This paper aims to discussing the relation between the protection of safety and well-being at work and the conceptions of organization adopted in the legal system, claiming that safety rules in force are not suited for the aims they should serve. To this purpose, the paper shows that: a) both interdisciplinary knowledge on well-being at work and the fundamental principles of international legal order recommend the adoption of primary prevention approach, i.e. the building of intrinsically risk-free work processes; b) nonetheless, in order for a primary prevention approach to be actually adopted, the organization should be conceived as a process of actions and decision always adjustable, rather than as a given and steady entity; c) in Italian legal order, the adoption of a conception of organization as a process of decisions and actions is currently frustrated both by a "traditional" conception of organization as the entrepreneur’s private domain and by a recent decline of general categories of work regulation. It follows that a primary prevention approach is still far to be completely adopted in Italian legislation on safety and well-being at work.
Keywords: Safety at work, regulation, labour law, organization, prevention, well-being