Documents Codagnone, Cristiano 5 results

"This critical and scoping review essay analyses digital labour markets where labour-intensive services are traded by matching requesters (employers and/or consumers) and providers (workers). It focuses on digital labour markets which allow the remote delivery of electronically transmittable services (i.e. Amazon Mechanical Turk, Upwork, Freelancers, etc.) and those where the matching and administration processes are digital but the delivery of the services is physical and requires direct interaction. The former broad type is called Online Labour Markets (OLMs) and is potentially global. The latter broad type is termed Mobile Labour Markets (MLMs) and is by definition localised. The essay defines and conceptualises these markets proposing a typology which proves to be empirically valid and heuristically useful. It describes their functioning and the socio-demographic profiles of the participants, reviews their economic and social effects, discusses the possible policy implications, and concludes with a research agenda to support European level policy making. It alternates the discussion of ‘hard' findings from experimental and quasi-experimental studies with analysis of ‘softer' issues such as rhetorical discourses and media ‘hyped' accounts. This triangulation is inspired by, and a tribute to, the enduring legacy of the work of Albert O. Hirschman and his view that ideas and rhetoric can become endogenous engines of social change, reforms, and policies. This essay tries to disentangle the rhetoric with available empirical evidence in order to enable a more rational debate at least in the discussion of policies, if not in the public arena. To do so, an in depth analysis of 39 platforms was undertaken together with a formal review of 70 scientific sources. "

"Digital platforms generally placed under the ‘sharing economy' and various other labels match different groups of users and providers and enable the increase in scale and speed for traditional transactions such as selling, renting, lending, labour trade, and provision of services. In many cases, these platform-mediated activities involve peer-to- peer or peer-to-business transactions that occur in a regulatory vacuum. Since 2014, the phenomenal growth of a few large commercial ‘sharing' platforms, the increasing number of economic sectors affected, and the conflicting interests among the stakeholders involved have made the ‘sharing economy' a domain of conflictual rhetoric and public controversies, legal disputes, and even violent protests. The various expressions used to refer to ‘sharing' platforms, by now appropriated by practitioners and stakeholders, are ‘floating signifiers' for all sorts of different activities, in what can be called the rhetorical politics of platformisation. Terms and concepts are used in such confused and confusing ways that it is at times difficult to ascertain whether advocates, opponents, regulators, and policy makers are discussing the same phenomenon. There is a closed self-reproducing loop between conceptual ambiguity, rhetorical controversies, and lack of sound measurement and empirical evidence. This loop, in turn, limits the space for a rational debate of alternative policy options and contributes to the fragmented regulatory approaches which currently address the ‘sharing economy'. This theoretically-inspired and empirically-informed critical essay (i) unpacks the ‘sharing economy' rhetoric, (ii) clears the field of semantic and conceptual ambiguity by providing a heuristically- useful and empirically-grounded typology, (iii) maps the controversies against available empirical evidence on the functioning and on the impacts of ‘sharing' platforms, (iv) reviews the debate and the literature which focuses on regulatory and policy issues, and (v) discusses all these aspects in terms of their policy implications, and of future European research on this topic. It does so in a unique way, because of the extensive evidence base used and the inter-disciplinary approach it takes in which theoretical and empirical economics, sociology, anthropology, regulatory and legal studies, and rhetorical analysis converge. The evidence comprises: a) 120 media items (newspapers and magazine articles; blogs especially by ‘sharing economy' advocacy groups and organisations; industry briefs etc.); b) in-depth analysis of a purposive sample of 70 platforms (website, blog, public relations and self-reports, etc.); c) 140 sources, consisting of scientific items (115) and broadly defined reports (25), selected using a formalised protocol and systematically reviewed; c) about 60 reports released by interested parties (industrial associations, platforms own reports and public relation materials); d) 70 indirectly relevant scientific contributions and policy reports."

"This report presents the results of the research ‘Exploring Digital Government Transformation in the EU: understanding public sector innovation in a data-driven society', in short DigiGov. The main goal of the research was to better understand how ICT-enabled innovation in the public sector can transform governance systems, and how governments can take advantage of emerging and future digital
technologies in order to address systemic problems such as the inefficiency of public services, existing inequalities of access, and a decline in trust and in perceptions of the legitimacy of government. Compiled over a period of 18 months (from December 2018 to July 2020) using a set of different approaches, this final report of the study concludes with suggestions as to how the future research agenda and policy developments in this field could be shaped."

"Digitalisation has a ‘hidden' impact on employment, particularly on the invisible conditions of some jobs, as perceived by workers, that are relatively less explored in the literature and that could represent a substantial social cost, particularly in the aftermath of the financial crisis and the COVID-19 pandemic.

We start by summarising a few main challenges of digitalisation, with a focus on the additional challenges brought about by the pandemic, the rise of platforms and alternative work arrangements, and the current attempts to regulate these.

We then discuss the hidden aspects of inequality linked to the unmeasured side effects of digitalisation. Mental health in particular should be taken into account, particularly in the post-pandemic context, which has led to a significant amount of working from home. Also, the reduction of tasks previously done in the workplace in favour of remote working might limit social interactions, creativity and innovation potential. We conclude by suggesting areas for policy interventions. "