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"Introduction" [2019] ELECD 1841; in Kenner, Jeff; Florczak, Izabela; Otto, Marta (eds), "Precarious Work" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2019) xi

Book Title: Precarious Work

Editor(s): Kenner, Jeff; Florczak, Izabela; Otto, Marta

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

Section Title: Introduction

Number of pages: 6

Extract:

Introduction
Izabela Florczak, Jeff Kenner and Marta Otto

Precarity of work is one of the core concerns of contemporary labour law
research. The need to examine closely the notion of precariousness in employ-
ment relationships emerged in the context of globalisation and automation
that induced a breakdown of traditional modes of working in the first decade
of the twenty-first century and made increasingly commonplace the practice
of using more `flexible' forms of employment without the whole spectrum
of rights associated with the standard employment relationship of regular,
full-time work. The need to address precarious work through labour regulation
has been given new impetus by the worldwide shift to more insecure jobs since
the global financial crisis, as well as the rise of the `gig economy' which has,
through digitalisation, transferred the risk element in the employment relation
from the employer to the worker.
Since the 1970s, discussion within academic and policy circles has been
largely centred on a key question: What constitutes precarious work?1 Despite
the persistent conceptual conundrum over the correlation between precarious
work, atypical employment and contingent work, and the lack of a universally
acknowledged taxonomy of standard/nonstandard employment in the litera-
ture, considered cumulatively the existing conceptions, superficially at least,
provide the fullest portrayal of the complexity of the precarity of work phe-
nomenon, an understanding of which is vital for the proper legal articulation
of the protection machinery/framework required. However, in the academic
discourse, the question of what the impact of ...