IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/bla/indrel/v57y2026i3p232-243.html

Building Legitimacy in the UK Platform Economy: Representative Strategies of Independent and Mainstream Trade Unions

Author

Listed:
  • Mathew Johnson
  • Morgan Rhys Powell
  • Eva Herman

Abstract

In this paper we explore the representative strategies of different trade unions within the UK platform economy, and the efforts to build legitimacy among a disparate workforce. Using data from multiple in‐depth research projects, we find that independent unions and self‐organised groups are competing to build representative claims from the ground up by identifying, amplifying, and acting upon shared grievances rooted in the labour process of platform work. In contrast, traditional unions largely rely on incorporating platform workers into representative structures through formal union membership, recognition agreements, and collective bargaining mechanisms. We argue that while there are differences between labour movement actors in terms of representative strategies, the declining power and legitimacy of the labour movement as a whole means that there remain persistent representation gaps which leave many without a meaningful voice in negotiations with employers and the state.

Suggested Citation

  • Mathew Johnson & Morgan Rhys Powell & Eva Herman, 2026. "Building Legitimacy in the UK Platform Economy: Representative Strategies of Independent and Mainstream Trade Unions," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(3), pages 232-243, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:indrel:v:57:y:2026:i:3:p:232-243
    DOI: 10.1111/irj.70029
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/irj.70029
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1111/irj.70029?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Paolo Borghi & Annalisa Murgia & Mathilde Mondon-Navazo & Petr Mezihorak, 2021. "Mind the gap between discourses and practices: Platform workers’ representation in France and Italy," European Journal of Industrial Relations, , vol. 27(4), pages 425-443, December.
    2. Tessa Wright & Sian Moore & Phil Taylor, 2023. "Union Equality Structures and the Challenge of Democratic Legitimacy: The Case of the Fire Brigades Union," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 37(5), pages 1339-1358, October.
    3. Davide Però, 2020. "Indie Unions, Organizing and Labour Renewal: Learning from Precarious Migrant Workers," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 34(5), pages 900-918, October.
    4. Heiland, Heiner, 2020. "Workers' Voice in platform labour: An Overview," WSI Studies 21, The Institute of Economic and Social Research (WSI), Hans Böckler Foundation.
    5. Jonas Tallberg & Michael Zürn, 2019. "The legitimacy and legitimation of international organizations: introduction and framework," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 14(4), pages 581-606, December.
    6. Alessio Bertolini & Ruth Dukes, 2021. "Trade Unions and Platform Workers in the UK: Worker Representation in the Shadow of the Law," Industrial Law Journal, Industrial Law Society, vol. 50(4), pages 662-688.
    7. Melanie Simms, 2015. "Accounting for Greenfield Union Organizing Outcomes," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 53(3), pages 397-422, September.
    8. Gwyneth Pitt, 2024. "‘The Simple Things You See Are All Complicated’: Thoughts on Deliveroo1," Industrial Law Journal, Industrial Law Society, vol. 53(4), pages 784-795.
    9. Dominika Polkowska, 2021. "Unionisation and mobilisation within platform work: towards precarisation—a case of Uber drivers in Poland," Industrial Relations Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(1), pages 25-39, January.
    10. Chris F. Wright & Colm McLaughlin, 2021. "Trade Union Legitimacy and Legitimation Politics in Australia and New Zealand," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(3), pages 338-369, July.
    11. Christian Dufour & Adelheid Hege, 2010. "The legitimacy of collective actors and trade union renewal," Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research, , vol. 16(3), pages 351-367, August.
    12. Scharpf, Fritz Wilhelm, 2009. "Legitimacy in the multilevel European polity," MPIfG Working Paper 09/1, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies.
    13. Zoe Adams, 2023. "Legal Mobilisations, Trade Unions and Radical Social Change: A Case Study of the IWGB," Industrial Law Journal, Industrial Law Society, vol. 52(3), pages 560-594.
    14. Virginia Doellgast & Matthew Bidwell & Alexander J. S. Colvin, 2021. "New Directions in Employment Relations Theory: Understanding Fragmentation, Identity, and Legitimacy," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 74(3), pages 555-579, May.
    15. Mansbridge, Jane, 2011. "Clarifying the Concept of Representation," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 105(3), pages 621-630, August.
    16. Reinecke, Juliane & Donaghey, Jimmy, 2022. "Transnational Representation in Global Labour Governance and the Politics of Input Legitimacy," Business Ethics Quarterly, Cambridge University Press, vol. 32(3), pages 438-474, July.
    17. Nicholas Martindale & Alex J. Wood & Brendan J. Burchell, 2024. "What do platform workers in the UK gig economy want?," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 62(3), pages 542-567, September.
