The millions of farm workers in the Global South are an important resource for smallholder producers. However, research on their labour organisation is limited. This article focuses on smallholder farm workers in Ghana’s cocoa sector, drawing on insights from qualitative interviews and the concept of bargaining power. We review the labour relations and working conditions of two historical and informally identified labour supply setups (LSSs) in Ghana’s cocoa sector, namely, hired labour and Abusa, a form (...) of landowner–caretaker relations, and identify an imbalance of horizontal power. Further, we analyse the labour relations and working conditions of an emerging and formal LSS in Ghana’s cocoa sector: private labour providers (PLPs). We argue that PLPs are likely to address the imbalance of horizontal power between farm workers and smallholders and bring about significant improvements in the working conditions of farm workers. We also assess the sustainability potential and limitations of PLPs and argue that tensions exist. We contribute to the growing horizontal power perspective by providing avenues for research and policy related to promoting sustained labour rights for farm workers in smallholder agriculture in the Global South. (shrink)

Textual exegesis is used to show that Marx's concept of social labor is transhistorical, referring to a collective activity of humans as a species. The collective nature of labor is suspended in capitalist production because of the anarchic character of market relations. But the suspension is skin deep: The sociality of labor asserts itself in a mediated manner through the alienated empowerment of goods with value. This is commodity fetishism, which vanishes when relations of production become actually (...) collective?matching the transhistorical essence of labor. Marx's concept of social labor is adjudged inadequate. It amounts to asserting that the actions of agents could be ex ante calculated according to a global rationality. In this respect, Marx's concept of social labor is reminiscent of the equally deficient notion of perfect competition in mainstream neoclassical economics. (shrink)

Labour and employment law no longer has a monopoly on regulating labour relations and is facing a crisis as its effectiveness is questioned. Codes of conduct adopted by companies to recognise their social responsibility for the global supply chain are instruments that can usefully complement labour and employment law. The aim of this paper is to analyse in depth the legal nature of codes of conduct and their impact on labour and employment law. Will (...) the use of codes of conduct reinforce the crisis of labour and employment law in the era of globalisation or will these codes be part of a solution to this crisis? Do we have to consider codes of conduct as competitors to labour and employment law or as an opportunity for rethinking the way that labour and employment law norms should be produced and applied? (shrink)

The Lithuanian success of implementing international obligation in order to encourage the regulation of labour relations by means of collective agreements is analyzed in this article. It is emphasized that development of social partnership is too slow, coverage of regulation of labour relations by means of collective agreement also is low-level and collective agreements basically are made at the plant level. It is noticed that, because of the need to find a suitable balance between implementing (...) the international obligation to encourage regulation of labour relations by means of collective agreements, and the necessity to undermine the raison d’être of the regulation by means of collective agreements itself, as the process, where attitudes of social partners has to be harmonised at maximum, the state has limited scope to influence the process of making collective agreements. (shrink)

Labour and employment law no longer has a monopoly on regulating labour relations and is facing a crisis as its effectiveness is questioned. Codes of conduct adopted by companies to recognise their social responsibility for the global supply chain are instruments that can usefully complement labour and employment law. The aim of this paper is to analyse in depth the legal nature of codes of conduct and their impact on labour and employment law. Will (...) the use of codes of conduct reinforce the crisis of labour and employment law in the era of globalisation or will these codes be part of a solution to this crisis? Do we have to consider codes of conduct as competitors to labour and employment law or as an opportunity for rethinking the way that labour and employment law norms should be produced and applied? (shrink)

As states grapple with the forces of liberalization and globalization, they are increasingly pulling back on earlier levels of welfare provision and rhetoric. This article examines how the eclipsing role of the state in labor protection has affected state–labor relations. In particular, it analyzes collective action strategies among India’s growing mass of informally employed workers, who do not receive secure wages or benefits from either the state or their employer. In response to the recent changes in state policies, I (...) find that informal workers have had to alter their organizing strategies in ways that are reshaping the social contract between state and labor. Rather than demanding employers for workers’ benefits, they are making direct demands on the state for welfare benefits. To attain state attention, informal workers are using the rhetoric of citizenship rights to offer their unregulated labor and political support in return for state recognition of their work. Such recognition bestows informal workers with a degree of social legitimacy, thereby dignifying their discontent and bolstering their status as claim makers in their society. These findings offer a reformulated model of state–labor relations that focuses attention on the qualitative, rather than quantitative, nature of the nexus; encompasses a dynamic and inter-dependent conceptualization of state and labor; and accommodates the creative and diverse strategies of industrial relations being forged in the contemporary era. (shrink)

