The labour market today is under severe pressure in all European countries. The crisis is (ab)used to change hard-won labour rights fundamentally, with negative consequences for the most vulnerable groups in the labour market. They are pushed more and more into precarious, temporary and inferior jobs with negative consequences for people living on the edge or in poverty. Poverty rates – even for those who have work – are rising alarmingly.

For the EU a harmonization of working conditions is the basis of their social model. For this purpose, the concept of ‘flexicurity’ has been elaborated. Flexicurity is a model based on a policy of easily dismissal and recruitment, simultaneously compensated by a generous social security system and an active employment policy. However, the crisis is making generous social policies and an active employment policy impossible. Flexicurity has now become  the fig leaf for a policy that breaks down social protection.

Starting from the observation that flexicurity is the basis of the current European social model, we wish to explore in this two-day working seminar, the potential for another social model that is based on the capabilities of people. This model starts from a different industrial model both socially and ecologically, and fights against poverty and precariousness.

On the page “conferences” and then “flexicurity” you will find all the documents of this seminar. In the weeks that follows you will find a more detailled report.