    18. Pedro Mendonça & Nadia K Kougiannou, 2025. "‘We Are Not All the Same’: The Capacity of Different Groups of Food Delivery Gig Workers to Build Collective and Individual Power Resources," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 39(2), pages 311-335, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Andrew DA Smith & Kevin D Tennent, 2025. "The employee representation plan movement in the United States 1913–1935: The attempted legitimation of novel organizational forms," Economic and Industrial Democracy, Department of Economic History, Uppsala University, Sweden, vol. 46(4), pages 1135-1163, November.
    2. Mathew Johnson & Eva Herman, 2024. "Out with the old, in with the new? Institutional experimentation and decent work in the UK," Economic and Industrial Democracy, Department of Economic History, Uppsala University, Sweden, vol. 45(4), pages 1137-1157, November.
    3. Martin B. Carstensen & Christian Lyhne Ibsen & Vivien A. Schmidt, 2022. "Ideas and power in employment relations studies," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 61(1), pages 3-21, January.
    4. Elisabeth Bethge, 2025. "Voices Beyond the Road: Comparison of Online Employee Voice in Traditional Transport and the Ride-Sharing Industry," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 39(6), pages 1303-1328, December.
    5. Bjarke Refslund, 2025. "Theorizing collective action—Instrumental collectivism as a key concept for explaining workplace collective action," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 64(2), pages 229-245, April.
    6. Julia Gray, 2024. "The life cycle of international cooperation: Introduction to the special issue," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 19(4), pages 641-664, October.
    7. Catherine E De Vries & Simon Hix & Miriam Sorace, 2025. "Reforming supranational institutions: Insights from a conjoint experiment in 16 countries," European Union Politics, , vol. 26(4), pages 649-666, December.
    8. Ewen, Janis & Heiland, Heiner & Seeliger, Martin, 2022. "Dynamiken autonomer Arbeitskonflikte im digitalen Kapitalismus: Der Fall "Gorillas"," Schriftenreihe Institut Arbeit und Wirtschaft 33/2022, Institut Arbeit und Wirtschaft (IAW), Universität Bremen und Arbeitnehmerkammer Bremen.
    9. Alexander Kentikelenis & Erik Voeten, 2021. "Legitimacy challenges to the liberal world order: Evidence from United Nations speeches, 1970–2018," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 16(4), pages 721-754, October.
    10. Felicity Vabulas, 2020. "Christian Kreuder-Sonnen. 2019. Emergency Powers of International Organizations: Between Normalization and Containment. (Oxford: Oxford University Press)," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 15(4), pages 969-973, October.
    11. Sara Maric & Elke S. Schuessler & Laura Thäter, 2025. "Neither Employment nor Self‐Employment: Avenues Towards Functional Platform‐Mediated Work Systems," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 63(2), pages 287-304, June.
    12. Greg Chih-Hsin Sheen & Hans H. Tung & Chien-Huei Wu & Wen-Chin Wu, 2023. "WHO approves? Relative trust, the WHO, and China’s COVID-19 vaccines," The Review of International Organizations, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 499-521, July.
    13. Cynthia Couette, 2024. "Epistemic competition in global governance: The case of pharmaceutical patents," Global Policy, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 15(3), pages 516-527, June.
    14. Philipp Harms & Claudia Landwehr, 2017. "Preferences for direct democracy: intrinsic or instrumental? Evidence from a survey experiment," Working Papers 1719, Gutenberg School of Management and Economics, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz.
    15. Rotte, Ralph & Alberty, Victoria & Dürholt, Andreas & Geiser, René, 2026. "Safeguards, Strategic Behavior, and Great Power Competition: The IAEA’s Board of Governors as an Instrument of Leverage for Potential Non- Compliers," SocArXiv kpx45_v2, Center for Open Science.
    16. Heiland, Heiner & Seeliger, Martin, 2022. "Betriebliche Öffentlichkeiten im Strukturwandel als Ausgangspunkt einer Demokratisierung der Arbeit?," Schriftenreihe Institut Arbeit und Wirtschaft 39/2022, Institut Arbeit und Wirtschaft (IAW), Universität Bremen und Arbeitnehmerkammer Bremen.
    17. Graham, Mark & Alyanak, Oğuz & Bertolini, Alessio & Feuerstein, Patrick & Kuttler, Tobias & Ustek Spilda, Funda & Valente, Jonas, 2025. "Pressure and praise as an action research methodology: The case of Fairwork," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, issue OnlineFir, pages 1-15.
    18. Petia Kostadinova, 2015. "Improving the Transparency and Accountability of EU Institutions: The Impact of the Office of the European Ombudsman," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 53(5), pages 1077-1093, September.
    19. Marco Marrone & Paolo Borghi, 2023. "Ai margini del sindacato, il sindacato nei margini: democratizzazione, demercificazione e disinquinamento tra alleanze possibili e nuove pratiche," ECONOMIA E SOCIET? REGIONALE, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2023(3), pages 35-52.
    20. Niedziałkowski, Krzysztof & Shkaruba, Anton, 2018. "Governance and legitimacy of the Forest Stewardship Council certification in the national contexts – A comparative study of Belarus and Poland," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 97(C), pages 180-188.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bla:indrel:v:57:y:2026:i:3:p:232-243. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0019-8692 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.