Fairwork Serbia 2021-2023
CENTER as a member of the University of the Oxford’s Fairwork Foundation rates and ranks platforms in the online gig economy to show how their working conditions meet its five Fairwork principles related to pay, conditions, contracts, management and representation. Center will lead the Fairwork efforts in Serbia by highlighting best and worst practices in the emerging platform economy and by giving every operational platform ain Serbia a ‘fairness’ score.
Nowadays, platform work provides essential income and opportunities to tens of millions of people around the world. However, most platform workers are not protected by existing employment laws or collective bodies, meaning they face low pay, precarity, and poor and dangerous working conditions. Thus, the Fairwork project is committed to highlighting the best and worst labour practices in the platform economy.
The main aim of the project is to point out that in a platform economy, jobs can be created in a better and fairer way. The evaluation of the working conditions of digital platforms is carrying out through continuous monitoring and ranking of the platforms based on Fairwork’s five principles of fair work – fair pay, fair conditions, fair contracts, fair management and fair representation. The fulfilment of these principles is assessed through the cooperation process within the global research network. The use of a specific methodological approach within the Fairwork project makes it possible to identify the extent to which platforms act in accordance with the five mentioned principles and to address the problems and challenges of workers working in non-standard forms of work, especially on platforms. As a part of the Fairwork network of researchers, Serbian Public Policy Research Center finished its pioneering evaluation of the four most popular platforms in Serbia based on five principles of fair work. The first assessment shows the potential for achieving standards, but with the necessary improvements if the principles of fair work are to be fully met. There is also a need to call for stronger protection and stricter standards of decent work in the platform economy in Serbia.
Thus, the aforementioned principles provide a reliable benchmark of fair platform work, for platforms, workers, customers and policymakers. The impact of this approach is evident: after collaborating with Fairwork, some platforms have made changes to improve their fairness towards workers, and their Fairwork score. As a part of the research network which currently operates in 25 countries across 5 continents, for the next 2 years, our researchers will be working closely with workers, platforms, advocates and policymakers to envision and build a fairer future of work. Besides that, Fairwork states that platforms may be responsible for their working practices, launching Fairwork Pledge. This declaration aims to engage with other organizations, such as universities, companies or investors that would like to demonstrate their public commitment to fairer platform work, guided by Fairwork principles.
