Introduction: What does the future promise for work, employment and society?

• Author: Damian GRIMSHAW,Uma RANI
• Date: 01 December 2019
• Published date: 01 December 2019
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ilr.12158

International Labour Review, Vol. 158 (2019), No. 4

Copyright © International Labour Organization 2019

Journal compilation © International Labour Organization 2019

* Senior Economist, ILO Research Department, email: amara@ilo.org. ** Director, ILO

Research Department, email: grimshaw@ilo.org.

Responsibility for opinions expressed in signed articles rests solely with their authors,

and publication does not constitute an endorsement by the ILO.

Introduction:

What does the future promise

for work, employment and society?

Uma RANI* and Damian GRIMSHAW**

Abstract. In introducing this double Special Issue, the authors draw on the art-

icles contained therein to highlight the main areas for consideration in research

on the future of work. They present the fast-paced changes affecting the world of

work as offering an opportunity to move towards equality-inducing growth, while

warning of the dangers posed by mismanaged technological change, inequalities

(highlighting the persistent and intersectional nature of gender inequality), global

supply chains and opportunities for social dialogue. In this light, they also pro-

pose policy recommendations focusing on strengthening worker protection and

representative institutions, rethinking regulatory frameworks and taxation systems,

and ensuring just transitions.

T

he world of work is changing rapidly and is increasingly shaped by techno-

logical advancements, globalization, changing demographics and climate

change. While the future of work presents a number of economic opportunities,

there are also serious challenges such as rising inequalities, high unemploy-

ment rates, job polarization and environmental degradation. As the contribu-

tors to this double Special Issue show, some of these trends raise questions

about the current growth or development paradigm and the need to shift to-

wards an “equality-inducing growth” model that promotes a more equitable

distribution of resources and wealth.

This double Special Issue adopts a multidisciplinary socio-economic and

legal perspective on the future of work. It includes articles that address the

specic economic impacts of technological advancements on the labour mar-

ket, but also seeks to widen and enrich this debate. This means questioning

the character of the current techno-economic paradigm to understand how

and why income and wealth has become concentrated among a select group

of elites and “superstar” rms. It also means widening the future of work lens

International Labour Review578

to encompass the inter-related issues of the changing international division of

labour, gender inequalities, social dialogue and the need for a shift in our ap-

proach towards human-centred growth and development. In terms of policy,

the 12 articles draw particular attention to the problematic lag in institutional

development to support and regulate the emerging techno-economic paradigm,

the need for distributive mechanisms (including social dialogue) to ensure that

the risks and benets of disruptive changes are shared more equitably, and the

need for a new commitment to extend adequate protections to workers not

currently covered by labour regulations.1

Technological advancements and labour markets

A major question for future of work research and policy debates concerns

the impacts of technological developments on labour markets. Technological

change and innovations are not new, but the pace and speed at which innov-

ations are taking place are unprecedented. Recent innovations, such as au-

tomation, articial intelligence and robotics, are changing the employment

landscape and forms of workplace organization, bringing about transforma-

tive changes in the economy and creating ripple effects across society, worker

behaviour and interactions with family life. These technological changes raise

policy questions about how to ensure job quality and full employment, how

to promote skill development to mitigate the risk of job destruction and job

polarization, and how to promote a fair distribution of productivity gains.

There is an ongoing debate on the extent to which occupations and tasks

may be automated and the impact that this would have on labour markets.

Frey and Osborne (2017) estimate that almost half the workforce in the United

States is at risk of automation in the next one to two decades, and similar

analyses for member countries of the Association of South-East Asian Na-

tions (ASEAN) set the risk at around 56 per cent (Chang and Huynh, 2016).

On the other hand, critics have argued that not all occupations are at high risk

or will be automated and that only a handful of tasks within particular occu-

pations will be automated. This focus on tasks nds a lower risk of job losses,

varying from 6 to 15 per cent depending on the country (e.g. Arntz, Gregory

and Zierahn, 2016; Nedelkoska and Quintini, 2018; Dengler and Matthes, 2018).

The fear that technological change threatens to create unemployment

is not new. Miriam Cherry describes similar sentiments in the 196 0s and re-

opens a past dialogue about work and technology to draw lessons that are

relevant to today’s challenges. One important lesson is that there is no auto-

matic equation that links an expected wave of automation with a predicted

volume of job loss. On the contrary, Arntz, Gregory and Zierahn (2019) des-

cribe several contingencies. First, the speed of diffusion may be lower than

1 In addition to the six articles contained in this rst part of the double Special Issue, this

introduction also refers to the articles in the second part by Miriam Cherry, Hannah Johnston,

Antonio Aloisi and Valerio de Stefano, Günseli Berik, Samuel Jubé, and Alain Supiot. These

articles will be published in International Labour Review, Vol. 159, No. 1 (2020).