Search Results

Chapter 2 discusses the characteristics of and the relationship between European and local social and employment policies. It starts with an overview on EU cohesion policy and characterises the ESF as a specific governance tool which nowadays combines financial, programmatic and procedural aspects in a unique manner. In a second step, the chapter discusses the crucial role of the local level in current activation policies. Chapter 2 argues that the local level deserves specific attention and should not be subsumed under national welfare systems. Furthermore, the streamlined EU cohesion policy and particularly the ESF establish a stronger direct link between the European and the local level and confront local actors with new opportunities and challenges.

This chapter sets the scene for the later contributions to the book, which is divided into two main parts. The first part addresses a wide range of concepts and debates about women and employment, seeking to ‘make the connections’ between different policy fields relevant to women's labour-market situation, and to take into account the most important structural features shaping the way labour markets are changing and developing. The second concentrates on the Gender and Employment in Local Labour Market (GELLM) research evidence in new ways. This book generally aims to highlight the disadvantage that women face within their local labour markets, and to show how policy, in a range of different spheres, contributes to and deepens that disadvantage, and to draw attention to some of the ways in which that situation could be changed. Finally, an overview of the chapters included in the book is provided.

This chapter begins with a discussion and vast review of the broad conceptual themes—these include an engagement with ‘globalization and labour’ as the major thematic pillar, with a special focus on globalization, gender, and work. The chapter then moves to the issues of workers’ agency in a capitalist landscape, presenting an alternative way of examining work and employment practices, addressing the issue of the spatiality of work and bringing geography into focus. Providing a fresh understanding to this interface by means of building geographical awareness and insights into the world of work, this chapter outlines the necessary theoretical tools in geography that assist in studying work, employment, and society. Whilst maintaining the discussion on labour geography as the core of this chapter, it also visits a few alternative frameworks eschewed in favour of this approach.

This chapter analyzes community ecology and crime, and addresses questions of how the work and school experiences of residents are conditioned by the characteristics of the neighborhoods and local labor markets in which they live. The rates for the most serious common crimes are higher in poorer neighborhoods than in those where more financially comfortable people live. This is in part because individuals from poor families are more likely to commit some types of serious crimes. Until the economic crisis of 2008, as the United States became more of a postindustrial economy, there were not as many unemployed people. Now the unemployed and underemployed ranks have increased substantially, and as those people look about them, they see others doing very well instead of seeing those in the broader society suffering along with them.

This concluding chapter provides suggestions, speculates on policies that might mitigate the problems described in the previous chapters, and considers new directions for research. It draws from the author's experience living in two cities: Pittsburgh and Seattle. From being a major industrial city in the early twentieth century, Pittsburgh struggles due to the decline of the American industrial sector which has led to an increase in homicide and gang violence. On the other hand, crime rates in Seattle are significantly lower. This can be traced to the city being a “twenty-first century industry town” and through the educational, racial, and ethnic composition of the city's residents, and importantly to the nature of the local labor market. Both cities, however, are creating new generations of criminals because much of the adult population is marginalized in the labor market and too many children are marginalized from school.