Decent work in contemporary capitalism: Dignity and recognition in digital microwork platforms

Abstract

A new standard of labour organization emerges in contemporary capitalism: the work on digital platforms, which can be of the on demand or the crowdwork kind. The crowdwork specifically consists of microtasks rolled out to the “crowd” through the platforms. In view of mi-crowork’s precariousness and lack of regulation, the International Labour Office produced a report that offers “18 criteria for fairer microwork”, which are the subject of analysis in this paper. These criteria were sorted into three categories: political representation, redistribution of resources (of an operational nature) and recognition of dignity (of a moral nature). From this analysis, ILO’s concept of decent work was problematized, concluding that the reality of microwork makes it nec-essary to introduce recognition as an obligatory and preceding dimension in order to encompass dignity as a condition for decent work.