Research On The Labor Rights Protection Of Couriers In The Platform Econom

With the rapid economic development,the China’s economic transformation have spawned new business formats,and the platform economy has become a new growth point for China’s economy.The prosperity and growth of platform economy depends on Internet technology.With the influence of science and technology,the platform economy has redefined the employment situation in China’s labor market.The traditional employment mode is gradually being replaced by the flexible,free and efficient employment mode,which giving birth to a group of platform workers mainly composed of deliverymen,delivery drivers,online taxi drivers and online writers.The labor relationship between platform workers and employers has become a key research area in the academic community.Among the many theoretical perspectives for studying employees and employers,labor process theory is an important theoretical tradition.In the new era,the reinterpretation of labor process theory has led many scholars to study the labor relationship between workers and employers under the background of platform economy.In the context of the development of the platform economy,the professional dilemma of couriers has attracted widespread attention from the society.As a typical representative group of platform workers,couriers represent the transformation and reconstruction of labor relations between platform workers and employers under the background of China’s economic transformation.This research intends to mainly use the labor process theory,combined with the theory of individualized society theory,the risk society theory,and the collective action theory through the literature method,interview method,and participant observation method,to analyze the confrontation and collusion between the courier and the employer in the labor process,and to understand the courier’s career dilemma,so as to put forward policy recommendations to improve the living conditions of couriers.From the perspective of labor rights and interests protection of couriers,couriers are basically absent at present.In the context of individualized society and risk society,atomized working methods,homogenized social relations,quicksand organizational status and involution of occupational radius have jointly led to the loss of the courier’s subjectivity status,the ambiguity of labor relations,uncertain employment prospects as well as the ’disembedding’ of social insurance system.Under the long-term highpressure and exhausting working conditions,the courier has frequent dangerous incidents,and the probability of occupational injury increases.The above difficulties lead to the courier’s lack of sufficient sense of social security,happiness and gain,which leads to a variety of negative social mentality of the courier.From the perspective of the relationship between couriers and employers,there are both confrontation and relatively hidden collusion between them.The confrontation between couriers and employers is mainly manifested in the following four situations:First,in terms of protecting their own rights and interests,couriers will protect their own rights and interests by means of help platform exemption from punishment and recourse to law;Second,in expressing dissatisfaction,couriers will use the way of showing weakness to employers and flexible resistance to obtain psychological comfort;Third,couriers will oppose the unreasonable system of enterprises through collective action in opposing the control of employers and pursue the maximization of their own interests;Fourth,in terms of getting rid of the constraints of employers,couriers will completely get rid of the control of employers by voting with their feet.However,couriers and employers will also choose to maximize their individual interests through collusion.The collusion between couriers and employers is mainly manifested in two aspects:when facing the government,couriers and employers conspire in signing labor agreements and paying social insurance;In the face of customers,couriers and employers conspire to achieve daily delivery rate,deal with customer complaints,seek management protection and seek profits.Judging from the process of collusion and confrontation between couriers and employers,the two have moved towards a professional community based on common interests.This occupational community has three typical characteristics:rational choice at the individual level,kinship at the organizational surface,and group conflict at the deep level of interests.The professional community formed by couriers and employers is indeed fragile and unstable,and faces the risk of rupture at any time.The fundamental reason is that the two sides have not developed a collective consciousness and common values.For this reason,they must move towards a state of being:a new type of professional community based on social solidarity.The new professional community takes equality as the premise,social solidarity as the goal,division of labor as the basis,common consciousness as the foundation,collective consultation as the method,and professional quality and professionalism as the principle.In order to further protect the labor rights and interests of couriers and consolidate the new professional community formed by couriers and employers,public policies need to make efforts from the following five aspects:1.Strengthening Solidarity:update development concepts applicable to the platform economy,such as the idea of system,the theory of community and the idea of social cooperation;2.Reduce collusion:establish a new labor relationship system that fits the courier group;3.Maintaining fairness:integrating the courier group into the current social insurance system of our country4.Resolving confrontation:creating a new mode of labor capital cooperation and consultation5.Consolidate the new professional community:cultivate the common values of courier employer.Only in this way can the labor rights of couriers be guaranteed,and a new professional community of couriers and employers based on social solidarity can be formed.