-الخلاصة:

• الخلفية والأساس المنطقي:

في الدول الأفريقية، تشكل الحصة من التوظيف غير الرسمي نسبة عالية جداً من إجمالي العمالة. تتراوح هذه النسبة من 40.2% في جنوب أفريقيا إلى 67.3% في شمال أفريقيا، وأكثر من 90% في وسط أفريقيا وشرقها وغربها. ومع ذلك، فإنها تتوافق مع مجموعة متنوعة من الحالات التي تميل استخدام مفهوم الغير الرسمية إلى محوها إلى حد كبير. تحت تسمية الغير الرسمية يتم بالتالي تضمين كل من حالات العمل التابع أو المستقل غير المعلن، والأنشطة التي قد تأتي تحت أشكال التعاون، أو حتى تكون محكومة بالعرف أو بالمساعدة المتبادلة العائلية. الفضيلة الإحصائية لمفهوم الغير الرسمية محدودة في هذا الصدد. فهو لا ينجح في الإمساك بتنوع الأشكال القياسية التي تمكن الفاعلين من تأهيل وتنسيق أنشطتهم. إشارة إلى العمل غير الرسمي كانت قد نشرت جزئياً بواسطة مكتب العمل الدولي (ILO). وقد قام حتى بتعزيزها لفترة، لا سيما من خلال النقاش حول سياسات التنمية ونشر تقرير بعثة متعددة التخصصات حول التوظيف في كينيا في عام 1972 (ILO، التوظيف، الدخل والمساواة: استراتيجية لزيادة التوظيف الإنتاجي في كينيا، جنيف، 1972). تحليل منظمة العمل الدولية (ILO) الآن أصبح أكثر نقداً بكثير. القرار المتعلق بالعمل اللائق والاقتصاد غير الرسمي الذي اعتمده المؤتمر الدولي للعمل في دورته الـ 90 في عام 2002 يمثل نقطة تحول في هذا الصدد. في اعتماد التوصية 204 في عام 2015، شددت الILO على أن حجم الاقتصاد غير الرسمي، بجميع أشكاله، يشكل عقبة كبيرة أمام حقوق العمال، بما في ذلك المبادئ الأساسية والحقوق في العمل، الحماية الاجتماعية، ظروف العمل اللائقة، التطوير الشامل وسيادة القانون، وله تأثير سلبي على تطوير المؤسسات المستدامة، والإيرادات العامة، ومجال عمل الدولة، لا سيما فيما يتعلق بالسياسات الاقتصادية والاجتماعية والبيئية، فضلاً عن سلامة المؤسسات والمنافسة العادلة في الأسواق الوطنية والدولية (توصية الILO رقم 204 بشأن الانتقال من الاقتصاد غير الرسمي إلى الاقتصاد الرسمي، اعتمدت من قبل المؤتمر الدولي للعمل في دورته الـ 104 في 12 يونيو 2015 في جنيف). تفترض الILO أن الانتقال من الاقتصاد غير الرسمي إلى الاقتصاد الرسمي ضروري لتحقيق التطوير الشامل والعمل اللائق للجميع (مرجع سابق). لتحقيق هذا الانتقال، تدعو التوصية 204 الدول إلى تنفيذ استراتيجيات متكاملة ومتسقة تهدف إلى تسهيل الانتقال إلى الاقتصاد الرسمي. يجب أن يكون تنفيذ هذه السياسات المتكاملة مدعوماً بـ عمليات تفتيش عمل فعالة وكفؤة. تجعل التوصية بذلك تفتيش العمل أحد اللاعبين الرئيسيين في الانتقال إلى الرسمية. تلتزم الدول الأعضاء بـ امتلاك نظام تفتيش ملائم ومناسب، وتوسيع تغطية تفتيش العمل لتشمل جميع أماكن العمل في الاقتصاد غير الرسمي من أجل حماية العمال، وتوفير التوجيه لأجهزة إنفاذ القانون، بما في ذلك كيفية التعامل مع ظروف العمل في الاقتصاد غير الرسمي (مرجع سابق). المفتش العمالي يلعب دوراً رئيسياً هنا. وهو مفوض بمجموعة من الوظائف التي قد تؤثر على كل أو جزء من العمالة غير الرسمية: حق الزيارة والتفتيش، ودور التوفيق غير الرسمي أو الإلزامي في حالة النزاع أو الخلاف.

