Documents Mara, Claudia 5 results

"Purpose – Revitalisation of Quality of Working Life (QWL) research points to non-standard work such as remote platform work as a compelling setting where research on QWL is needed. Whereas the literature on working conditions in remote work platforms is rich, knowledge on the topic is fragmented. This systematic review aims to synthesize and integrate findings from existing literature, to offer an encompassing and multidimensional understanding of QWL and the managerial practices linked to it, in remote work platforms. Design/methodology/approach – A systematic review of 24 empirical qualitative studies selected based on a multiple-database search using Boolean search engines. The selection of studies to be included in the review was performed through a 4-steps procedure, following the PRISMA protocol. A thematic analysis of the studies was performed to synthesize findings. Findings – We synthesize and show how remote platform workers experience a degrading quality of working life along five QWL dimensions and we illustrate how these QWL dimensions are influenced by platforms' managerial practices such as client-biased systems, rate-setting mechanisms, reputational systems, global competition schemes, lock-in systems, monitoring and nudging systems and information asymmetry. Originality – The study contributes to reinvigorating QWL literature by producing a systematic synthesis of workers' experience of QWL in the non-standard work context of remote platform work and the managerial practices that influence QWL. Our study overcomes two main shortcomings of the existing empirical studies published: (a) studies examine only a few QWL dimensions and/or (b) examine some platforms' managerial practices that influence QWL, overlooking others."

"This study provides information allowing for an assessment of the representativeness of the actors involved in the European sectoral social dialogue committee for the tanning and leather sector. Their relative representativeness legitimises their right to be consulted and their capacity to negotiate agreements. The aim of Eurofound's studies on representativeness is to identify the relevant national and European social partner organisations in the field of industrial relations in the EU Member States. This study identifies industriAll Europe, representing employees, and COTANCE, representing employers, as the most representative European-level social partner organisations in the tanning and leather sector."

"This article explains how digitally mediated provision of domestic care services perpetuates the invisibility and informality of such work through individualising risk, which we operationalise by one of its dimensions, that of unpaid labour. We understand unpaid labour as the cost of the risk borne individually by workers at the intersection of the social (inter-personal) and economic (monetary) spheres. Drawing on the experiences of domestic care workers providing their services through platforms, the study shows how platforms have made their way into the labour markets and welfare structures of two mature economies, Belgium and France. Via their (digital) rules, they pursue ‘regulatory compliance' and ‘disruption' as distinct strategies for establishing platform dominance, albeit with country-based differences. Platform-mediated employment outcomes remain generally unrecognised, undocumented and informal, with unpaid labour characterising the cost of the individualisation of risk."

"While there have been numerous – mostly qualitative – studies on the experience and the conditions of platform labour, the exploratory potential of biographical research has so far been overlooked. This article responds to this gap in research by presenting a case study of a French crowdworker, who was interviewed in the context of a larger European research project on precariousness and unpaid labour. On the basis of her autobiographical narrative, the authors reconstruct how her relationship with two online labour platforms evolved throughout the course of two years. The aim of this article is to illustrate the benefits of adopting a longitudinal, process-oriented perspective on the experience of online gig work in a biographical context. By giving informants the time and space to openly narrate and reflect about how their lives evolved, it also becomes possible for them to work through difficult past experiences and gain new perspectives. Furthermore, this research approach can be a tool to amplify ‘voices from below' as a corrective against powerful corporate strategies. The authors aim to make the process of interpreting autobiographical narrative interviews transparent by highlighting the analytical relevance of selected formal textual features."