Andrew Ross
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814776292
- eISBN:
- 9780814777398
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814776292.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Cultural Studies
Is job insecurity the new norm? With fewer and fewer people working in steady, long-term positions for one employer, has the dream of a secure job with full benefits and a decent salary become just ...
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Is job insecurity the new norm? With fewer and fewer people working in steady, long-term positions for one employer, has the dream of a secure job with full benefits and a decent salary become just that—a dream? This book surveys the new topography of the global workplace and finds an emerging pattern of labor instability and uneven development on a massive scale. It looks at what the new landscape of contingent employment means for workers across national, class, and racial lines—from the emerging “creative class” of high-wage professionals to the multitudes of temporary, migrant, or low-wage workers. Developing the idea of “precarious livelihoods” to describe this new world of work and life, the book explores what it means in developed nations—comparing the creative industry policies of the United States, United Kingdom, and European Union, as well as developing countries—by examining the quickfire transformation of China's labor market. It also responds to the challenge of sustainability, assessing the promise of “green jobs” through restorative alliances between labor advocates and environmentalists. The book argues that regardless of one's views on labor rights, globalization, and quality of life, this new precarious and “indefinite life,” and the pitfalls and opportunities that accompany it is likely here to stay and must be addressed in a systematic way. A more equitable kind of knowledge society emerges in these pages—less skewed toward flexploitation and the speculative beneficiaries of intellectual property, and more in tune with ideals and practices that are fair, just, and renewable.Less
Is job insecurity the new norm? With fewer and fewer people working in steady, long-term positions for one employer, has the dream of a secure job with full benefits and a decent salary become just that—a dream? This book surveys the new topography of the global workplace and finds an emerging pattern of labor instability and uneven development on a massive scale. It looks at what the new landscape of contingent employment means for workers across national, class, and racial lines—from the emerging “creative class” of high-wage professionals to the multitudes of temporary, migrant, or low-wage workers. Developing the idea of “precarious livelihoods” to describe this new world of work and life, the book explores what it means in developed nations—comparing the creative industry policies of the United States, United Kingdom, and European Union, as well as developing countries—by examining the quickfire transformation of China's labor market. It also responds to the challenge of sustainability, assessing the promise of “green jobs” through restorative alliances between labor advocates and environmentalists. The book argues that regardless of one's views on labor rights, globalization, and quality of life, this new precarious and “indefinite life,” and the pitfalls and opportunities that accompany it is likely here to stay and must be addressed in a systematic way. A more equitable kind of knowledge society emerges in these pages—less skewed toward flexploitation and the speculative beneficiaries of intellectual property, and more in tune with ideals and practices that are fair, just, and renewable.
Andrew Ross
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814776292
- eISBN:
- 9780814777398
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814776292.003.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Cultural Studies
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the emerging pattern of labor instability in the changing global marketplace. In the modern era, mass migration to cities and manufacturing zones was ...
More
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the emerging pattern of labor instability in the changing global marketplace. In the modern era, mass migration to cities and manufacturing zones was and still is a monumental geographical process, disrupting or reinventing ways of life and fabricating the vast new urban spaces where half of the world's populations currently secures a livelihood. Indeed, today's livelihoods are pursued on economic ground that shifts rapidly and not one, not even those in the traditional professions, can any longer expect a fixed pattern of employment in the course of their lifetime. Moreover, the last three decades of deregulation and privatization have reshaped the geography of livelihoods for almost everyone in the industrialized world, and for a large percentage of the population in developing countries.Less
This introductory chapter provides an overview of the emerging pattern of labor instability in the changing global marketplace. In the modern era, mass migration to cities and manufacturing zones was and still is a monumental geographical process, disrupting or reinventing ways of life and fabricating the vast new urban spaces where half of the world's populations currently secures a livelihood. Indeed, today's livelihoods are pursued on economic ground that shifts rapidly and not one, not even those in the traditional professions, can any longer expect a fixed pattern of employment in the course of their lifetime. Moreover, the last three decades of deregulation and privatization have reshaped the geography of livelihoods for almost everyone in the industrialized world, and for a large percentage of the population in developing countries.
