The Cage Of Freedom:Flexible Employment And Work In Labor Relations

China has a large group of laborers.Labor relations have received widespread attention in the current network society.The realization of labor’s rights and interests has a decisive influence on the sound development of society.In the context of the Internet,the flexible system is applied to labor relations.The original single labor relationship has become complicated,labor employment and work have become flexible,the distribution of rights and obligations between labor relations subjects is no longer clear,and the boundaries of responsibilities are blurred and uncertain.Labor rights are more vulnerable to infringement.As a new form of labor relations,whether flexible systems can bring harmony in labor relations is particularly critical.Returning to the study of flexible systems in the labor process and focusing on harmony in labor relations and social stability,can also expand the diversity of labor relations research.Focused on the process of workers participating in flexible employment and work,This study,with a topic of labor relations and the flexible system,distinguishes and connects the flexible working system in the labor process with the flexible employment system in the labor market category,and reveals the production logic of the flexible system.Two professional groups,programmers and air-conditioning workers,selected as research cases and placed in the specific labor process and labor market to investigate the application and practice of flexible working system and flexible employment system,were compared and analyzed to reveal the difference in the effects of the flexible system on the two types of occupational groups and the common dilemmas faced by different labor markets,in order to explore the formation and functioning mechanisms of flexible systems.Research has found that,first of all,the flexible system increases the “autonomy” of the workers,who have the freedom to master the labor process and enter and exit the labor market on the surface.The programmer’s “two-way choice” and the air-conditioning workers’ “pure labor awareness” rationalize the operation logic of the flexible system,Secondly,the flexible system has greatly realized the production elasticity,organizational elasticity and market elasticity of the enterprise.The rights of laborers are actually compressed.During the labor process,workers must rigidly obey the flexible needs of enterprise.the stability of enterprise production order and the dynamic balance of the labor market come at the cost of the instability of individual labor.Finally,coupled with the active identification of workers,the state,market,enterprises,and technological mechanisms have jointly promoted the production and reproduction of flexible systems.The invisible control of technology has resolved the face-to-face conflicts between labor relations.State intervention has given enterprises rights and constraints.Competition forces companies to reduce human expenditures and intensifies competition between labors.Through flexible systems,companies construct laborers’ identity,which makes them become self-management atomized individuals.