Great piece - and thanks for the shout out to our US data worker report with CWA!
Valerio De Stefano
@valeriodeste.bsky.social
Canada Research Chair in Innovation, Law and Society, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto
“Employers have always claimed broad authority to organize production and introduce new technologies. AI extends that authority by making the labor process more observable, extractable, and reproducible.” @valeriodeste.bsky.social onlabor.org/training-you...
Training Your Replacement, One Keystroke at a Time ✦ OnLabor
AI and the hidden wage theft of automation training Reuters recently reported that Meta plans to install tracking software on U.S.-based employees’ computers to capture mouse movements, clicks, and ke...
onlabor.org
New piece out on @onlabor.bsky.social discussing how workers are increasingly forced to train the AI that may replace them. I argue this opens the doors to new forms of wage theft and exploitation that should be addressed by regulators, courts and collective bargaining onlabor.org/training-you...
🚨 BREAKING - The International Court of Justice has just recognised that the right to strike is protected by international law, under ILO Convention no. 87 🚨 This is a momentous decision that protects the fundamental rights of workers worldwide and upholds the rule of law in workplaces everywhere.
Highly recommend this excellent article by @valeriodeste.bsky.social about how “one of hidden stakes [of the political realignment of the tech right] is who gets to control the workplace & on what terms" and "why labor law belongs at the centre of these debates" www.socialeurope.eu/silicon-vall...
Prof. @valeriodeste.bsky.social has started the final day of our ICTS Conference with a keynote on how social partners can shape technological change, with Marianne Vind, Andreas Holbak Espersen, Oliver Roethig, Ramona Lopez @ccoociudadania.bsky.social & Fernando Berzal bringing in their views.
A super sharp piece on how the politics, culture, and practices of management undermine democracy. This is the guiding idea behind my own research into management-tech, and it's somewhat surprisingly under-theorized given how pervasive being subject to rule by bosses.
Valerio De Stefano@valeriodeste.bsky.social · 6mo agoA new blog for Social Europe, drawing from a recent keynote. I argue that AI at work is not just about efficiency. It is about managerial power, workers’ voice, and democracy. If democracy is eroded at work, it does not stay there. It reverberates into society www.socialeurope.eu/silicon-vall...
A new blog for Social Europe, drawing from a recent keynote. I argue that AI at work is not just about efficiency. It is about managerial power, workers’ voice, and democracy. If democracy is eroded at work, it does not stay there. It reverberates into society www.socialeurope.eu/silicon-vall...
Silicon Valley’s Anti-Democratic Turn Begins at Work
Silicon Valley’s quarrel with democracy is not abstract — it begins in the workplace, where unilateral authority is normalised.
socialeurope.eu
Just joined Substack and wrote a post on how deregulating labour markets has disproportionate gender impact substack.com/@valeriodest...
Valerio De Stefano | Substack
Law Professor - Tech, Labour, Fundamental Rights
substack.com
Sharing a recent keynote: algorithmic management is expanding employer power (hiring, pay, scheduling, monitoring, discipline). Privacy law helps, but we need collective counterbalances - co-determination and collective bargaining - so we stay citizens, not subjects, at work youtu.be/493uQv6gfxg?...
Algorithmic Management and EU Law: Quo Vadis? | Keynote by Valerio de Stefano
YouTube video by FES Global
youtu.be
Happy to share the program of an International Conference on Artificial Intelligence at Work that we will hold online and in person in Toronto on January 22 & 23. We have a stellar lineup of speakers and hope to see many of you there or online. Share widely! Register at www.yorku.ca/events/aiatw...
Happy to share the program of an International Conference on Artificial Intelligence at Work that we will hold online and in person in Toronto on January 22 & 23. We have a stellar lineup of speakers and hope to see many of you there or online. Share widely! Register at www.yorku.ca/events/aiatw...
A great blog by @valeriodeste.bsky.social on a proposal for an ILO Convention on Platform Workers - Could not be more topical and could not be more interesting! www.socialeurope.eu/shaping-the-...
Shaping the Future of Digital Work: A Bold Proposal for Platform Worker Rights
A new draft convention proposes to establish a comprehensive rights and protections for platform workers globally.
socialeurope.eu
✂️ “Simplify”. “Streamline”. “Scale back”. Brussels is all about boosting competitiveness by cutting red tape. The intention to stimulate the economy is laudable, but there is a real risk of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Trimming will achieve little. theconversation.com/were-critici...
