Employment Challenges in Europe: In

Marie Curie Actions—Networks for Initial Training (ITN) |
Call (part) identifier FP7-PEOPLE-ITN-2012 | Project number 317321 ChangingEmployment
Marie Curie Initial Training Network ‘Changing Employment’
Deliverable 11.6: “Employment Challenges in Europe: Initial Findings”
(February 2015)
The following report highlights the initial research findings by Theme (1, 2 and 3)
and the achieved progress in identifying the employment challenges that arise in
Europe. In the period being reported, network research and outreach activities have
developed significantly on the following levels:
1. Training curricula design for ChangingEmployment ESRs;
2. Network schools and additional workshops organized within each Theme aiming
at enhancing the progress of ESRs individual research projects. For further
information, the events are listed below:
 Network School 3: Flexicurity, Labour Market and Social Dialogue, June
2014:
http://www.changingemployment.eu/Default.aspx?tabid=2901&articleType=Ar
ticleView&articleId=2756
 Annual Colloquium, Mid-term Review & Network School 4. Comparative
European Social Models, Wroclaw, November 2014:
http://www.changingemployment.eu/Default.aspx?tabid=2901&articleType=Ar
ticleView&articleId=2859
3. Preliminary research results dissemination at prestigious international
conferences, good quality working papers under revision at highly ranked
Journals in the field. For further information, please access the link:
http://www.changingemployment.eu/Research/Outputs/tabid/3960/Default.aspx
4. The development of an online academic dialogue platform ChangingEmployment
blog, aiming at setting the background for critical debate and a reflexive
approach on the added value that the empirical data bring to the individual
research projects. For further information, please access the link:
http://www.changingemployment.eu/Blog/tabid/2286/Default.aspx
5. The development of a very fruitful collaboration with ChangingEmployment
Associate Partners on supporting the career development plans of the ESRs
enrolled in the training programme by providing them:
 the opportunity of having short research visits. Special thanks goes to ILO
and CAIRDE teo. For further information, please access the links:
http://www.changingemployment.eu/NewsView/tabid/2257/articleType/Article
View/articleId/4797/ILO-Study-Visit-November-2014.aspx
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.819769471369103.1073741836.
576851615660891&type=3
 internships, short-term mobility stages and implicitly the development of their
professional networks. Special thanks goes to: ETUI, ILO, Consulting Europa.
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Theme 1: Management and Employees
Summary
‘Management and employees’ incorporates three research projects. The first
research project is dealing with ‘Social partners as managers of organisational
change’. The preliminary findings revealed an underdevelopment of Sectoral Social
Dialogue Committee of Electricity activity and implicitly a very soft nature of its
outputs. As an effect of the crisis, the dominant type of joint-texts found in this SSDC
are ‘joint opinions’ enhancing partner lobbying in the detriment of national collective
bargaining and employment relations system. In addition to a progressive dilution
and fragmentation of sectoral boundaries at the societal level, collective interests
are more easily and congruently organized and represented by employers’
associations than by trade unions at the EU level of social dialogue. An intervenient
outcome is that once with the shift to “autonomy” and bilateral social dialogue
without any rules, employers do not feel the obligation to negotiate at the EU level,
which reinforces an unequal relation of power between EU social partners.
The initial findings in the second research project ‘Employment relations as multilevel bargaining arenas in transformation’ uncover significant differences in the
quality of transnational social dialogue between the two case studies undertaken on
ArcelorMittal (steel sector) and Allianz SE (insurance). In both cases, the data show
that there is considerable potential for transnational agreements in issues that are of
joint importance for employees and management such as health and safety. In the
case of ArcelorMittal the global framework agreement (GFA) on health and safety
has improved health and safety conditions on the ground. In the case of Allianz SE,
the European framework agreement (EFA) on work-related stress has contributed to
a better management of stress at work in the company. Concerning the issue of
social-dialogue, in ArcelorMittal case this is highly fractionalized between plants, the
EWC, national bodies of employee representation and the sector level.
