Arab Reform Initiative مبادرة الإصلاح العربي - 61d ago

This panel will analyze the labor market disruptions and opportunities arising from digitalization and the enlargement of the digital economy. From automation and AI to platform-based and gig work, digitalization is reshaping employment relations and labor market choices and dynamics. Vulnerable groups, such as agricultural workers, underprivileged women, persons with disabilities, migrants, and rural communities, face higher barriers to access digital infrastructure and skills. Panelists will explore how these changes interact with the green/ energy transition and neoliberal policies, contributing to increased precarity, informality and non-standard forms of work, and weakening social protection systems and their financing models. They will propose ways to counter the anticipated socioeconomic impact of rapid digital transformations through more inclusive and equitable social protection. Moderator: Samir Nassar, Project Manager – Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at AUB Speakers: Shady ElBassouni, Associate Professor of Computer Science, AUB Farah Al Shami, Senior Fellow and Social Protection Program Director, ARI Lena Simet, Senior Researcher and Advocate, Poverty and Inequality, HRW