Social minimum: the last bastion of legal protection for people vulnerable to the digital economy

• Author: Thiago Santos Rocha
• Pages: 416-425

416

Social minimum: the last bastion

of legal protection for people vulnerable

to the digital economy

Thiago Santos Rocha1

University of Oviedo

INTRODUCTION

The impact of the changes introduced by the digital economy on the material

conditions for a dignified life leads to the inevitable questioning of the juridically

acceptable limit of the intervention of new technologies in the current forms

of production and distribution of wealth. The promise that the technological

modernization of the economy would be accompanied by social development is

not always fulfilled. On the contrary, it often leads to people being cut off from

their sources of income and a consequent increase in the concentration of wealth.

Although debates on what would be morally, philosophically or

economically acceptable are also relevant, the delimitation of this work means

that its scope is restricted to the juridical sphere, which is responsible for filtering

the aforementioned systems. To this end, the paradigm of analysis chosen is

the principle of the dignity of the human person, as it is the guide of the main

international treaties and constitutional texts after World War II.

1 PhD student in Constitutional Law and researcher subsidized by the Vice-Rectorate of

Research of the University of Oviedo (Spain), through the Plan for Support and Promotion of Research

(Project PAPI-19-PF-01). E-mail: rocha@uniovi.es.