On the contrary, the social-dialogue in Allianz SEWC is characterized by a cooperative atmosphere between management and employees and can be labeled as
a “project-oriented” EWC. The third research project ‘The nature of new
management paradigms and the process of adoption-adaptation’ is dealing with the
productive model of a Romanian factory operating in the automotive industry (Dacia
plant) and the tensions that arise between workers and management within that
model. In the case of the Romanian car producer Dacia, the Logan project took a
more radical approach to the concept of low-cost production. The low-cost
productive model of Renault’s Romanian subsidiary has generated recurrent
conflicts between labour and management, which have been temporarily solved
through moderate increases in wages and improvements in working conditions. The
initial findings indicate that the case of Dacia is an instance where the union
succeeds in defending workers’ rights in an environment geared towards thwarting
organized labour. A key part of its success was the preservation of workplace
solidarity through constant efforts to retain membership levels combined with an
intensive strike activity. In this sense, workplace mobilization acted not only as a
way to gain concessions from the employer but also as a catalyst for preserving the
union’s legitimacy in front of its members and its autonomy from the company’s
management. The degree of success the union has achieved in representing the
interests of its members is explained by the union’s capacity to repeatedly mobilize
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the rank and file and maintain high levels of mobilization for long periods of time, as
was the case with the 2008 strike.
An analytical overview of Theme 1 (Management and employees) initial
research findings
T1 - (ESR1 – Sara Lafuente Hernández, Université libre de Bruxelles)
Project title: Social partners as managers of organisational change
As regards my initial findings, I have focused on the outcomes and activity of the
as an institution for collective bargaining and social dialogue.
My first findings have pointed at an underdevelopment of such SSDC activity, and at
the very soft nature of its outputs. SSDC Electricity is quite an active second
generation Committees in terms of number of joint texts agreed since it was
established (33 in total from 1996). However, none of these texts can be qualified as
an “agreement” that would imply a binding commitment (rights and obligations) for
social partners involved. The dominant type of joint-texts found in this SSDC are
“joint opinions”, which address European or national institutions, and thus can be
considered to be the product of partner-lobbying and not substantial bargaining in
the sense of national collective bargaining and employment relations systems.
Moreover, the use of “joint opinions” has risen since the beginning of the crisis. The
topics treated are also soft in their nature, mostly relating to the EU energy policy
and electricity market, so they follow the European Commission’s agenda according
to the consultation function of European social dialogue. Other topics treated are
health and safety, training, social dialogue, restructuring, gender equality, corporate
social responsibility, harassment, telework and ageing workforce, but none of the
joint-texts touches “hard” issues such as wages or working time.
Moreover, I found from the representativeness studies that the definition of “sector”
(as an arena for employment relations) is not unique across levels, and that the
choice of a particular institutional definition entails consequences that have to be
taken into account for the understanding of structural incongruences, and dynamics
within multi-level employment relations. The meaning that the “sector” traditionally
displays at the national level in Western European countries has not been
transposable to the EU level of sectoral social dialogue. This leads to a misfit of
arenas across levels, while at the EU level the “sector” is lined up with a purely
economic definition following NACE codes. According to the data analyzed (data on
representativeness congruency and involvement in collective bargaining structures
at the national level of EU social partners’ members, principally), I have found that
this definition of “sector” has an impact on the representation of collective interests
at the level of the SSDC. In that structural context, and in addition to a progressive
dilution and fragmentation of sectoral boundaries at the societal level, collective
interests are more easily and congruently organized and represented by employers’
associations than by trade unions at the EU level of social dialogue.
In light of the outcomes issued by the SSDC Electricity, where “joint opinions” are
the clearly the dominant instrument put forward, the sectoral definition seems also to
have an impact in what can be achieved and negotiated at the EU sectoral social
dialogue level (lobbying, instead of binding agreements) and the use that different
social partners make of the institutional forum of SSDC.
