Disguised Employment - The Nature of Forced Entrepreneurship

Abstract

Present labor markets are in the wind of change. A widely made distinction between employees and individual contractors has been challenged. The study discusses abductively, i.e. both conceptually and empirically, the nature of being a responsible employer. Consequently, the two central concepts are: a) responsibility and b) employment relationship. The empirical research task is: Why does disguised employment exist? Question of the research is: What is disguised employment as forced entrepreneurship? The approach is qualitative and abductive, which in this case means a two-way dialogue between the findings gained from literature and interviews. For this exploration, twelve open and unstructured interviews were conducted, two authentic written descriptions of dispute cases were analyzed and three concluding theme-based interviews were made by phone to clarify some remaining open questions. Disguised employment causes harm to employers and employees in the form of forced contracts, lack of experience in firms and unethical and irresponsible outsourcing. Responsible employment is a balance between rights, obligations, power and corporate social responsibility.