Isabelle Ferreras, senior research associate at the Center for Labor and a Just Economy, Harvard; visiting fellow for 2023-24, Institute for Ethics in AI, Oxford and Professor at the Catholic University of Louvain.

You were invited, as an expert, to attend the conference of the Spanish presidency of the EU, on 22 September, at Santiago de Compostela, on the future of work and social dialogue. Democracy at work was one of the three topics discussed by a panel. Is this concept one of growing importance on the European agenda?

Yes, it’s really become a matter of debate at EU level. The Spanish Presidency of the EU, in the person of Yolanda Díaz, Minister of Labour and the Social Economy, has included democracy at work among its priorities. She calls for democratisation within companies and places this issue at the heart of the European strategy, even speaking of a “bifurcation of the European project”. She explained that this matter had to be at the heart of the discussions, from this year onwards, when it comes to drawing up the European Commission’s roadmap. Several days later, addressing the ETUC executive committee, she once again placed democratisation within companies at the centre of her speech. She identified European Works Councils as the body that offered a genuine possibility of achieving progress in the field of workers’ rights. So, there is real movement happening at European level, with certain countries acting as the driving force: Spain of course, but Belgium too – its Minister of Labour and the Economy Pierre-Yves Dermagne was at the conference, and Belgium will be taking over the presidency of the EU on 1 January 2024 for the next six months. The Portuguese Minister of Labour, Ana Mendes Godinho, also issued a very clear call for democracy at work to be placed at the centre of our European strategy for managing the digital and green transitions…. Lastly, there was an address by the European Commissioner for Jobs and Social Rights, Nicolas Schmit, who affirmed that democracy also has to exist within the economy and that a new equilibrium has to be created within companies’ decision-making structure. According to Nicolas Schmit, workers must have the right to “co-decide”.

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