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The misuse and unequal use of SSDC is also linked to the inappropriate application
of some of the European Commission’s representativeness criteria by the
employers’ side, and additionally to the lack of sufficient institutionalized control on
representativeness of social partners and clearer criteria or transnational ones, and
to the lack of normative power acknowledgment to social partners at the EU sectoral
level. With the shift to “autonomy” and bilateral social dialogue without any rules,
employers do not feel the obligation to negotiate at the EU level, which reinforces an
unequal relation of power between EU social partners. Those circumstances explain
the noticeable trend in SSDCs, at least SSDC Electricity, to serve employers’
lobbying interests as a functional “partner-lobbying” platform, leading to the
overrepresentation of the consultation function of social dialogue at the sectoral EU
level in relation to the negotiating one.
These preliminary findings, which arose from legal texts and secondary data
analysis, have lead me to further research. I expect to carry on expert interviews
with social partners involved in the SSDC Electricity, at the EU level, as well as
national social partners involved in EU level structures, in order to verify and nuance
my conclusions from a qualitative perspective. The puzzling questions in that level
are the following: (i) why do national trade unions actually invest and devote
resources (and in what extent do they do this) to the EU level of sectoral social
dialogue, when this level seems rather functional to employers’ collective interests
and not very advantageous for labour and effective improvement in working
conditions at the local level, according to my findings; (ii) why do European trade
unions agree on partner-lobbying with the employers’ side at the level of SSDCs?
How can this alignment of positions be explained at that level, according to social
partners and taken into account the revealed unbalance of power?; (iii) why do
European trade unions agree to NACE codes sectoral definition, when it appears
that those do not reflect national sectoral realities and do not help trade unions
organizing collectively across multi-level structures?; (iv) do these functioning,
dynamics and structural misfits at the level of SSDC imply unequal results for
national trade unions, depending on their country of origin/national system of
employment relations? Is labour more disadvantaged, in terms of representation
capacity at the level of SSDC and multi-level structures, in some countries than in
others- namely comparing Belgium and Spain as paradigmatic of a coordinated
economy and a Southern European country?
A theoretical legal dimension could be here further explored, aiming at the
improvement of structural deficiencies and incongruences relating the
representativeness of social partners at the level of EU social dialogue and the
vertical link between the EU and national levels. I would like to explore and suggest
an alternative legal framework aiming at a better vertical integration of normative
and institutional levels.
Furthermore, as the idea of a promising path for sectoral employment relations (at
any level) is called into question by empirical and theoretical reasons (fragmentation
of work organizations, dilution of sectoral boundaries, shift to a services’ economy),
wouldn’t other arenas of employment relations actually be better suited for the
development of substantial and effective collective bargaining on work conditions, in
which labour could have better representation and mobilization opportunities? The
quite distressing first findings relating to the sectoral dimension of EU social
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dialogue motivate my research in two other directions: the transnationalisation of
collective bargaining at the company level within MNCs, and the emergence of new
dynamics and institutions of collective bargaining at the local territorial/plant level.
These two trends in the development of employment relations are motivated by the
development of both global production networks at the supranational level on the
one hand, and by the increasing fragmentation of the firm at a local and plant-level
(outsourcing).
I will then look into the role of EWC in the multi-level case studies selected among
electricity MNCs located in Belgium and Spain, and explore how their link to local
institutions of employment relations is being shaped (vertical integration,
representation, enforcement of agreements or implications of information shared). In
this regard, I intend to analyse two particular cases of MNC fulfilling the EWC
Directive criteria, but where EWC have not been established (yet): Iberdrola in Spain
and Elia in Belgium. The analysis of the latter would enrich my understanding of
transnational employment relations developments and dynamics within MNCs, as it
would bring to discussion the factors that can motivate or impeach the constitution of
EWCs within certain companies.
As regards the territorial dimension/level, I will look into the new opportunities (if
any) arising for social partners and their management of employment relations at
that level, and will search for the links between the local level and other institutional
levels of employment relations (national or regional multi-employer structures,
EWCs within the concerned MNC, EU sectoral social dialogue)
Last year, I explored some territorial experiences of collective mobilization and
transversal collective bargaining facing outsourcing in two industrial plants in
Belgium and Spain. I would be interested in further approach these cases from a
multi-level perspective, in order to uncover multi-level dynamics that could
eventually strengthen territorial collective bargaining potential.
