Proceedings of 8th European Assembly on telework (Telework2001)

165Table 2:Tele-cooperation in Europeworkers who tele-cooperate as % <strong>of</strong>all workersregularly(in %)occasionally(in %)not(in %)Self-employed workers who telecooperateas % <strong>of</strong> all self-employed 2regularly(in %)occasionally(in %)not(in %)Denmark 26.0 5.9 68.1 35.7 0.0 64.3Finland 43.4 6.9 49.7 40.5 0.0 59.4France 21.7 4.8 73.5 10.7 3.6 85.8Germany 26.8 5.3 67.9 13.6 9.8 76.7Ireland 32.1 5.4 62.5 16.6 6.5 76.8Italy 17.6 9.8 72.6 9.7 11.7 78.6Netherlands 29.9 15.5 54.6 20.0 28.9 51.2Spain 19.7 4.2 76.1 12.7 6.4 81.0Sweden 29.9 7.9 62.2 21.0 16.3 62.7U.K. 37.5 5.2 57.3 14.7 1.7 83.6EU10 28.2 6.7 65.1 13.6 8.1 78.3Data source: ECaTT 1999 (n=3,895), see Gareis 2001This means that there is no sign that a significant share <strong>of</strong> today’s self-employed freelancers willconvert into e-lancers any time soon, as they have not even started making use <strong>of</strong> the most basictools <strong>of</strong> electronic collaboration. One should also be careful before taking other trends towardsgreater flexibility in work organisation as precursors <strong>of</strong> a dissolution <strong>of</strong> employment relationshipsinto an eLancing labour force.It is true that ICTs have enabled increases in flexibility in all <strong>of</strong> the main categories <strong>of</strong> change(time, place, contract and work content). With regard to working time, companies now <strong>of</strong>fer/demand models that are much more variable and adapted to the requirements <strong>of</strong> workers and/orthe company than they have been in the past. However, the more these measures enhance internalflexibility, the less companies need to revert to raising external flexibility through outsourcing<strong>of</strong> activities to subcontractors or freelancers (Bosch 2000). The working time situation <strong>of</strong> thedependent employed workers gradually becomes more similar to that <strong>of</strong> the self-employed. Thisshould not be interpreted, however, as a sign that employee status is eroding. It indicates rather thatdependent employment arrangements are adapting to new requirements.With regard to the type <strong>of</strong> contract, own-account self-employment (without employees) is obviouslyon the rise, but continues to employ only a small minority <strong>of</strong> the total labour force. The fact thatthe highest shares <strong>of</strong> own account self-employed are to be found in the less developed EU MemberStates indicates that most <strong>of</strong> these workers are in personal services and trade rather than in theknowledge economy. The share <strong>of</strong> self-employed workers who are engaged in activities which aresuitable for e-lancing is most certainly very small.There is only limited evidence that temporary work can be regarded as a first step towardsoutsourcing work to freelancers. It is being used to employ special labour market participants