Many readings of the Parable of the Labourers in the vineyard want to treat the owner as representing God. Knowledge of actual agricultural practices relating to the management of vineyards suggest, on the contrary, that the details of the parable obstruct an easy identification of the owner with God, and that he displays unusual behaviour not only by paying all the labourers the same wage, but by his very intervention in the hiring process. The conclusion reached is that the parable (...) constructs the vineyard owner, typically one of the nouveau riche who lived in cities, not only as a ‘good employer’ but also, contrary to expectation, as a patron who intervened well beyond the strict norms of economic exchange. (shrink)

This essay offers a new reading of Marx's chapter on ‘the working day’ in Capital Volume One by exploring the textual theme of night-time work. Even as Marx emphasises how the lengthening workday enables the super-exploitation of producers’ wage labour, his depictions of nocturnal experiences highlight more forcefully the destruction of workers’ reproductive resources, capacities and relationships. Night comes to represent the contracted time, condensed space, petrified relational bonds and thwarted desires for human reproduction in a free, fulsome sense (...) that includes reinvigorating oneself, caring for others and enjoying experiences apart from work or care. Night's role as a privileged signifier and catalyst of these changes comes through in key passages about women, children and vampires, and in theoretically meaningful variances between Marx's German paraphrasing of English sources and those original texts, which replace Marx's phrases in English translations of Capital. Contemplating Marx's ambivalent reflections on legal-political action to limit workday hours, I argue for making struggles over social reproduction in a capacious sense central to working-class politics today. I demonstrate the power of this Marxian analytic by considering the compression of social-reproductive time among today's microworkers, who fuel the digital economy by performing platform-based ‘tasks’ at all hours for very low wages. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to analyze from a strategic ethical perspective four selected shareholder resolutions reported by the Social Issues Service of the Investor Responsibility Research Center regarding international labor and workplace standards. Particular attention will be paid to specific employee relations issues at the operating and tactical level of individual multinational firms. The paper concludes with policy recommendations for proxy statements.

Challenging the new political-economic “mainstream” that considers trade unions to be “complicit” in labor market dualization, this article’s analysis of union strategies in Italy and South Korea, most-different union movements perceived as unlikely cases for the pursuit of broader social solidarity, shows that in both countries unions have successively moved away from insider-focused strategies and toward “solidarity for all” in the industrial relations arena as well as in their social policy preferences. Furthermore, unions explored new avenues of (...) political agency, often in alliance with civil society organizations. This convergent trend toward a social model of unionism is ascribed to a response of unions to a “double crisis”: that is, a socioeconomic crisis, which takes the form of a growing periphery of the labor market associated with growing social exclusion, and a sociopolitical crisis, which takes the form of an increasing marginalization of the unions from the political process. (shrink)

Social responsibility is addressed to corporations, but can also be applied to other powerful organizations. This study tests the impact of labor union social responsibility on key measures of labor union attachment. After developing a scale of labor union social responsibility, craft union apprentice workers were surveyed and their responses analyzed with structural equation modeling. Labor union social responsibility was directly and positively related to union commitment and job satisfaction. Union commitment and job satisfaction fully mediated (...) the negative relationship between labor union social responsibility and propensity to withdraw from the union, and the positive relationship between labor union social responsibility and union participation. The results suggest that labor union social responsibility can enhance union attachment and inform union strategy. (shrink)

This article aims to explain the declining efficacy of California’s Agricultural Labor Relations Act over the past quarter century. It argues that the origins, terms, and outcomes of the Act emerged from an interplay between state and society: between the capacity of the state to initiate and implement social reform policy and the capacities of key social classes to tilt outcomes to their benefit. In contrast to both “state-centered” and “society-centered” views of the relationship among social (...) classes, state structures, and public policies, an historical-institutional theoretical frame reveals that social forces and political institutions are reciprocally constitutive, and that policy outcomes emerge from their interaction. Whereas labor union decline and policy failure are usually attributed to shifts in the political climate, in this case shifts in class leverage effected by the strategic choices of the farm labor union movement were at certain points more influential. (shrink)