We’re criticising GDPR for all the wrong reasons
The new EU Commission is all about ‘competitiveness’, but their plans to cut data protection rules are extremely short sighted.
theconversation.com
On @ssrn.bsky.social, a new paper with Sangheon Lee @ilo.org on the World Bank's Business Ready project. Focusing on the #B-READY Labor Topic, we highlight significant divergence from ILO standards and domestic labour laws, and an endorsement of very poor quality jobs. bit.ly/BRSSRN
The World Bank's Business Ready Project: The Labor Topic, ILO Standards and the Role and Impact of Labour Regulation <br>
The World Bank's new Business Ready (B-READY) project replaces the controversial Doing Business index in assessing global business and investment environments a
papers.ssrn.com
Very thrilled to announce the publication of a special issue of the Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal, titled "New Perspectives on Worker Subordination." Edited by Valerio De Stefano, Sara Slinn, & Eric Tucker (Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto). 🧵👇
Spent the morning at Markham Campus of York University talking to incoming Sport Management students. (Lots of interest in the Sports Law course!) The campus is really cool. Hung out on the Makr room checking out 3-D printers and our new e-sports lab!!
Another nudge to ease the exodus from Twitter/X: A starter pack of interdisciplinary voices on Bluesky exploring the intersection between employment relations and labor inequalities. Feel free to suggest more people to add to the list!
We all have many new followers since the last couple of days (Hi Everyone!), so I am reposting this blog on “back to office mandates” and overreaching employer authority
Valerio De Stefano@valeriodeste.bsky.social · 2y ago+ NEW BLOG OUT + Nicola Countouris and I discuss Amazon’s recent “back to office mandate”. This case shows again that employers’ powers, rooted as they are in public law, should be better hold accountable to avoid arbitrariness in democratic societies and… www.socialeurope.eu/amazons-offi...
+ NEW BLOG OUT + Nicola Countouris and I discuss Amazon’s recent “back to office mandate”. This case shows again that employers’ powers, rooted as they are in public law, should be better hold accountable to avoid arbitrariness in democratic societies and… www.socialeurope.eu/amazons-offi...
Amazon’s office mandate: The hidden power play behind workplace control
Amazon’s office mandate exposes workplace power dynamics and the need to rethink employer control.
socialeurope.eu
Finally #platformwork will be regulated in 🇪🇺 Cringey that the 🇩🇪 & 🇫🇷 governments did not support it. Read this first assesment by @valeriodeste.bsky.social & Antonio Aloisi www.socialeurope.eu/gig-workers-...
‘Gig’ workers in Europe: the new platform of rights
A presumption of employment and rights on algorithmic management are at the heart of the revived platform-work directive.
socialeurope.eu
The Platform Work Directive introduces a shift of the burden of proof in favor of platform workers, and groundbreaking protections against abusive algorithms at work. Not everything that was needed, but a step forward. A preliminary analysis with Antonio Aloisi www.socialeurope.eu/gig-workers-...
‘Gig’ workers in Europe: the new platform of rights
A presumption of employment and rights on algorithmic management are at the heart of the revived platform-work directive.
socialeurope.eu
My book on digital labour platforms is now open access - and I will be presenting it in Bristol on Tue 28 Nov, 1pm, in room 2.13, Wills Memorial Building. Here is the link to the book: www.bloomsbury.com/uk/digital-w...
Also a few quotes from yours truly and reference to a special issue co-edited with Virginia Doellgast in this great story about AI surveillance at the workplace
SSteven Greenhouse@greenhousenyt.bsky.social · 3y ago
At some companies, algorithms fire workers without human intervention. At others, software keeps tabs on bathroom breaks. AI & other technologies are increasingly unsettling many workers & workplaces And labor unions are pushing harder to win protections from AI www.theguardian.com/technology/2...
Despite a good across-the-aisle compromise by the EU Parliament, Member States blocked the Platform Work Directive because they couldn’t get EP to agree to watered-down protection. Unsurprising that Conservatives Govs did so; bizarre that liberals & progressives aligned with them, swayed by lobbying
The ILO submitted to the International Court of Justice the documents about its referral re: the protection of the right to strike in International Labour Law (and ILO Conv 87, specifically). This is likely one of the most important labour cases worldwide this century www.icj-cij.org/case/191
Right to Strike under ILO Convention No. 87
icj-cij.org