The University of Milan Bicocca is pleased to announce

International conference
Precarious & unrepresented. New workers facing the deficit of rights and social representation

16 December 2015
09.30—18.30
Auditorium Guido Martinotti, Università Milano Bicocca
Edificio U12 - via Vizzola, 5 - Milano

The lack of protection and the shortcomings of the representation of workers are topics of increasing relevance. These two phenomena are part of larger processes regarding the destructuring of the labour market, the growing precariousness of the labour force, the reduction of workers' rights and protection and the weakening of traditional labour unions.
These phenomena have rekindled the debate regarding the dualism of the labour market and the related dichotomy between insider and outsider. The fragmentation of the labour market renders the labour market dualism thesis increasingly less convincing.
Today even those employed in private sector manufacturing jobs, whose number has been diminishing in recent decades, are increasingly at risk of losing their jobs, despite the greater level of protection that the primary labour market has traditionally enjoyed. On the other hand, the number of workers in the secondary market is on the rise and these workers face a vicious circle of occupational instability and a lack of labour union protection. These twofold processes call for a re-consideration of dualization theories.
The lack of representation and protection involves a wide range of subjects: young workers entering the labour market, a growing number of immigrants, temporary and seasonal workers employed in traditional jobs, a diversity of workers engaged in new occupations in the services industry. Traditional labour unions, while losing strength in traditional sectors, are also finding it increasingly difficult to represent workers in new forms and areas of employment, despite the on-going efforts to renew their strategies through new organizational means. Indeed, such a problem brings about the effort to create organizations that offer innovative means of protection that also make use of new communicative technologies.
Research on the type of organizations addressing the most disadvantaged groups in the labour market is still in its early stages, especially in Italy. It is taking on an ever-growing importance, as demonstrated by the research by Enrico Pugliese entitled "Nuovi soggetti del lavoro e forme di rappresentanza" (New actors in the labour market and new forms of representation). The research ended in 2013 and involved a group of researchers from several universities: La Sapienza (Rome), Federico II (Naples), Milano Statale, Milano Bicocca, and the IRPPS-CNR(National Research Council) in Rome.
In this conference we discuss this issue from a comparative and international perspective.

The conference is divided into two sessions:
9.30 - New actors on the labour market and the deficit of protection
14.30 - The crisis and the organizational responses of vulnerable actors on the labour market

The full program can be downloaded below.