L’irresistibile ascesa degli stage e le sue conseguenze

From a historical point of view, job insecurity is a structural feature of the wage condition. The uninterrupted growth and the increasing stabilisation of the working conditions that the West experienced between the ’50s to the ’70s of the twentieth century are an exception limited in space and time. The neoliberal globalisation has put an end to this ‘exceptional period’ and the policies adopted to counteract the effects of the crisis erupted in 2008 are bringing out new forms of precariousness, including internships and job placements. This paper analyses the policies adopted by the European Union within the education and vocational training field since the second half of the ’90s and demonstrates how these policies have led to a real explosion of the internships phenomenon, especially after the beginning of the crisis in 2008. Moreover, it shows how the internships have contributed to devalue the workforce as a whole through the dissemination of new forms of precariousness based on unpaid work.