Grandstand. A new arrangement of the work society is at work without any thought being given to what we collectively want. The presidential campaign debate, crystallized around the retirement age, testifies to our inability to rethink our system, while the urgency is to reinvent a social pact to respond to changes in our society.
In the world of work, attention is indeed occupied by the phenomenon of platforms or, more broadly, by the enthusiasm for entrepreneurial activity and its “start-ups”. Yet it is in the salaried universe that everything changes. Make no mistake about it: between the weariness of the bond of subordination, the health crisis and the effectiveness of communication technologies, the evolution of the wage relationship and its modes of expression must be at the center of the reflections, much more than the legal status of platform workers, which is only an indicator of disturbances in a work society designed for the open-ended contract (CDI).
The CDI remains today the normal form of work. It constitutes the cornerstone of employment policies, guaranteeing employees social recognition and reserved advantages, such as access to credit and housing. The CDI was conceived as the promise and condition of a stable life. However, if today France still has nearly 80% of employees, they are no longer all holders of a full-time permanent contract and the use of atypical forms of employment contracts has developed very widely.
Since the turn of the century, labor law reforms have evolved towards greater flexibility in response to globalization and the financialization of the economy. We then gradually entered an era of instability, in which the injunction of permanent adaptation is essential: the relationship to time is no longer part of stability. This break, in germ for many years, has been fully consumed with the rise of forced teleworking.
The fuel of the century
The technological revolution, the emancipatory aspirations of the individual and the evolution of the role of the company in society have also largely reshuffled the cards: the individual questions his own relationship to work and seeks to control his destiny. without giving up the fullness of his rights as a person and no longer as a simple worker. The crisis resulting from Covid-19 has weighed on the morale of citizens and led to the worrying observation of“a tired society” (CFDT-Jean Jaurès Foundation report of November 26, 2021). This paradigm shift requires us more than ever to rethink, collectively, what working means.
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