The article aims to systematize and discuss the concept of outsourcing in Brazilian research, seeking to create a dialogue between the different disciplinary areas of studies, as well as indicating the different levels of abstraction of the concept. It starts from a broader and more structural definition of the place of outsourcing in contemporary capitalism, discussing the different forms of outsourcing, revealed by empirical studies, in order to, from them, present some operational concepts, especially in the legal field. In addition to the conceptual questioning, a proposal is presented to create a qualitative methodology for the construction of indicators that allow for dimensioning outsourcing, taking as “raw data” the results of empirical research carried out in the country.
Outsourcing; Concept; Indicators