The philosophies of education serve as the guide of the teachers in handling the teaching-learning process. However, a belief will remain as a belief unless it is practiced. This study aimed to find the relationship between the philosophical beliefs and practices of the 30 teachers of the schools in San Roque, Mabini, Bohol - San Roque Elementary School and San Roque National High School, S.Y. 2019-2020. The study utilized a quantitative method descriptive survey research design. The research instrument used was (...) a self-constructed questionnaire in which the reliability was tested by a Cronbach’s Alpha using Statistical Package for the Social Science (SPSS) software. Simple percentage and weighted mean were some of the statistical treatments used. Kendall’s tau_b, a non-parametric test, was used to determine the correlation between philosophical beliefs and their equivalent pedagogical practices. All of the statistical treatments were also run using the SPSS software. Further, the researcher assured the proper observation of the research ethics protocol. Based on the results, the philosophies of Progressivism (3.63) and Perennialism (3.31) were the most and least prevailing philosophical beliefs, respectively. On the other hand, the most and least prevailing philosophies practiced are Progressivism (3.69) and Essentialism (3.19), respectively. Moreover, research findings revealed that there was a significant relationship between the philosophical beliefs of teachers and their pedagogical practices. In conclusion, this study claims that teachers’ pedagogical practices are dependent to their philosophical beliefs; and as the teachers believed on a particular philosophy of education, they practice it accordingly to the extent of their adherence to the belief. (shrink)

This article examines the conventional Rehnist interpretation of active labor market policy in Sweden during the period from the war to the early 1970s and asks how it relates to the basic principles of evidence-based social science research.It is shown that the interpretation is misleading, reproducing and communicating material, stories, and images that were supplied bysome of the leading Swedish actors rather than producing an analysis based on the empirical examination of actual developments.The conclusion of the article offers suggestions (...) for an alternative evidencebased interpretation of the Swedish case. (shrink)

Some scholars claim that Critical Realism promises well for the unification of the social sciences, e.g., "Unifying social science: A critical realist approach" in this volume. I will first show briefly how Critical Realism might unify social science. Secondly, I focus on the relation between the ontology and methodology of Critical Realism, and unveil the politics of metaphysics. Subsequently, it is argued that the division of labour between social scientific disciplines should not be metaphysics-driven, but (...) rather question-driven. In conclusion, I will therefore defend a question-driven pluralism as a guide for interdisciplinarity. (shrink)

In this paper I focus on the Hungarian intellectual and politician Paul Szende’s sociologically oriented epistemology. I trace the influences of physiology, psychology, economy, evolutionary theory of his day on his sociological theory of abstractive knowledge, and discuss the close connection between physiological, social, and economic aspects in the early sociology of knowledge. My discussion continues with an examination of Szende’s differentiation between two economic effects within social epistemology: on the one hand the ‘economy of thought’ in the (...) tradition of Ernst Mach, with its physiological, organic, and integrative functioning of knowledge; on the other hand, the socio-economic effects of social selection, exclusion, and societal antagonism. Besides the Marxist and more specifically the Austro-Marxist environment of Szende’s writings, I trace the influence of the economic theory of Italian economist Achille Loria on Szende’s understanding of the antagonistic nature of the transformation of knowledge. The paper is set at the intersection of philosophy of science and history of science. It relates epistemological issues to historical, social, and scientific developments in Szende’s day and thus combines a philosophical analysis of Szende’s sociological theory of knowledge with historical research into the natural, social, and economic sciences of his time. (shrink)

In recent years, feminist scholarship on emotional labor has proliferated. I identify a related but distinct form of care labor, hermeneutic labor. Hermeneutic labor is the burdensome activity of: understanding and coherently expressing one’s own feelings, desires, intentions, and movitations; discerning those of others; and inventing solutions for relational issues arising from interpersonal tensions. I argue that hermeneutic labor disproportionately falls on women’s shoulders in heteropatriachal societies, especially in intimate relationships between women and men. I also suggest that some of (...) the gendered burdens of emotional labor that feminist scholars point out would better be described as hermeneutic labor. Drawing on feminist philosophy as well as findings from social psychology and sociology, I argue that the exploitation of women’s hermeneutic labor is a pervasive element of what Sandra Bartky calls the ‘micropolitics’ of intimate relationships. The widespread expectation that women are relationship maintenance experts, as well as the prevalence of a gendered demand-withdraw pattern of communication, leads an exploitative situation to appear natural or even desirable, even as it leads to women’s dissatisfaction. This situation may be considered misogynistic in Kate Manne’s sense, where misogyny is a property of social environments rather than a worldview. (shrink)

