Contingent workers' expectations for a collective voice: between individualism and the need for representation

This chapter presents the concerns, needs and aspirations for social protection and representation felt and expressed by contingent workers in Italy and Spain. Based on the analysis of 52 in-depth interviews conducted with contingent workers in both countries, the perceived social protection needs and gaps and their attitudes towards collective representation by unions and other kinds of organizations are examined. Our findings point to the existence of structural and identity barriers that prevent contingent workers from acquiring a collective definition of their interests and, therefore, from union involvement. For them, collectivity is built rather on the basis of individual and autonomous decisions to join a group or an organization. When asked to imagine the most suitable form of representation for their labour interests as contingent workers, very few specific proposals emerged; however, common to all of them is the idea of changing the approach to traditional workers' representation.