2020 SOZIALPOLITIK.CH VOL. 2/2020 – ARTICLE 2.1 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18753/2297-8224-156 X Decent Work Revisited – Effects, Implications, and Limits of the Concept Twenty Years Onwards Monica BUDOWSKI 1 , Nina JANY 2 , Sebastian SCHIEF 3 University of Fribourg Dear Readers, Since the International Labour Organisation (ILO) launched the Decent Work Agenda about two decades ago (ILO 1999), the ILO, its member countries and partner organizations have been mainstreaming it. Globalization and the acceleration of transnationalization processes, digitalization and financialization, flexible working hours and the weakening of employment standards and labor organizations represent important challenges to this agenda. The pressure that the omnipresent buzzword of competitiveness has created, has led – amongst many other effects – towards benchmarking procedures and outcomes that in turn have increased pressure on workers and affected working environments. To date, there are still many areas of the world of work (regional, sectoral) where working conditions are far from the ideal of Decent Work. The present issue of socialpolicy.ch is the result of a workshop held at the University of Fribourg/Switzerland in November 2019. 4 It aims at giving insight into some currently debated topics and questions linked to the decent work concept. In order to place the contributions of this issue into the broader context of the decent work concept, we introduce the concept by briefly outlining its origins, normative bases, application levels, and actors eligible to promote it. In a next step, we present how decent work could be used as an organizing tool, especially for trade unions. After discussing the implications of digitalization on the concept of decent work, we reflect on its meaning in the context of care work and gender relations. We conclude that the decent work concept should be integrated into a broader perspective where it relates to questions of decent care work and a decent life. 1 Prof. Dr. Monica Budowski (monica.budowski@unifr.ch) is a professor in the Department of Social Policy, Social Work and Global Development at the University of Fribourg/Switzerland. 2 Nina Jany (nina.jany@unifr.ch) is a doctoral researcher in the Department of Social Policy, Social Work and Global De- velopment at the University of Fribourg/Switzerland. 3 Dr. Sebastian Schief (sebastian.schief@unifr.ch) is a senior lecturer in the Department of Social Policy, Social Work and Global Development at the University of Fribourg/Switzerland. 4 We would like to thank all the participants of the workshop for the fruitful collaboration. We are also grateful to the Swiss National Science Foundation for supporting the workshop and this special issue financially (Grant no. 184367).