Work in the age of collaborative platforms between innovation and tradition

Abstract

Starting from the Uber ruling of the Court of Justice of 20 December 2017 this paper tries to demonstrate how innovation in the gig economy or collaborative economy does not change the basic issues of labour law but rather requires a greater adaptation of these issues to the new digital context. The principal issue is the classification of the platform company’s providers, which follows the traditional distinction between self-employment and the dependent work relationship. At the root of that classification there are still ‘hetero-direction’ and the employer’s prerogatives, although they can assume a different and more complex physiognomy in the digital age.