10.6092/issn.2531-6133/11393
The process of transforming human labour into machine work has long been on the agenda of the International Labour Organization. The difference is that today, industry 4.0, artificial intelligence and big data are undermining highly technical qualified work as well as “heavy labour”. Therefore, on the ILO's centenary, it becomes relevant to reflect on its roles in the face of the challenges posed by technological innovations. Of these, we highlight the need to reinvent education to increase employability and to create protection mechanisms for those in uninterrupted 24-hour online employment, because summarize the contradictions experienced in the current world of work facing new technologies. The ILO cannot be indifferent to this new focal point: the balance between technological innovations - which certainly bring us enormous benefits - with the new demands of training and legal protection of workers.
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Ana Paula Silvestrini Vieira Alves
University of Bologna Law Review
Educational Technology
Achieving the Right to Work in the Face of Technological Advances: Reflections on the Occasion of the ILO's Centenary
Text.Serial.Journal
https://bolognalawreview.unibo.it/
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2020-07-22
2020-07-22
2020-03-16
2020-07-22
226-233
UBLR
Ana Paula Silvestrini Vieira Alves
2020/07/22
10.6092/issn.2531-6133/11393
226
University of Coimbra
2531-6133
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Educational Technology
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Achieving the Right to Work in the Face of Technological Advances: Reflections on the Occasion of the ILO's Centenary
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    llVOLUME 5                                       llISSUE 1                                                                     NOTES



                                 UNIVERSITY OF BOLOGNA LAW REVIEW
                                 h ps://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2531-6133/11393
                                                       A

         Achieving the Right to Work in the Face of Technological
    Advances: Reﬂec ons on the Occasion of the ILO’s Centenary
                                   ANA PAULA SILVESTRINI VIEIRA ALVES †


                                                     ABSTRACT

    The process of transforming human labour into machine work has long been on the agenda of the
    International Labour Organization. The difference is that today, in industry 4.0, artificial
    intelligence and big data are undermining highly technical qualified work as well as “heavy
    labour”. Therefore, on the ILO’s centenary, it becomes relevant to reflect on its roles in the face
    of the challenges posed by technological innovations. Of these, we highlight the need to reinvent
    education to increase employability and to create protection mechanisms for those in
    uninterrupted 24-hour online employment, because summarize the contradictions experienced
    in the current world of work facing new technologies. The ILO cannot be indifferent to this focal
    point: promoting training and legal protection for workers so that they can keep up with
    technological innovations and simultaneously have health and welfare.


                                                     KEYWORDS
     International Labour Organization; United Nations; Fourth Industrial Revolution; Automation; Educational
                                                   technology


                                               TABLE OF CONTENTS

    Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .     .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   227
    1. What Challenges do New Technologies Impose? . . . . . . .           .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   228
             1. 1. Reinventing Education to Increase Employability         .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   229
             1.2. Right to Disconnect . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .      .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   231
    2. Final Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .    .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   .   232




†
     Ana Paula Silvestrini Vieira Alves, Ph.D. Candidate in Public Law, University of Coimbra (Portugal). Mrs.
    Silvestrini Vieira Alves is specialized in Administrative law and Emerging technologies, with a deeper interest
    on public regulation of the economy and of telecommunication.




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     INTRODUCTION

The International Labour Organisation [hereinafter ILO], a United Nations [hereinafter
UN] agency dedicated to social justice through formulation and application of
international labour standards, completed its centenary. Headquartered in Geneva, it
has about 2000 staff and more than 800 experts on mission, acting with the guarantee of
independence and autonomy in relation to national governments.             It has a budget
composed of obligatory contributions from Member States and its organizational
structure is classic: an Assembly, a Council and a permanent Secretariat under the
direction of the Board of Directors. However, it stands out as the only UN agency with a
tripartite structure, with representatives of governments, employers’ organizations and
workers from the 183 Member States, acting on an equal footing.
        According to the preamble of its Constitution, the ILO’s existence is justified by
the poor working conditions, which cause injustice, misery, deprivation and fears of the
negative social effects that may result from unfair international competition. Its mission
is the pursuit of universal and permanent peace based on social justice. Its principal
mode of operation is through the establishment of international standards, via
conventions and recommendations. These conventions are submitted to the Member
States for ratification. Recommendations establish the “directive” principles to guide
national policies and practices.
        The ILO was created at the end of World War I (1919), through the Treaty of
Versailles, to work together with the League of Nations, an international organisation
that centralised the new world order. From its beginning to the present day, it stood out
in its defence of workers’ rights, in different moments and contexts in which it was
inserted: it survived World War II and in 1946 became the first specialized international
organization of the UN, and it was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on its fiftieth
anniversary, while it was still observing the Cold War.
        Currently, it continues to work on behalf of old labour demands, such as ending
slave and child labour, but at the same time it faces new questions coming from a new
wave of globalization, financial crisis, and the use of innovative technologies in the
entire production chain. Artificial intelligence, big data, and industry 4.0 are shaking
both “heavy labour” jobs and high-tech jobs (“white-collar” jobs). Therefore, in the ILO’s
century of work, it is relevant to reflect on its guidelines and identify ways to be able to
act in the face of all this news.




