Evaluating whether the Gig economy is transforming the nature of employment relations. The industrial relations challenges within the digital platform economy in the 21st.

Abstract

The rise of the gig economy has the potential to benefit all stakeholders, workers, companies, and the society. For this reason, the field of employment relations attracts the interest of scholars and practitioners by stimulating the debate about the future of labour, job regulations, and the effect of technology and working conditions. Since the last century, the field of the industrial relations has been the major discipline to study the nature of labour relationships through the interaction of its main actors: employees, employers, and the state. This research aims to study the transformation of the nature of these industrial relations, their actors, roles and employment relations within the gig economy through a comprehensive literature review of the existing industrial relations framework. We will analyse the different work perspectives, the quality of job status, forms of collective action unions, and control algorithmic management. Finally, some of the main future challenges that the gig economy rises to the society will be highlighted, and some further research needs concerning the digital platforms governance, the conditions and unions for gig workers and the impact of gig work on employment relations and industrial relations theory.