An Odd-Jobs Republic. The 2025 Referendum in Italy and the Long Decline of Labour Rights

The referendum held in Italy on 8-9 June 2025, backed by trade unions and the centre-left, and widely covered by the international press, aimed to firmly reintroduce the topic of labour and job insecurity (precarietà) into the political debate and to mobilise citizens around it. The proposed questions, concerning dismissals, fixed-term contracts, protections in small enterprises, and workplace safety, sought to reignite collective attention on employment issues which, in recent years, had lost both urgency and centrality. Despite these intentions, the outcome was disappointing: with turnout just above 30%, the quorum was not reached, marking a clear defeat for the promoters.
The very need to resort to a referendum on a topic such as labour policy already reflects the fragility of the Italian labour landscape, which has struggled for decades to make itself heard through more direct means such as collective bargaining, strikes, or grassroots pressure. Moreover, by shifting the conflict between capital and labour from the social to the political arena, a profound imbalance of power has emerged, one that has in fact been ongoing for decades. A crucial moment in this regard was the 1985 referendum on the sliding wage scale (scala mobile), which came, not by coincidence, at the close of an era, the 1970s, in which the trade union movement had dominated the political scene.
Job insecurity (precarietà) in Italy is anything but new; it has become a long-term structural condition resulting from a historical, political, and legal process that has profoundly reshaped the country’s employment structure. From the 1970s onward, the Italian production system began undergoing major transformations due to the crisis of the Fordist model, deindustrialisation, and the growing shift toward a service-based economy. This led to a decline in stable employment within the industrial sector and a rise in more flexible (and often less protected) forms of work. Starting in the 1980s, labour policies began to prioritise flexibility, with the stated goal of addressing youth unemployment and easing labour market entry. Flexibility thus became the dominant paradigm of labour law reforms. The introduction of non-standard employment contracts (such as fixed-term, part-time, training-employment contracts, and solidarity contracts) was justified by the need to respond to the changing needs of businesses and to the increasing mobility of the workforce, and these contracts were the direct implementation of this logic.
A fundamental step in this process came with the introduction of the “Treu Package” (Pacchetto Treu) in 1997, which officially introduced temporary agency work (lavoro interinale or somministrato) and coordinated and continuous collaboration contracts (co.co.co) into the Italian system. This marked a turning point in labour law, signalling the beginning of the spread of atypical and unstable forms of employment, which would later become the standard. Tiziano Treu, who advocated for a balance between flexibility and security, justified the reform as a means of increasing employment. In practice, however, job stability began to weaken structurally. The process of legal precarisation accelerated with the Biagi Law (2003), which was based on Marco Biagi’s “White Paper”. This reform expanded the range of contract types (on-call work, job sharing, occasional work, and professional apprenticeships) and restructured employment services, opening the job-matching market to private actors. While Biagi maintained that flexibility should go hand in hand with new forms of protection, in reality the reform resulted in a surge of precarious contracts, particularly among younger workers.
Precariousness (precarietà) was not merely a side effect of these reforms, but often a direct consequence of deliberate legislative choices. The new types of contract allowed companies to reduce labour costs but weakened workers’ bargaining power. Work became fragmented, unequal, and discontinuous, making it difficult to build solid professional careers. Furthermore, the weakening of Article 18, culminating in the Jobs Act of 2014-2015, marked the definitive erosion of one of the key protections for employees in Italy (Betti 2019).
Labour law scholars played a key role in this process. From the 1980s onwards, figures such as Gino Giugni, Tiziano Treu, Pietro Ichino, and Marco Biagi contributed significantly to shaping these reforms. They advocated for a revision of labour law based on greater flexibility, emphasising the need to move beyond rigid categories of subordinate employment and to recognise the diversity of modern work forms. Although their vision was driven by a modernising impulse, it often led, in practice, to a real reduction in collective protections. These scholars framed flexibility as a necessary response to the crisis of the traditional industrial model and the emergence of a knowledge-based economy. Biagi, for instance, promoted “employability” and “adaptability” as new foundational principles. However, the shift from job-based to person-based social protection did not translate into adequate welfare policies or lifelong learning systems.
The idea of “protected” flexibility (flessibilità protetta) largely remained theoretical, particularly after the social-democratic left fully embraced the flexibility paradigm. Despite a rhetorical emphasis on rights, labour policy continued along the trajectory set by previous reforms. The language changed, but the approach remained similar: promoting individual autonomy, encouraging occupational mobility, and placing less emphasis on protecting traditional forms of employment.
The precarisation (precarizzazione) of work in Italy has not simply been the result of economic evolution, but the outcome of deliberate legislative choices, underpinned by a legal and political culture that has deeply redefined the role of labour in society. The referendum results clearly reflected this.
Far from being a neutral tool, flexibility has been the keystone of a new labour market order, characterised by instability, inequality, and a weakening of social cohesion (Musso 2011). This was also evident in the 2025 referendum through the link between the four labour-related questions and the fifth on citizenship, a fundamental pillar of the constitutional project of a Republic “founded on labour”. As historian Michele Colucci (2025) notes, the idea that work is not only a means of earning a living but also a way of participating in the community has been definitively set aside. In its place is the notion of a Republic founded on “odd jobs” (lavoretti) (Staglianò 2018), in which work has lost its value, continuity, and dignity. The weakening of this connection is especially significant in relation to migrant workers, who often find themselves in precarious conditions: active in the labour market, but excluded from the rights that define citizenship. To recognise the value of labour also means to make citizenship a reality for all, starting with those who have historically been marginalised.
After years of eroded labour rights, increasingly limited protections, a worrying rise in workplace accidents, and a crisis in the collective and emancipatory dimension of work, the referendum could have represented a new beginning: an opportunity to bring labour in all its forms back to the heart of politics. The failure to reach the quorum, however, underscored how difficult it has become to mobilise society in defence of workers’ rights and protections. Undoubtedly, there were contradictions in how the left and trade unions handled the referendum, avoiding direct acknowledgment of their own roles in the precarisation process. Yet, despite years marked by fatal accidents, layoffs, and wage support schemes, the “call to arms” (chiamata alle armi) did not elicit a response, not even one strong enough to meet the 50% quorum. This, even months later, remains a matter for serious reflection.
References:
- Eloisa Betti, Precari e precarie. Una storia dell’Italia repubblicana, Roma 2019.
- Michele Colucci, Sulla stessa barca: lavoro e cittadinanza, una storia comune, 30 maggio 2025, in https://fondazionefeltrinelli.it/pubblico/sulla-stessa-barca-lavoro-e-cittadinanza-una-storia-comune/.
- Stefano Musso, Storia del lavoro in Italia. Dall’unità a oggi, Venezia 20112.
- Riccardo Staglianò, Lavoretti. Così la sharing economy ci rende tutti più poveri, Torino 2018.
OpenEdition schlägt Ihnen vor, diesen Beitrag wie folgt zu zitieren:
Jacopo Ciammariconi (7. August 2025). An Odd-Jobs Republic. The 2025 Referendum in Italy and the Long Decline of Labour Rights. TrIBES. Abgerufen am 15. Dezember 2025 von https://doi.org/10.58079/14gue