For that purpose, I am currently conducting experts interviews in Belgium and in
Spain at the different mentioned levels. I will also develop secondary data analysis
drawing on collective bargaining outcomes. I expect these further steps in my
research might lead to preliminary conclusions on the differences that multi-level
employment relations’ dynamics and structures offer to social partners from two
different national employment relations systems and welfare states (Belgium and
Spain). I expect to find different degrees of involvement and opportunities for social
partners in such societal and regulatory contexts, as well as a different uses by
Belgian and Spanish social partners of the several arenas at their reach within the
multi-level framework.
T1 (ESR2 - Mona Aranea Guillén, Universidad de Oviedo)
Project title: Employment relations as multi-level bargaining arenas in
transformation
This PhD project deals with European employment relations in two multinational
corporations. The multi-level setting of European employment relations calls for indepth case study research across actors, spaces and processes. The originality of
the research presented here derives from its combinations of the three major
instruments of industrial relations at the European level. This multi-level analysis
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includes European Sectoral Social Dialogue Committees (SSDCs), European Works
Councils (EWCs) and European Framework Agreements (EFAs). The qualitative
empirical data emerges in-depth interviews with management and employees
involved in European employment relations. The ongoing fieldwork in three
European countries (Spain, Germany and Belgium) has produced preliminary
comparative findings that help to gain a better understanding of transnational social
dialogue at various levels.
The literature review undertaken in Year 1 of the Marie Curie project (ESR 2
appointment started in March 2013) has revealed that the main arenas of European
employment relations – SSDCs, EWCs and EFAs - are currently suffering from
institutional underdevelopment and in some cases blockades by management. The
qualitative fieldwork carried out since Year 2 (2014) shows important differences in
the quality of transnational social dialogue between the two company case studies,
ArcelorMittal (steel sector) and Allianz SE (insurance). For example, how the two
corporations engage very differently in the respective SSDCs of steel and insurance.
Also the EWCs are different in their relation to management and their potential for
pro-active employee representation with considerable implications for the
implementations of European or global company agreements signed in recent years.
European Works Councils (EWCs) in general tend to be bodies of information and
consultation with no room for collective bargaining in the foreseeable future.
However, the case studies show that there is considerable potential for transnational
agreements in issues that are of joint importance for employees and management
such as health and safety. Both the ArcelorMittal EWC and the SE Works Council
(SEWC) of the European company Allianz SE have managed to sign substantial
European or global framework agreements with the respective companies in recent
years. The ArcelorMittal global framework agreement (GFA) on health and safety
has improved health and safety conditions on the ground and the European
framework agreement (EFA) on work-related stress at Allianz SE has contributed to
a better management of stress at work in the company. In both cases the main
factors of success seam to be a joint interest in improving conditions and the role of
committed individuals on both sides who keep up negotiations and push for
implementation after the signing of the agreement. In the case of Allianz SE,
management seems to support the implementation of existing framework
agreements on lifelong learning and work-related stress sometimes even against
resistance from the local management level.