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      1. WHAT CHALLENGES DO NEW TECHNOLOGIES IMPOSE?

The twentieth century was marked not only by world conflicts, but also by technological
innovation. The inventions of this period include the airplane, the cloning of Dolly - the
sheep, the invention of television (1923), the discovery of penicillin (1928), the emergence
of the transistor (1947), the discovery of the DNA molecule (1953), the invention of optical
fibre (1952), and the orbit of first artificial satellite (1957).
          Moreover, as Manuel Castells points out, notably from the seventies onwards, a
new economy, society and culture began to be built on the basis of information technology.
From Silicon Valley, a new technological paradigm expanded in several countries that,
despite their differences, have produced more technological innovation and enlarged the
scope of transformations, diversifying their sources.1
          As a result, in 1990, a new socio-economic, informational, networked, and global
context was consolidated. The World Wide Web was also created in this decade and
expanded the applications of artificial intelligence, with the emblematic example of the
robot Deep Blue (IBM) defeating the chess champion Garry Kasparov.2
          From the nineties onwards, many other technological innovations emerged and
shook labour relations in a profound way. Kasparov’s defeat by Deep Blue boosted
investment in human-computer cooperation; today, computers are becoming so
sophisticated that their human collaborators have begun to become irrelevant.
          In December 2017, a new milestone was reached when the AlphaZero (Google)
program defeated the Stockfish 8 program, which was the 2016 computer world
champion of chess. The most surprising thing was that the outdated computer had
access to centuries of human experience accumulated in chess as well as decades of
computer experiments and was able to calculate 70 million positions per second. The
newcomer and winner, AlphaZero, estimated only 80,000 positions per second, was never
taught chess strategies by its human creators, and it was prepared for the match in just
four hours. AlphaZero played against itself, using the latest principles of machine
self-learning and thus made “creative” moves and strategies.3
          In addition, since 2008, a global financial and economic recession has made it
difficult to bear repercussions and has undermined the foundations of states to levels
which were previously unimaginable.                  This has led to the expansion of multilevel
governance in various public and private sectors and to the breakdown of territorial and
1
  MANUEL CASTELLS, THE RISE OF THE NETWORK SOCIETY 142-76 (Wiley, 2d ed. 2000).
2
  See, e.g., Deep Blue, STANFORD CS221 (2013), https://stanford.edu/ cpiech/cs221/apps/deepBlue.html.
3
  See David Silver & Demis Hassabis, AlphaGo Zero: Starting from scratch, DEEPMIND (Oct. 18, 2017), https://deepm
  ind.com/blog/article/alphago-zero-starting-scratch.


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sovereignty barriers, as was the case of Portugal, Greece and Ireland when they
requested financial rescue from the Troika.
          Indeed, everything has changed since the creation of the ILO. Since the beginning
of the twentieth century, society, politics and economics do not represent any identity.
Technological innovations have always been the fuel of these transformations throughout
history. It is no different now: reflecting on achieving the human right to work and on the
role of the ILO in its centenary is completely entwined with the new technologies in our
lives.
          In this respect, the following issues stand out: In the face of unemployment, what
skills are necessary for a professional to return to the market? In current labour relations,
do employees present new weaknesses and therefore, do they have to be given new rights?



    1. 1. REINVENTING EDUCATION TO INCREASE EMPLOYABILITY

Human work has been replaced by machines equipped with artificial intelligence, capable
of working with big data and of being inserted throughout the production chain of the
digitized industry (industry 4.0), typical of a fourth Industrial Revolution. In turn and far
from keeping up with the changes, most schools continue to teach based on a syllabus
developed many years ago which, as the Canadian Rod Allen states, needs urgent revision
because it is preparing students for a world that no longer exists.4
          The study “Ready to Work?”, carried out by around 800 employers, identified the
most valued skills in the job market. The skills chosen as priorities were: analysis and
problem solving, creativity and innovation, adaptability and flexibility, planning,
organization and motivation for excellence, linked to the ability to maintain a positive
attitude and to be persistent. The specific technical-scientific skills acquired in formal
education and training programs (hard skills) appeared in sixth and last place, evidencing
that the employers “attach greater importance to the personal and interpersonal skills”,
also called transverse or soft skills.5
          If the recruiter does not seek to first identify what the candidates know
cognitively, it seems clear to us that an update of the education system is necessary in
order to invest in the socio-emotional and behavioural skills that are being demanded.

