Informed, active, empowered: research into workers’ information literacy in the context of rights at work

Abstract

The paper reports the findings of research into information literacy in the context of workers’ rights in Croatia. It analyses workers’ information behaviour and the ways in which they obtain and use information to seek the protection of their rights. The paper aims to map out a new research framework for information literacy situated at the junction of workplace and critical information literacy. Quantitative data were collected by an online questionnaire with 50 primarily close-ended questions on a nationally representative sample of N=500 employed workers. Quantitative analysis was carried out on the data employing SPSS and Excel. Higher levels of being informed and information competences, and active information behaviour, lead to less frequent violations of workers’ rights and to a greater readiness to seek the protection of, and fight for, those rights. The findings confirm the importance of information literacy in the prevention of violations of rights and in mounting effective opposition when these occur, and in the empowerment of workers to seek their protection and improvement. The results allow further delineation of the information literacy practices of workers. The paper brings the first attempt to look into the prospect of the critical workplace information literacy construct.