The ArcelorMittal works council can be considered a functioning “service EWC”, a
platform where employee representatives receive relevant information they cannot
get hold of anywhere else. While this gives certain added value to the European
level compared to the national and local level of social dialogue, employee
representatives also report that the EWC is highly dominated by management and
limited in terms of the issues raised there. Trade unions at the European level do not
support a strengthening of the ArcelorMittal EWC as they insist that direct
negotiations with management should be in the hands of trade unions rather than
works councils. Social dialogue is further weakened by a fierce inter-plant
competition in the company and fracturing of the workforce through
“divisionalization” and a lack of demand in Europe. The 2009 ArcelorMittal EFA on
restructuring and social dialogue takes innovative steps towards direct negotiations
between company management and European as well as national trade unions. The
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quick and successful negotiation of the agreement shows that EFAs between
European trade union federations and transnational corporations have the potential
to improve social dialogue and working conditions in the given company. However,
the implementation of the agreement both at the national and at the European level
meets many challenges, most of them rooted in a lack of ownership and recognition
both from the management and employee representatives side. There is little coordination between the sector level and the company level of social dialogue in
ArcelorMittal as the company does not participate in the regular meetings of the
SSDC steel and trade unions do not use the committee for negotiations on working
conditions or restructuring in the steel sector. The SSDC steel is mainly
characterized by “partner lobbying” as social partners use the forum in order to
jointly lobby the commission around business interests such as the European
energy and climate change policy. Social dialogue in ArcelorMittal is highly
fractionalized between plants, the EWC, national bodies of employee representation
and the sector level.
The Allianz SEWC is characterized by a co-operative atmosphere between
management and employees and can be labeled as a “project-oriented” EWC. This
means that the works council develops own initiatives independent from
management and ensures a substantial representation of employee interests. The
key to success seams to be the ability of trade unions in Allianz SE to make use of
multiple levels of social dialogue in order to give weight and legitimacy to their main
issues, such as restructuring, work-related stress, performance-related pay or
homeworking. The Allianz trade union network (ATUN) installed in 2010 brings
together trade unionists from various countries and prepares employee initiatives to
be brought up in the SEWC. Some key actors involved in the ATUN also participate
in the Sectoral Social Dialogue Committee (SSDC) Insurance and thus manage to
transport important issues from one level to the other. Other members of the ATUN
also have a seat on the company supervisory board. This allows for a close
communication and co-ordination between company employees and trade unions.
Direct negotiations between the core HR managers and the SEWC happen in a socalled Social Dialogue Group, a small forum consisting of nine Allianz managers, the
six employee representatives from the supervisory board and another four employee
representatives from the SEWC select committee. The select committee prepares
the works council meetings and is entitled to sign agreements with management.
The Social Dialogue Group was formed as the result of an informal agreement
reached at board level. Thus in Allianz SE we can see an evolving multi-level
strategy of worker participation that uses a fragile structure – based on informal
agreements with management – to produce stable outcomes in the form of official
agreements signed both by management and the European works council.
T1 (ESR3 – Dragoş Adăscăliţei, Central European University)
Project title: The nature of new management paradigms and the process of
adoption-adaptation
During the first year of appointment ESR3 has focused on analysing the productive
model of a Romanian factory operating in the automotive industry and the tensions
that arise between workers and management within that model. A survey of the
literature on foreign direct investments (FDI) in the Central and Eastern Europe
(CEE) automotive industry showed that these investments initially followed a “lowroad” strategy that gradually shifted into a complementary specialization strategy,
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which also came along with a more pronounced interest from components
manufacturers to invest in the region. Taking advantage of the low production costs,
automotive manufacturers used CEE as a staging ground for developing low-cost
models destined to respond mainly to consumers in postsocialist countries, but
which also began to appeal to Western consumers. In the case of the Romanian car
producer Dacia, the Logan project took a more radical approach to the concept of
low-cost production. The Logan was conceived as a car cheap enough to compete
with older models produced in the region, yet with high enough quality to compare
with Western standards. Against the odds, the project ended up being a remarkable
success story.
The success registered by Dacia with its Logan project has nonetheless not been
without its problems. The low-cost productive model of Renault’s Romanian
subsidiary has generated recurrent conflicts between labour and management,
which have been temporarily solved through moderate increases in wages and
improvements in working conditions. In the absence of market competition for
models based on the Logan platform, a productivity-for-wages bargain—forged
between the plant union and management after an almost three-week long strike in
2008—seemed to offer the necessary stability in the relationship between the two
actors. However, this bargain proved to be a double-edged sword for both company
and union. While it secured higher wages for workers, it also altered the strategy
used by the company in order to contain future wage increases. In recent years,
threats with relocation and automation have become more frequent and, despite
their questionable credibility, have not remained without consequence for the local
union’s negotiation approach.