This article integrates theory and concepts from the business and society, business ethics, and labor relations literatures to offer a conceptualization of labor union social responsibility that includes activities geared toward three primary objectives: economic equity, workplace democracy, and social justice. Economic, workplace, and social labor union stakeholders are identified, likely issues are highlighted, and the implications of labor union social responsibility for labor union strategy are discussed. It is noted that, given the breadth of (...) labor unions in a global work environment, labor union social responsibility also has implications for NGOs, corporations, and how corporate social responsibility is viewed going forward. This article concludes by noting that the nexus of labor relations and corporate social responsibility warrants more attention in management and labor relations literatures. (shrink)

Drawing on feminist labour law and political economy literature, I argue that it is crucial to interrogate the personal and territorial scope of labour. After discussing the “commodification” of care, global care chains, and body work, I claim that the territorial scope of labour law must be expanded beyond that nation state to include transnational processes. I use the idea of social reproduction both to illustrate and to examine some of the recurring regulatory dilemmas that plague (...) labour markets. I argue that unpaid care and domestic work performed in the household, typically by women, troubles the personal scope of labour law. I use the example of this specific type of personal service relation to illustrate my claim that the jurisdiction of labour law is historical and contingent, rather than conceptual and universal. I conclude by identifying some of the implications of redrawing the territorial and personal scope of labour law in light of feminist understandings of social reproduction. (shrink)

Much of the debate around temporary foreign worker programs in recent years has focused on full or partial access to rights, and, in particular, on the extent to which liberal democratic states may be justified in restricting rights of membership to those who come and work on their territory. Many accounts of the situation of temporary foreign workers assume that a full set of rights will remedy moral inequities that they suffer in their new homes. I aim to show two (...) things: first, and based on experiences reported by former Live-in-Caregivers in Canada who now have access to the full set of citizenship rights, and German citizens who are descendants of Kurdish guestworkers in Germany, I have proposed that even after gaining citizenship, many of them experience social stigma and a sense of exclusion. Second, I have argued that this neglects a basic need that individuals have, which is to have access to relational resources within society in order to be protected against social deprivation. This need is seemingly immune to be effectively protected through the known catalogue of social, civic and political rights. Instead, I argue that social deprivation needs to be analyzed through the lens of institutional vulnerability to yield an analysis of the moral obligations of liberal democratic states. (shrink)

Civil society organizations attempt to induce corporations to behave in more socially responsible ways, with a view to raising labour standards. A broader way of conceptualizing their efforts to influence the policies and practices of employers is desirable, one centred upon the concept of civil governance. This recognizes that CSOs not only attempt to shape the behaviour of employers through the forging of direct, collaborative relationships, but also try to do so indirectly, with interactions of various kinds with the (...) state being integral. Drawing on evidence derived from UK-based CSOs involved in work and employment relations, four types of civil governance are identified and characterized. By elaborating the concept of civil governance, and demonstrating how different types of civil governance operate, the research extends our knowledge and understanding of how CSOs, as increasingly prominent actors in the field of work and employment relations, operate within, and contribute to, systems of labour governance. (shrink)

Why does scholarship on transnational labor regulation (TLR) consistently fails to search for improvements in working conditions, and instead devotes itself to relentless efforts for identifying administrative processes, semantics, and amalgamations of stakeholders? This article critiques TLR from a pro-worker perspective, through the philosophical work of Georg Lukács, and the concepts of reification and commodification. A set of theoretically grounded criteria is developed and these are applied against selected contemporary cases of TLR. In the totality that is capitalism, reification of (...) social relations of production conceals completely the experiences of workers. In TLR, managerialist and process-oriented scholarship is dominant, verifiable outcomes and positive improvements in conditions of employment are not sought, and worse, meaningless procedures are celebrated as positive achievements. (shrink)

Emotion management in the workplace is drawing increasing attention from researchers. However, they still know little about how positive leadership affects employees’ emotional labor. Building on social information-processing theory, we examine whether and how a servant leadership style influences employees’ emotional labor. Using a sample of 305 employees in 81 work units of 25 subcorporations at a food company in China, we find that servant leadership relates negatively to surface acting but relates positively to deep acting at work. We (...) also find that the indirect effect of servant leadership on surface/deep acting via affective trust is stronger than the indirect effect via cognitive trust. Our research reveals that servant leadership influences employees’ emotional labor more through affective trust than cognitive trust. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of our findings. (shrink)

