Work-to-rule (also known as an Italian strike, in Italian: Sciopero bianco, or slowdown in US usage) is a job action in which employees do no more than the minimum required by the rules of their contract or job, and strictly follow time-consuming rules normally not enforced. This may cause a slowdown or decrease in productivity if the employer does not hire enough employees or pay the appropriate salary and as such does not have the requirements needed to run at the level they desire. It is a form of protest against low pay and poor working conditions, and is considered less disruptive than a strike or lockout as obeying the rules is not susceptible to disciplinary action or loss of pay. In practice there may be ambiguous conditions, for example a contract that requires working additional hours when necessary, or a requirement to work to operational requirements. In such cases workers have been recommended to ask for a written direction to carry out the work, which can be used as evidence if necessary. Applications Quiet quitting Quiet quitting is an application of work-to-rule. Despite the name, the philosophy of quiet quitting is not connected to quitting a job outright, but rather, employees avoid going above and beyond at work by doing the bare minimum required and engage in work-related activities solely within defined work hours. Proponents of quiet quitting also refer to it as acting your wage or calibrated contributing, and say that the goal of quiet quitting is not to disrupt the workplace, but to avoid occupational burnout and to improve work-life balance. There are no verifiable sources as to who coined the phrase, but it was thought to be inspired by the tang ping ("lying flat") movement that began in April 2021 on Chinese Internet social networks and became a buzzword on Sina Weibo. Later that year, Chinese Internet users combined tang ping with involution, a process researched by American anthropologist Clifford Geertz in his 1963 book, Agricultural Involution. The book gained attention in the late 1980's from social sciences research about China which led to the term, "involution," gaining great attention in China. In 2020, "involution" became one of the most commonly used words on Chinese-language media, where it is used to describe the feeling of exhaustion in an overly competitive society. After tang ping became a buzzword and inspired numerous Internet memes, business magazine ABC Money