Abstract: Platform employment is a broad concept. What is meaningful in the discussion of labor law is the organizational platform, which has two models: a labor contract-based model and a non-labor contract-based model. The latter is the object of dispute over qualitative legal relations. However, this non-labor contract-based platform employment model differs from conventional labor relations in that there is a certain degree of platform control and labor provider autonomy in the labor process. As such, it does not meet the existing subordination standards, as the labor relationship is not established. It is classified into the category of mixed contract in civil atypical contracts under the current law. This kind of platform employment cannot be effectively adjusted under the current framework of the "labor dichotomy" of "subordinate labor-independent labor", as the rights and interests of labor providers are insufficiently protected. The cause of the problem lies in the academic positioning of labor service providers as "quasi employees", whilst the nature of such platform employment is that of the socialization of contract for work, which is an institutional blank area under the "labor dichotomy". Therefore, in light of the necessity of social protection for labor providers in this kind of platform employment, a normative system of "quasi employees" between the civil law and the labor law should be constructed to promote the transition of the legal framework for adjusting social labor payment from one based on "labor dichotomy" to one based on "labor trichotomy".

Keywords: platform employment; labor relations; quasi employee; subordination

The author of this article is an associate research fellow at and the deputy head of the Social Law Department of Institute of Law, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. This article is published in Journal of China University of Labor Relations 4 (2020).