Despite the popularity of teams in universities and modern organizations, they are often held back by dishonest actions, social loafing being one of them. Social loafers hide in the crowd and contribute less to the pooled effort of a team, which leads to an unfair division of work. While previous studies have mostly delved into the factors related to the task or the group in an attempt to explain social loafing, this study will instead focus on individual (...) factors. Accordingly, the aim is to investigate the determinants of social loafing attitudes, namely moral meaningfulness and mindfulness in a university setting. We further examine the relationship between attitudes and intentions and introduce the moderating role of motivation in the attitude–intention link. The findings from a sample of 319 business students reveal that both mindfulness and moral meaningfulness are negatively related to loafing attitudes, while attitudes positively predict social loafing intentions. In addition, we find that extrinsic motivation strengthens the relationship between social loafing attitudes and intentions. (shrink)

Time is money. According to E.P. Thompson, this saying lies at the core of the logic of capitalism. And yet, in the vast literature on state-capital relations, the strategic value of time has remained relatively neglected compared to rent distribution and monetary exchanges. Elaborating on the recruitment of migrants by employers and their intermediaries in Mauritius, this article explores the role of bureaucratic time and delays in businesses’ access to the fundamental resource for economic accumulation: labour. It reveals (...) a bifurcated bureaucratic pathway, a two-speed logic in the Mauritian bureaucracy of migration. On one side is the lengthy and unpredictable process of administering the authorisations to recruit foreign workers; on the other appear what I term the “shortcuts through the red tape”, the exemptions to the bureaucratic procedures and delays that benefit politically connected actors. Drawing on this case study, I contend that the politics of waiting, inherent to bureaucratic routine, matters in the relations between business and the state. (shrink)

The quality of our theoretical argumentation, the diversity and insights of our methods, and our general level of understanding are markedly better than a generation ago. However, this progress has been driven by a division of labor with increased specialization that has led each part of the field to become narrower.

Despite continued social protest, something quite fundamental has changed in the regulation of class relations in France. This article explores two paradoxes of this transformation. First, a dense network of institutions of social dialogue and worker representation has become implanted in French firms at the same time as trade union strength has declined. Second, the transformation has involved a relaxation of centralized labor market regulation on the part of the state, yet the French state remains a central (...) actor in the reconstruction of the industrial relations system. Institutional reform of industrial relations could not take place without the active intervention of the state because employers and trade unions alone were unable to create durable industrial relations institutions. The collapse of trade unionism meant the need for new actors on the labor side and only the state could both create and confer legitimacy upon those new actors. (shrink)

This article focuses on emotions, conceptualised as emotional labour, evoked during data practices used to repurpose and enable healthcare data journeys for Finnish public healthcare. Combined approaches from critical data studies and the sociology of emotions were used to contribute to a better understanding of the mundane but often invisible work of the emotions of experts involved in data practices, such as facilitating data journeys and building data technologies. The article is based on a two-and-a-half-year ethnographic study conducted in (...) a Finnish regional public healthcare and social service organisation. The study results were derived from the analysis of 39 interviews and fieldnotes produced by observing 170 h of various meetings, events and work activities performed by experts. The results were organised into three forms of observed experts’ emotional labour related to three phases of healthcare data journeys: caring for data production and preparing data for travel, managing excitement and frustration in data processing for continually building the data management system, and reassuring users in making sense of obtained data analytics. The results contribute to a greater understanding of the emotions and emotional labour generated by healthcare data journeys and in relation to the volatile nature of healthcare data and the collaborative character of data practices. This work advocates for a better recognition of the emotional aspects of data practices and their implications on data-based knowledge and datafication processes in healthcare. (shrink)

The development of genomics has dramatically expanded the scope of genetic research, and collections of genetic biosamples have proliferated in countries with active genomics research programs. In this essay, we consider a particular kind of collection, national biobanks. National biobanks are often presented by advocates as an economic ‘‘resource’’ that will be used by both basic researchers and academic biologists, as well as by pharmaceutical diagnostic and clinical genomics companies. Although national biobanks have been the subject of intense interest in (...) recent social science literature, most prior work on this topic focuses either on bioethical issues related to biobanks, such as the question of informed consent, or on the possibilities for scientific citizenship that they make possible. We emphasize, by contrast, the economic aspect of biobanks, focusing specifically on the way in which national biobanks create biovalue. Our emphasis on the economic aspect of biobanks allows us to recognize the importance of what we call clinical labor—that is, the regularized, embodied work that members of the national population are expected to perform in their role as biobank participants—in the creation of biovalue through biobanks. Moreover, it allows us to understand how the technical way in which national biobanks link clinical labor to databases alters both medical and popular understandings of risk for common diseases and conditions. (shrink)

