I danni alla sfera interiore (anche oltre la malattia), tra fattori organizzativi e fattori ambientali

Abstract

The article examines the protection against harm affecting the worker’s inner sphere, moving from organisational risk factors (mobbing, straining, and related phenomena) to environmental ones, in light of Grosseto Labour Court judgment No. 46/2025 concerning “anticipatory anxiety” arising from asbestos exposure. The analysis shows that, although case law fully recognises the compensability of non-pathological inner suffering, it tends to seek evidence of such suffering in the very same clinical indicators that foreshadow the onset of illness, according to a “degenerative” approach rooted in constitutional case law. This results in undue relevance being attached to the individual’s capacity to cope when determining whether compensation is due, as well as in the risk that legal protection may come too late, once the harm has already developed into a pathological condition. Without relaxing the thresholds governing compensation for non-pecuniary damage, the article argues that the inferential reasoning used to establish such damage should instead be based on non-clinical presumptive evidence relating to the seriousness of the harmful conduct and the individual’s lived experience.