Furthermore, the case of Dacia is an instance where the union succeeds in
defending workers’ rights in an environment geared towards thwarting organized
labour. A key part of its success was the preservation of workplace solidarity
through constant efforts to retain membership levels combined with an intensive
strike activity. In this sense, workplace mobilization acted not only as a way to gain
concessions from the employer but also as a catalyst for preserving the union’s
legitimacy in front of its members and its autonomy from the company’s
management.
The success of the Dacia union is attributed to its associational power, which needs
to be distinguished from its structural power. Along the years, the union has
bolstered its associational strength by fostering the calibration of its claims to the
demands and needs of the rank and file, remaining cautions as to the continued
need for investing time and resources into organizing its members, being actively
involved in all matters relating to its members’ welfare both during and after the
restructuring program that immediately followed Dacia’s privatization, maintaining
traditional service provision activities for its members, as well as permanently
insisting on the need for union members to be ready for mobilization in case the
union needs to follow up on its strike threats. The degree of success the union has
achieved in representing the interests of its members is explained by the union’s
capacity to repeatedly mobilize the rank and file and maintain high levels of
mobilization for long periods of time, as was the case with the 2008 strike.
However, the union’s successful mobilization was conditioned by Dacia workers
having considerable structural power. The degree and nature of workers’ structural
power has witnessed significant mutations since the 2008 strike and the onset of the
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crisis. If before the strike the situation at Dacia resembled the one of high labour
turnover and chronic shortage of skilled labour, things soon shifted in the opposite
direction, with a very low turnover and the local labour market becoming highly
dependent on Dacia and other automotive operations. This came partly as a result
of the crisis, which severely impacted on other opportunities on the local labour
market or elsewhere, via migration. A big role in bringing about these changes was
played by the union itself.
Threats with delocalization are much more effective in such a situation of low
turnover and a tight and segmented labour market. Since the opening of the new
Tangiers plant in 2012, threats with delocalization have become much more
common. With the prospect of the Romanian assembly plant to be taken out of the
production loop, these threats are targeted mostly at workers’ workplace bargaining
power. The union has tried to counter this threat by reemphasizing the strategic
importance of the Dacia plant and appealing to the government for indirect help that
would secure the company’s competitiveness and thus maintain jobs.
Theme 2: Inclusion and exclusion
Summary
Theme 2 “Inclusion and exclusion” comprises of five PhD projects that conduct their
investigation at the intersection of employment and migration regimes in the EU.
The work of the ESR 5, - “Migration aspirations & realities: Experiences of Polish
migrants in the UK” – looks into the occupational mobility of the female Polish
migrants in the UK in the after math of 2004 accession of Poland to the EU. The
author asks: what opportunities did the accession open up specifically to Polish
women? The initial findings indicate that the opportunities of European citizenship
have been mainly manifested in the context of the regularization of a formerly
irregular movement, facilitating access to formal employment, as well as
professional progression through inclusion into the UK labour market. Some women
see the opportunity to migrate as a chance to escape demanding gendered
expectations of starting a family and domesticity. Nevertheless the general starting
point for all female migrants remains to be low skilled, low-paid employment, while
occupational progression often takes place within traditional ‘migrant’ sectors or
following a UK-based education, due to the difficulty of recognizing Polish-obtained
qualifications. ESR 6 project, - “Pathways to citizenship (inclusion) and conflict
(exclusion): employment relations in migrant workers’ workplaces in Belfast,
Edinburgh and Wroclaw,” - continues the discussion of European citizenship. In
order to grasp the mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion the project scrutinizes the
very concept of citizenship bringing in emotional, identity and moral aspects to it.
