Searching for Hope Beyond the Failed EU Directive on Platform Work: Fairwork’s Response to The Failed Council Vote

Fairwork is an international research project analysing labour standards in platform and AI-mediated economy based at the University of Oxford and the Berlin Social Science Center. Since 2019, we have evaluated working conditions in 673 platforms operating in 39 countries across five continents, interviewing over 5000 workers and several dozen platform managers. Our research has highlighted important shortcomings in labour standards in the platform economy, in Europe and beyond. 

This document presents the office Fairwork response to the failed Council Vote on the EU Platform Work Directive where we highlight the need to continue efforts to create the conditions for a fair future of platform work. In our response we also offer three actions points: continue multi-stakeholder dialogue; implement regulatory mechanisms at the member state level; and invest in research.