digital revolution, have provided that a certain number of working hours, regularly paid, must be devoted to training and retraining of the workers directed to adjourn their skill and prevent technological obsolescence.

These collective innovations are an initial contribution of the social parties to a much wider policy perspective that is recalled by the ILO report. Its first pillar of action calls for the recognition of universal entitlements to lifelong learning as a fundamental investment in people capacities necessary to enable them to thrive in the digital era.

The prospects of work time reduction are still controversial and have to pass a difficult test of feasibility. Past experiences seem to suggest that the most practical approach is not to legislate on the issue but to experiment possible solutions by collective agreements beginning from the company level.

A few pilot agreements reported in Italian firms using advanced technologies have adopted with some success forms of work time reduction, mainly to 35-38 hours weekly, coupled with flexible work time schedules (Pero, 2019 e 2020).

Another controversial evolution, partially linked to new technologies, is the growth of part time. In a country like the Netherlands it accounts for around half of the working population and has become a common way of distributing work often within the family. It may be used as a favourable way of conciliating work and family life, if it were not for the fact that the majority of part timers are women, and that such an arrangement contributes for them not to conciliate but to sum up their family roles with external work.

Recently in many countries, beginning with Italy, there has been a considerable increase of involuntary part time, which amounts in fact to a form of disguised unemployment or of underemployment. This trend is one aspect of the crisis of employment, which is particularly worrying because it has been so far disregarded or under evaluated also due to the fact that it concerns mostly women workers or youngsters, which are still considered secondary wage earners.

The need to face this problem with specific policies is urgent because part timers are disadvantaged in many respects. First of all they are affected by a reduction of their wages, by unfavourable working conditions and by diminished possibilities of career, since the principles of equal treatment sanctioned by many national legislations and by an European directive are not fully respected. 

Moreover these unfavourable working conditions are reflected in the lack or in the reduction of many provisions of public welfare, like unemployment protection and old age pensions, and often of welfare benefit provided in collective agreements.

9. Social security: beyond insurance schemes

This last remark raises a much wider problem which I can only mention here, namely the negative consequences of the various kinds of atypical and precarious work on public Welfare systems

The ILO report stresses the need to apply to this problem the same principle of universality proposed by the basic guarantees of employment relations; it advocates a social protection floor for everyone in need, complemented by contributions to social insurance schemes that provide increased levels of protection.

The social security schemes applied in many countries, including Italy, were established in the past on the assumption of stable labor markets and stable jobs. Keeping these schemes unchanged has negative consequences on the social protection for non standard job, due to the fragmentation and frequent interruptions in their work records.

Some countries have begun to introduce changes aimed at correcting their insurance based social protection systems, from unemployment benefits to old age pensions, by extending some basic protections to non standard types of work. These changes have parallels with those introduced in the regulation of other conditions of the individual employment relationship.

The progress of reforms in this area is slow and is meeting the same obstacles encountered in the extension of basic social rights and fair conditions of treatment to all workers. A further difficulty is that the reforms of social security have to cope with the reduction of financial resources available for spending which is caused by the diminished tax base caused by the increased volatility  affecting employment.

The extension of this approach to part time work is a most difficult case because the tax base for their contributions linked to wages is greatly disproportionate to their needs of social protection (Ferrera, 2009; Marhold, 2018; Treu , 2018; OECD, 2017; European Commission, 2018).

10. To cope with an uncertain future: reinvigorating the social contract

The transforming forces of technologies and of international competition  which have brought about the great transformations of work have profoundly influenced also the international scenario and the relations among the nations. The national responses to the challenges posed by this new scenario have been diversified, even polarized in many respects, and these different reactions have contributed to increase the distance among the social and economic conditions of the various countries and of their citizens.

While these responses reflect the different conditions of each national community, they are increasing  the divergences and dualisms in the world economy. This trend contradicts the mission of the ILO and of our discipline to promote social justice and progress for all workers and citizens and is bound to create social and geopolitical tensions  which may contribute to destabilize the international scenario. The risk is increased by the fact that the divergences among the nations add up to the inequalities  which have been growing among individuals and social groups.

The contradictory pressures of the various forces which are transforming the world make for an extremely uncertain international scenario. The ILO has been directly affected by these tensions. It has been weakened by the distancing of some member states (Us in the first place), like other international institutions (the World health organization); moreover it has suffered from the disaffection of the employers associations which have resisted to the proposal to reinforce the powers of the ILO in the composition of international disputes concerning the interpretation of the conventions.

The recurrent crisis and lately the health emergency have demonstrated the fragility of many economic arrangements which have brought prosperity in the past and also of the systems of social and civil rights on which democratic welfare societies are based. The democratic states and their social actors are called to react to the challenges  which are threatening the global social and economic stability.

These states and their constituents social partners should take the lead not only in supporting the role of international institutions like the ILO but also in taking action to strengthen the social contract in their respective countries as advocated by the global commission on the future of work. 

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