4차 산업혁명과 노동법의 과제

The Fourth Industrial Revolution or the Digital Revolution is changing the basic conditions and contents of human labor. It has long been common practice to provide labor from anywhere and to connect with companies outside of traditional working hours. The promotion of labor flexibility and job mobility is the central topics of modern labor law and labor policy. Labor laws should not miss the connecting factors with technological and social progress. To do this, we need to revise the structure of the labor law, which is based on the existing industrialization stage. For example, the working hours system of the Labor Standards Act needs to be revised toward the way that reflects the reality of living relationships and raises autonomy. Enterprises and workers need to have the possibility of flexibly forming work places and hours because it is needless to relax regulations in public law. Labor law presupposes the public order model of a modern society that aims for civil society. It should be developed in the direction of securing autonomy and participation of individual workers as a member of civil society, away from the class thinking of the nineteenth century. The Fourth Industrial Revolution is making an important contribution to reviewing the role of labor law in civil society and seeking a new direction. Labor law experts should not underestimate the challenge to the labor laws caused by the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The labor law should be angled towards the level of technological and economic developments. Otherwise, the system of labor law will become fundamentally threatened.