• Objective:

Questioning the role of labor inspectorates in the transition from informality to formality. The aim is both to gain a better understanding of the role of labor inspectors in relation to work activities in the informal economy and, at the same time, to test the solidity of the "informality" category by observing the activity of labor inspection. How can we study and account for the pluralism of normative forms characteristic of activities classified as informal? Our hypothesis is that these are revealed as soon as labour inspectorates are recognized as having a right of inspection over all or part of the activities developed in the so-called informal economy, particularly when they adopt a professional stance that is both proactive and pedagogical, but also when they are called upon to deal with industrial accidents, collective conflicts and individual disputes. In particular, we would like to study the situations in which the normative forms mobilized in the context of informal employment are put to the test of state normativity. 
The project has 3 main focuses.
The first axis aims to understand the transition policies implemented in Côte d'Ivoire and Morocco to ensure the transition from the informal to the formal economy. The aim here is to study the impact of ILO recommendations on the implementation of transition-to-formality policies within labor administrations. 
The second and third axes will deal more directly with the postures and practices of labor inspectors with regard to the informal sector. 
The second concerns the role of the labor inspectorate in monitoring compliance with labor law. To what extent can this control be applied to informal employment situations? This is obviously a complex question. It involves several levels of questioning. The first, and by no means least, concerns the competence of the labor inspectorate. To what extent are labor inspectors de jure or de facto competent to monitor or promote the rights of workers in the informal economy? Labour inspectorates' positions may vary from one country to another, but also according to the type of informality under consideration. Informal work in a declared enterprise, self-employment, customary forms of work, agricultural work... all constitute specific cases.  Over and above the question of control, the question of the competence of the labour inspectorate with regard to types of informal employment also plays an important role in workers' access to legal proceedings and to the labour judge. In Côte d'Ivoire, for example, referral to the courts is subject to prior conciliation with the labor inspectorate. It is not uncommon for the inspector to act as a filter for access to the courts, by only ruling on the condition that the employment relationship referred to him is indeed a subordinate employment relationship. Labour inspectorates often declare themselves incompetent in matters of informal employment, due to the absence of a written employment contract. More broadly, the question of the inspectorate's competence enables us to analyze the ways in which informal activities are qualified. Once they consider themselves competent, labour inspectors can adopt different approaches to atypical work situations. Is the aim to control in order to punish violations of labor legislation? On the contrary, is the role of the labor inspectorate one of prevention, or of promoting minimum protection, primarily in the field of informal employment? 
The third focus will be on the conciliation function. In both Côte d'Ivoire and Morocco, the labor inspectorate has a conciliation function in the event of individual labor disputes, as well as a mission to prevent and regulate social conflicts. This is a function of the labor inspectorate that is not entirely specific to the context of West Africa and the Maghreb. French law has also served as a model here. In Côte d'Ivoire and Morocco, however, this conciliation function is particularly important. In some cases, it even seems to replace the control function more commonly performed by the labor inspectorate. It is much more often a sitting inspection than a standing one.  In this respect, the conciliation function is ambivalent. It is obviously intended to facilitate the resolution of disputes between employers and workers through recourse to the labor inspectorate. But it can also play a role in filtering such disputes. In Côte d'Ivoire, for example, a conciliation or non-conciliation report is a necessary prerequisite for referral to the labour judge. The Labour Inspectorate's declaration of incompetence in matters of informal employment - and sometimes, even more fundamentally, the a priori assumption of incompetence - may well constitute an obstacle to referral to the judge, even though this decision of incompetence could itself be the subject of a debate before the judge. More generally, what role does the labor inspectorate play in resolving labor disputes in the informal economy? Can it play an important role through its conflict prevention, individual dispute conciliation and mediation functions? Is this a vector of transition towards formality, particularly through references to regulation/pacification solutions that refer to or take as their model standards such as representation, negotiation, collective organization, decent wages, discrimination, etc.

• Main methods: 

1. Semi-structured interviews 
   Interviews will be carried out with players involved in monitoring compliance with labor law rules, likely to shed light on the intervention of the labor inspectorate in matters of informality: labor inspector, labor director on the one hand, lawyer, members of professional organizations, as well as NGOs confronted with informal work in their actions. How is informality represented? How is the transition from the informal to the formal economy promoted by the International Labour Organization in Morocco and Côte d'Ivoire? What functions does the labor inspectorate have? How do labor inspectors perceive their role and adapt their practices to informal work situations? How do social partners, civil society players and legal professionals integrate labor inspection into their actions in relation to informality? 
   2. Document collection and analysis 
   The material here will consist of reports, documents and standards produced by the International Organization and the Moroccan and Ivorian labor administrations in connection with informality. 
   The third axis of the project will focus on the analysis of pleadings and judgments in cases dealing with informal work and involving the Labour Inspectorate at some stage of the proceedings (legal notes, evidence, legal documentation, conclusions, reports, court decisions).

-Progress:

This work involves a researcher (Laetitia Kouadio) who recently defended her doctoral thesis under a cotutorship contract UB /Université Alassane Ouattara (Bouaké, Côte d'Ivoire), under the co-direction of Jérôme Porta and Nanga Silue
The year 2023-2024 has been very fruitful for the LABIA project. In December 2023, we conducted an initial survey over a few days in Rabat and Casablanca on the activity of labor inspection. In the spring of 2024, the core team (Philippe Auvergnon, Redouane Garfaoui, Jérôme Porta, and Nanga Silué) conducted a series of interviews with several labor inspectors in Abidjan and Bouaké during two weeks. The work on drafting a research report is underway and should be completed by April. Subsequently, the aim will be to produce various publications from it on the one hand and to seek funding outside of the IPORA project (ANR, regional project) to extend this initial approach to informal labor on the other.