Uberization and the (in)existence of employment links between application drivers and the digital platforms on which they are registered

Abstract

This article investigates the existence of employment relationships among Uber drivers and a digital platform to which they subscribe. Through a contextual analysis of the creation and development of the labor laws, it unfolds how the triggering requirements of the employment relationship are contextualized from the perspective of industrial capitalism. This is the period when the formal employment contract (known as CLT in Brazil) was established and its application to the digital era’s capitalism, characterized by the presence of robotics, algorithms, and job flexibility in the face of new possibilities of subordinations. Based on this assumption, the study will analyze, from a doctrinal perspective, the requirements triggered by the relation between work and its applicability on Uber’s company, as well as the jurisprudential understanding of the theme.