This article contributes to the debate on automation and justice by discussing two under-represented concerns: labour justice and equality. Since automation involves both winners and losers, and given that there is no ‘end of work’ on the horizon, it is argued that most normative views on the subject – i.e. the ‘allocative’ view of basic income, and the ‘desirability’ views of post-work and workist ethics – do not provide many resources with which to address unjustly unequal divisions of (...) class='Hi'>labour involved in technological innovation. This article problematises these common responses reframing the problem from the perspective of labour justice. While the allocative view assumes that labour justice follows ‘spontaneously’ from income redistribution, the desirability views are chiefly interested in either defining or contesting the meanings of work for individuals, overlooking the interdependent nature of work and concerns of equality other than autonomy. Two conceptions of labour justice are thus applied to the problem: Paul Gomberg’s contributive justice, and Iris Young’s democratic division of labour. Instead of deciding between them, the normative core of ‘contributive parity’ is suggested as a critical standard for assessing unequal labour structures, and for envisaging a future in which technology can be an ally in making social cooperation fair. (shrink)

The current legal and political practice of human rights invokes entitlements to freely chosen work, to decent working conditions, and to form and join labor unions. Despite the importance of these rights, they remain under-explored in the philosophical literature on human rights. This article offers a systematic and constructive discussion of them. First, it surveys the content and current relevance of the labor rights stated in the most important documents of the human rights practice. Second, it gives a moral defense (...) of these rights arguing that their support involves an appropriate response to important human interests and to the human dignity of workers. Finally, it explores central normative issues about the relation between labor rights and human dignity. It responds to some objections about the importance of work, explains why labor human rights may not exhaust the demands of dignity regarding labor and arbitrates a common tension between independence and solidarity within our practical affirmation of human dignity. (shrink)

The combination of money and intimacy, particularly in the context of paid caring, can be difficult, given the tendency to view them as belonging to separate spheres. This research studied paid caring within the context of breastfeeding and labor support, using 72 interviews with lactation consultants, doulas, clients, and health care professionals, as well as 150 hours of ethnographic observation. Building upon the work of Viviana Zelizer, I examined the relational work of lactation consultants, doulas, and their clients, finding that (...) this process is highly influenced by the way gender is mapped onto the separate spheres dichotomy. Lactation consultants, doulas, and their clients drew boundaries around their social relations to construct them as different from family care in order to legitimate the combination of money and intimacy. Lactation consultants and doulas both experienced tension in determining appropriate transactions and media for their care work, which illustrates how the separate spheres ideology can perpetuate the relative low pay of care work. (shrink)

Engeström’s (1987, 1999) innovations in cultural-historical activity theory emphasise the role of contradictions in analysing and transforming learning in practice. This paper considers some of the problems and possibilities contained in his analytical understanding of contradictions, in relation to activity and to what he terms ‘expansive learning’ (Engeström, 2001, 2004, 2007). In doing so, it builds upon Engeström’s stated concern with theorising activities ‘in capitalism’. Its goal is to problematise the underlying practical definition of contradictions and the claims made for (...) his ‘contradiction-driven’ analysis of work practices as a platform for transformation. This paper suggests that the definition of contradictions that underpins Engeström’s notions of ‘expansive’ learning and his ‘developmental work research’ methodology is restrictive because it underplays the wider social contradictions and antagonisms inherent in the commodification of labour-power . As such, while Engeström’s take on activity theory offers a valuable approach to reforming configurations of labour within the bounds of capitalist efficiency, its engagement with capitalism’s internal contradictions is uneven and, therefore, its claims to produce transformative, expansive learning are heavily qualified. The framework of this argument is provided by Postone’s (1996) reading of Marx’s Capital and Grundrisse as social theories of labour within capitalism and the extensive analyses of the social reproduction of labourpower developed by Rikowski (1999, 2000a, 2000b, 2002a, 2002b), Allman et al. (2000) and Dinerstein and Neary (2002). The paper ends with a consideration of the practical research possibilities emanating from its call to ground activity theory and its concern with contradictions in a sophisticated understanding of labourpower theory. It draws upon the UK-based Learning in and for Interagency Working Project’s (2004 ‑ 2008) intervention research in multiprofessional children’s service settings. It discusses the project’s rethinking of the notion of contradictions, the need to understand the division of labour as a tool in the social production of labour-power and the sense in which historical shifts in the ways that institutions organise collective labourpower make visible the social production of labourpower as an object of activity. (shrink)