4
  See Francisco R. Pereira, Escolas preparam alunos para um “mundo que já não existe” [Schools prepare students for a
  “world that no longer exists”], OBSERVADOR (Jun. 4, 2019, 6:32 PM), https://observador.pt/2019/06/04/escolas-
  preparam-alunos-para-um-mundo-que-ja-nao-existe/ (Port.).
5
  Diana Aguiar Vieira, Transição para (ou durante) a vida profissional: quais competências mais importantes e como
  desenvolvê-las? [Moving to (or during) Professional Life: What Are the Most Important Skills and How to Develop
  Them?], DIRIGIR&FORMAR (IEFP), Jan.-Mar. 2019, at 36 (Port.).


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The development of these skills can be done, for example, through physical, artistic,
dramatic or musical activities, as they are relevant vehicles for stimulating creativity and
self-confidence.
            However, in addition to these transversal competences, current society must
have digital literacy, and this highlights the role of technology in education. On the one
hand, we have seen many high-standard private schools introduce attractive
state-of-the-art equipment for students without a clear pedagogical purpose for its use
and on the other hand there are a majority of low-income schools that fear for the future
of education that they provide because they are unable to acquire technological
equipment.
            Neither of these perspectives is correct. First, having cutting-edge gear in the
classroom is not enough. Technology has to be introduced with the aim of encouraging
students to think, to question, to be creative, to be flexible when facing quick changes,
and to be supportive in crisis management. The excess of technological equipment
without these well-defined purposes can generate undesirable side effects, contrary to
the development of the aforementioned transversal competences.
            Second, there is no need for high-tech state-of-the-art equipment because
students do not have to deal with major market launches to acquire cross-cutting skills
and technological skills. As an example, even a small robot with an average cost of
twenty euros can be used in a satisfactory way in the teaching of several subjects, with
the students programming it to overcome challenges launched by the educator.6 Besides,
not every single student needs to have electronic equipment for individual use. On the
contrary, it is important that they work in pairs, at least, to develop certain skills related
to team spirit, collaboration, solidarity and constructive criticism.
            Teaching computational thinking is an excellent way to combine the development
of transversal skills and digital literacy, even for those with low purchasing power. It is
about using fundamental concepts of computer science as the basis for teaching problem
solving, systems projection, and understanding of human behaviour.
            According to Jeannette M. Wing, when facing a problem, we can question how
difficult it is to solve it and the best way to do it. Following computational reasoning, we
have solid theoretical bases for answering these questions accurately.                          In addition,
“equipped with computing devices, we use our intelligence to solve problems we would



6
    See Rita Laranginha, Juliana Lopes, Maria Catarina Sousa & Neusa Branco, Representar Retângulos com um Robot
    [Representing Rectangles with a Robot], EDUCAçãO E MATEMáTICA [EDUCATION AND MATHEMATICS], Jan./Feb./Marc.
    2019, at 45 (Port.).


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not have dared to even try before the computer age, and to build systems with features
limited only by our imagination.”7
           To do so, it is necessary to have enough political will for a minimum investment
and partnerships with the private sector. This is what is happening, for example, in
Kenya, where the Kiltamany Elementary School in the Samburu Reserve has become an
example of wireless, technology-enabled classroom success thanks to the country’s
expanding technology community. Using Kio tablets designed by Nairobi-based software
company BRCK, children and adults in Samburu are learning not only languages and
math, but also acquiring digital literacy, cross-curricular skills and self-confidence.8



    1.2. RIGHT TO DISCONNECT

In addition to technological innovations may have the potential to both eliminate and
create jobs, they also greatly affect existing labour relations. According to a survey
conducted in Brazil by PWC and Fundação Getúlio Vargas, 80% of global CEOs believe that
technology can have a significant impact on their business within five years. In fact, the
digital revolution has empowered people, with collaborative networks transforming
traditional corporate operating models, consumers swapping large amounts of
information, and citizens taking on roles that were once the media’s monopoly on
communications and information.9
           Current labour relations are different not only from the employer’s perspective,
who demands new skills and competences but also from the employees, who value more
flexible work regarding schedules and locations. It has not yet been properly evaluated
what real benefits and disadvantages for the worker’s health this dynamic can bring.
           The ILO recently launched the “Working Anytime, Anywhere” report with
research conducted in fifteen countries with employees using new technologies to work
outside their employers’ facilities. Its conclusions showed several positive effects, such
as greater autonomy of working time, more flexibility and the possibility of organizing
working and personal life, while reducing travel time and increasing productivity.
However, the study also identified disadvantages to employees, such as the tendency to


