Realizing freedom of association and collective representation beyond employment boundaries AELIM YUN Korea National Open University

‘Standard employment relationship’ as a historical architecture  Vertically integrated firm  Single employer, Bilateral relations  Control over the performance of work  Continuity of contract term  Entitlement to rights based on employment status  A historical compromise of distribution of cost and risks between capital, labour and society (Supiot et al. 2001) in developed countries  ‘Precarious work’ as distribution towards workers of the insecurity and risks 2

(1) Making the employment relationship a dotted line  Dividing an employment relationship into contracts  Discriminatory payment based on the ‘contract’  Employer’s increasing power over the continuance of contract, and consequent control over the work  Increasing parts of working hours are left behind payment  Denying an employment relationship : on-call worker etc. 3

(2) Making the employment relationship indirect / disguised  Dividing the function of a employer over corporate boundaries  Avoiding the employment relationship  Control over the work via ‘intermediaries’  Contractualizing/ standardizing the performance of work  Increasing economic dependence on the rule of labour market, rather than on a particular employer 4

(3) Making precarious work ‘the norm’  Workers who have been treated as ‘the peripheral’  Workers on unemployment or underemployment  Legislation and government policies as a driving force of increasing precarious work  Workers take risks and insecurity which typically attached to the labour market 5

Case studies: Precarious work arrangement 6 global value chains (Samsung Electronics) ‘in-house’ subcontracting control via training, service guidelines, monitoring Subcontracted worker multi-layered subcontracting (Construction) ‘independent contractor’ control via intermediaries & piecework Owner- operator public service sector (School) ‘worker of School Account’ control via fixed-term contract, government policy & gendered discrimination Fixed-term contract worker Young worker publc & commercial service sector etc. ‘intern’, ‘Trainee’, ‘Part-timer’ etc. control via unemployment policy, the norm of labour market & discrimination based on age

Case studies: Organizing strategy & Fights 7 improvement of pay system, User-enterprise’s responsibilities collective action against and collective bargaining with the user-enterprise Subcontracted worker better regulations on multi-layered subcontracting, working hours reduction, protection against wage arrears collective action targeting at public contractors & aiming at mobilizing workers of the industry Owner- operator organizing via occupational networks exposing discrimination based on gender & types of work empowering women & building self-confidence Fixed-term contract worker Young worker organizing based common age, experience &culture challenging to the ‘norm’ in fractured labour market collective representation of the generation

Case studies: IR institutional hurdle 8 controversy over the collective bargaining agent & status of employers anti-union activity of the user-enterprise Subcontracted worker multi-layered subcontracting system informalisation of employment entitlement to collective labour rights based on employment status Owner- operator budget control by the Goverment ambiguity in the collective bargaining agent prohibition of collective bargaining pluralism Fixed-term contract worker Young worker denying workers who suffer from constant job insecurity collective labour rights Government policy encouraging to use precarious work

Lesson 1: From separated firms to vertically integrated network of firms  When we see only individual entities separately, it is difficult to identify who should take responsibility for workers’ rights, as a ‘function’ of the employer is performed by several firms.  Many legal systems limited regulatory interventions into a boundary of separate entities, and this allowed the principal enterprise to transfer their risks to others downwards value chains.  Right to collective bargaining and collective actions should be secured to the level of the principal enterprise across the whole value chains. 9

Lesson 2: Building IR institutions beyond employment relationships  The power to provide jobs for workers and power to set a standard in the labour market has increasingly significant meaning as to IR institutions.  Economic dependence should be understood as ‘alienated’ subordination rather than quasi-subordination.  All types of dependent workers including those working for multi user-enterprises should be entitled to equal protections which could relieve insecurity and precariousness in the labour market. Fully and equally securing freedom of association for those would be most effective way. 10

Lesson 3: Enlarging IR towards reversing the risks and insecurity transfer  Demands for tackling the risks and insecurity transfer towards workers & providing workers with universal platform for security irrespective of employment status  Collective Representation for all workers in the value chain, without being limited to union membership  Building alliances among workers’ organization with a view to countervailing power to recommodification of labour  Putting the role of state on the table; addressing policies which institutionalize unbalanced power distribution between capital and labour 11