In this article I use Baudrillard’s claim that systems of exchange are ontologically and historically prior to systems of production, and Arendt’s understanding of birth as the arrival of something both quite familiar and quite new into the world as the starting-points for a theory of labour as relation. Such a theory has the virtue of avoiding the problem, found in Marx, Arendt and elsewhere, that labour is both a vital feature of being human and yet a drudgery (...) that will be absent from post-revolutionary society (in the case of Marx) or strictly relegated to the private realm (for Arendt). It also involves repositioning the work of social reproduction – of which women’s labour in giving birth is exemplary – as paradigmatic. (shrink)

Proposals for a universal basic income have reemerged in public discourse for a variety of reasons. Marx’s critique of exploitation suggests two apparently opposed positions on a basic income. On the one hand, a basic income funded from taxes on labor would appear to be exploitative of workers. On the other hand, a basic income liberates everyone from the vulnerable condition in which one is forced to sell one’s labor in order to survive, and so seems to be one way (...) of abolishing exploitation at its root. This paper will develop a conception of exploitation that resolves the conflict in favor of basic income. The conception of exploitation is grounded in a liberal egalitarian conception of justice rather than in Marx’s labor theory of value or an exclusive focus on the worker-capitalist relation. This position is not premised on an acceptance of the basic institutions of capitalism, but rather is a standpoint from which to evaluate them. It is not necessary to downsize our ideas of freedom and equality. But it is less obvious than it appeared in classic Marxist formulations that socialism is necessary for social justice. To quote the title of a famous article, there could be a ‘capitalist road to communism’, if a substantial basic income is feasible in a capitalist society. (shrink)

In this Article we propose an analytical framework for allocating responsibility for the protection of worker’s rights in the global labor market. Since production and services have expanded globally, and the state’s ability to protect worker’s rights on the national level has been undermined, the main challenge today is to find the appropriate institutional arrangements that allocate responsibility in a manner that realizes basic labor standards. The Article argues that in the context of a global labor market, responsibility should be (...) perceived in terms of "shared responsibility," whereby responsibility is shared by a complex network of agents and institutions that take part in global production and services. Within these global social networks and connections, labor relations generate a unique type of social connection which implies a special type of commitment and obligation towards workers. We propose four principles to guide the allocation of responsibility for remedying the unjust conditions of workers in the world, based on measures of connectedness, capacity, benefit, and contribution. (shrink)

This study examines the social impacts of labor-related corporate social responsibility policies or corporate codes of conduct on upholding labor standards through a case study of CSR discourses and codes implementation of Reebok - a leading branded company enjoying a high-profiled image for its human rights achievement - in a large Taiwanese-invested athletic footwear factory located in South China. I find although implementation of Reebok labor-related codes has resulted in a "race to ethical and legal minimum" labor standards (...) when notoriously inhumane and seriously illegal labor rights abuses were curbed, Chinese workers were forced to work harder and faster but, earned less payment and the employee-elected trade union installed through codes implementation operated more like a "company union" rather than an autonomous workers' organization representing worker' interests. In order to explain the paradoxical effects of Reebok labor-related codes on labor standards, I argue the result is determined by both structural forces and agency-related factors embedded in industrial, national and local contexts. To put it shortly, I find the effectiveness of Reebok labor-related codes is constrained not only by unsolved tension between Reebok's impetus for profit maximization and commitment to workers' human rights, but also by hard-nosed competition realities at marketplace, and Chinese government's insufficient protection of labor rights. Despite drawing merely from a single case study, these findings illuminate key determinants inhibiting the effectiveness of labor-related CSR policies or codes in upholding labor standards, and hence two possible way-outs of the deadlock: sharing cost for improving labor standards among key players in global supply chain; and combining regulatory power of voluntary codes and compulsory state legislations. (shrink)