7
  Jeannette Wing, Computational Thinking, COMM. ACM, Mar. 2006, at 33.
8
  Na África Rural, os Tablets Revolucionam a Sala de Aula [In Rural Africa, Tablets Revolutionise the Class], NATIONAL
  GEOGRAPHIC (Jan., 2018), https://www.natgeo.pt/ciencia/2018/01/na-africa-rural-os-tablets-revolucionam-
  sala-de-aula (Port.).
9
  O futuro do trabalho: impactos e desafios para as organizações no Brasil [The future of work: impacts and challenges for
  organizations in Brazil], PWC (2014), https://www.pwc.com.br/pt/publicacoes/servicos/assets/consultoria-
  negocios/futuro-trabalho-14e.pdf (Port.).


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work longer hours than they would work in the traditional dynamic, resulting in poor
health and well-being.10
            By the end of the twentieth century and during the first years of the twenty-first
century, overwork due to uninterrupted connectivity raised great concerns regarding
employees with senior management and managerial positions. There are even labour
laws that exclude these workers from the right to a limited working day, to rest-breaks,
to daily rest, to weekly paid rest, and to the night works additional payment, as it is the
case of the Consolidation of the Labour Law in Brazil (Article 62).
            In the current scenario, this description is no longer typical only for employees
in senior management and management positions. It has spread to middle-level workers,
who are now also connected in an uninterrupted fashion. There are some employers who
already claim to pay a higher salary to employees who are online twenty-four hours in
order to avoid the payment of additional overtime hours. However, we must be aware that
a limited hour working day is a health issue in society and not a mere economic problem
that concerns only the worker.
            In the year 2013, in Germany, Volkswagen and BMW agreed with their workers to
limit the use of mobile devices to exchange work messages outside the normal working
hours. In the year 2014, in France, the employers’ federations of engineering, information
technology, consulting and market research firms agreed with the main trade unions on
the right to disconnect distance communication tools and in 2017 the country added that
agreement into their labour legislation.11




        2. FINAL CONSIDERATIONS

The need to promote digital education and the right to disconnect summarizes the
contradictions experienced in the current labour environment in the face of new
technologies. There is great concern about unemployment, but we are also worried
about overwork. It is said that the new technologies are stealing people’s work, but
simultaneously people are being enslaved by technology. It is convenient to have quick
10
     See JON MESSENGER   ET AL., EUROFOUND AND THE ILO, WORKING ANYTIME, ANYWHERE: THE EFFECTS ON
     THE WORLD OF WORK     (Publications Office of the European Union and Int. Labour Office, 2017),
   https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/—dgreports/—dcomm/—publ/documents/publication/wcm
   s_544138.pdf
11
   See Raquel Martins, Devemos ter o “direito a desligar” do trabalho? Governo abre debate [Should we
   have the “right to disconnect” from work? The government opens a debate] PúBLICO (Jan. 6, 2017),
   https://www.publico.pt/2017/01/06/jornal/devemos-ter-o-direito-a-desligar-do-trabalho-governo-abre-d
   ebate-32496252 (Port.).


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access to information, but we fear not being constantly up to date and losing our place in
the job market. We grew up hearing that work dignifies a person, but we feel our dignity
being violated by the invasive work that excessive technology can lead to.12
             In its centenary, the ILO cannot be indifferent to this focal point of labour
humanization and the social justice: promoting training and legal protection for workers
so that they can keep up with technological innovations and simultaneously have health
and welfare.
             Technological innovations have brought new ways of working, but these do not
dispense with legal regulations. The internal labour law of states and international
labour law, with the highest standards set by the ILO, should continue to protect people
and promote humanization in labour relations.
             Just as information technology infrastructure needs to be regularly updated to
maximize performance of the system, the ILO must also renew its efforts in order to best
meet the expectations of its tripartite composition - employees, employers and
government - and to fulfill its mission of development of social justice.




12
     Jorge Luiz Souto Maior, Do direito à desconexão do trabalho [About the Right to Disconnect from Work], REVISTA DO
     TRIBUNAL REGIONAL DO TRABALHO DA 15ª REGIãO, July- Dec. 2003, at 296 (Port.).


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