Certification of banana plantations is widely used as a device for protecting and improving socio-economic conditions of wageworkers, including their incomes, working conditions and—increasingly—voice [related to labour relations and workplace representation]. However, to date, evidence about the effectiveness of certification in these domains is scarce. We collected detailed field data on economic benefits for improving household income, social benefits for labour practices, and the voice of wageworkers focusing on identity and identification issues amongst wageworkers at Fairtrade (...) certified banana plantations and comparable, non-certified plantations in the Dominican Republic. We used different types of regression models to identify significant relationships. Econometrical analysis of survey results complemented by field observations and outcomes from in-depth stakeholder interviews indicate that the impact of Fairtrade certification on wageworkers’ economic benefits is rather limited. However, the impact on the voice of wageworkers, is more evident. On Fairtrade certified plantations workers are more satisfied with the course of life and better represented. Thus while the additional value of Fairtrade certification on primary wages seems limited, Fairtrade has relevant positive effects on the labour force, particularly by delivering in-kind benefits, offering a sense of job-security, improving voice and enabling private savings. Benefits of certification, but also other interventions with a similar purpose, might therefore not be discerned in terms of economic benefits such as wages or basic labour conditions that are under direct control of national law, but they should be identified in terms of social benefits and improved norms of conduct for wageworker engagement. (shrink)

Hannah Arendt famously argued that acts of violence are corrosive to a free and plural politics. However, the broader implications of her critique of violence are less well known. Reading her concept of violence comprehensively, with regard to (ostensibly non-political) labor and work as well as action, this article reveals its broader relevance for contemporary political thought: the political question of violence lies at the heart of our ecological crisis and is crucial for the social structure of labor domination. (...) While Arendtian politics is without normative guarantees, the conceptual distinction between instrumental violence and free politics is crucial, because it renders the political judgment of violence possible. In every realm of human activity, the refusal to acknowledge violence stunts our capacity to care for the world. (shrink)

Conference environments enable diverse roles for academics. However, conferences are hardly entered into by participants as equals. Academics enter into and experience professional environments differently according to culture, gender, race, ethnicity, class, and more. This paper considers from a philosophical perspective entering and initiating culturally into academic conferences as a woman. It discusses theories of gender and emotional labor and emotional management, focusing on Arlie Hochschild’s foundational work, and affect in gendered social relations, considering Sara Ahmed’s theorization of (...) the feminist killjoy and the affect alien. It applies these lenses to explore problematic experiences of women initiates at conferences. The paper proceeds with a theoretical discussion of gender, emotional labor, and affect. Then the paper discusses women academics’ experiences generally and at conferences, including educational research conferences, with reference to relevant higher education research as well as anecdotal evidence, relating these experiences to the theories. It thus aims to tie together theoretical insights, higher education scholarship, and ordinary real-life experiences of gendered social relations in conference activities. (shrink)

Using an institutionalist, supply-side framework, the article describes and assesses the industrial relations reform agenda of the Australian labor movement between 1983 and 1996. Five institutional conditions for diversified quality production are identified, each of which was tackled to some extent in Australia. The article finds the strategy did not yield the benefits promised. Economic performance was average, union density fell steeply, and institutional supports for union membership and bargaining are threatened. Union misjudgments and an unfavorable historical and institutional (...) legacy, in particular the weakness of workplace bargaining structures, explain much of the Australian situation. Furthermore, the union supply-side reform agenda needs to be placed in its proper context. Without complementary policies affecting aggregate demand, innovation and industry policies, and finance reform, supply-side intervention can have only a limited impact. Unions in a neoliberal political economy are not strong enough to force through industrial restructuring alone. (shrink)

Collective bargaining is the main vehicle for labour worldwide to negotiate wages, benefits, retirement policies, training and other terms of working with management in both the public and private sectors. Labour economists have long been active in modelling the relations between collective bargaining agreements, labour markets and social welfare conditions. This book presents a theoretical model of unions which offers a unified treatment of the centralisation of bargaining, the credibility of labour contracts, the unionisation (...) of labour markets and the relative bargaining power of the union. Tapio Palokangas develops the microfoundations of bargaining and examines collective bargaining interacting with public policy, investment and growth, and international trade and specialisation. In conclusion Professor Palokangas challenges the commonly held view that collective bargaining has a negative impact on economics welfare, and argues that with the existence of market failure, collective bargaining can be welfare enhancing. (shrink)