The author suggests that migrants often chose to affiliate themselves with certain
“communities” of value, associated with either Poland or the UK and deriving
strongly from the experience of employment and inclusion in the places of work. The
findings illustrate how migrants’ narratives and choices simultaneously advance and
undermine neoliberal logics of a self-made, entrepreneurial wo/man and that while
being their aspiration, neoliberal citizenship glosses over some “hidden injury” in the
respondents’ biographies. ESR 7, - “Workplace diversity in MNCs and trade union
inclusion strategies: Belgium, France and the UK,” – looks into the work of ‘public
service multinational’ companies of asks: What role do workforce diversity strategies
play in developing union activists and managers in subsidiaries? And: Why are
these specific strategies suitable for a public sector multinational? The fieldwork for
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the project is yet to commence in early 2015, however, some of the findings are
already incorporated in the fieldwork design. Thus the author sets out the specificity
of the ‘public service multinational’ as a) operating under significantly reduced or
absent market forces, b) in response to unique character of the public sector
customer and thus, c) experiencing a particular ethical relation of the ‘public service’
to the employees. Building on this understanding of the specificities of the sector as
shaping the power dynamics within the sector, the research explores the role of the
trade unions outside of the traditional focus of the national level.ESR 8 project, “Return migrants inclusion and employment: the case of return migration from the
UK to Poland,” - analyses the return migrants labour market situation through the
conceptual lens of critical realism. Thus, on the one hand the author seeks to
acknowledge migrants’ agency, and on the other hand, to take into account specific
structural labour market situation. The projects finding present a valuable critique of
the ‘human capital’ approach which suggests that, in case of return, migrants gain a
significant advantage in employability over the domestic labour force, due to the
experience and expertise gained in migration. The author demonstrates various
institutional and subjective obstacles in the way of transferring skills gained in
migration and highlights the role of the working culture and values in migrants’
decision for return or re-migration. ESR 9, - “Life on the margins - the social
implications of precarious work specifically in relation to young minority ethnic
workers,”- is a cross-national investigation (the UK, France and Spain) of the
experiences of minority ethnic and migrant care workers conducted at the
intersection of migration, gender, ethnicity and age. The main findings of the
research indicate that there is a multiplication of disadvantage and discrimination
related to age, race, nationality and migrant status both in domestic setting of the
geriatric care sector as well as in the institutions such as care homes. The author
explains this by the fact that care sector engenders structural pressures to maintain
low costs of labour in the context of the commodification of care. These dynamics
manifest themselves through the construction of care as unskilled labour and
channelling gendered and racialized workforce into this sector.
An analytical overview of Theme 2 (Inclusion and exclusion) initial research
findings
T2 – (ESR5 – Karima Aziz, LondonMet)
Project title: Migration aspirations & realities: Experiences of Polish migrants
in the UK
The research project focuses on the experiences of Polish migrants in the UK and
their performance in the UK labour market as well as the influence of structures and
agency on their working and wider lives. Following a literature review on Postaccession Polish migration to the UK, pilot interviews I conducted in the UK as well
as personal interest I focused my research on the experience of female Polish
migrant workers.
Polish post-accession migration to the UK has due to its numerical significance
attracted a broad variety of research generally conceptualising this movement as
economic or work migration. But 10 years after enlargement there is some
agreement that this is not homogeneous group. Earlier discourses about this
phenomenon focused on downward social mobility, but some newer findings now
suggest that especially some Central and Eastern European migrants have been
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able to move up the occupational ladder. While enjoying the freedom of movement,
these migrants’ qualification often do not get recognised and they often start out
working in low skilled, low-paid as well as gendered employment. In the discussion
on the feminization of migration immigrant women were either conceptualized as
‘underdog in world capitalist system’ (Moch 2005) pushed by patriarchy into least
desirable positions or alternatively as agents of change (Morokvasić 1984). The
feminisation and segmentation of the labour market is the context in which migrant
women seek employment.
The Census of 2011 shows that in England and Wales 51 % of the Polish-born
population is female and 49 % is male. The data show that this group is rather
young and demonstrates a gendered dimension of economic activity and formal
employment between Polish men and women in the UK with women dominating the
categories of part-time employment and ‘looking after home or family’. While
distribution, hotels and restaurants is still the biggest sector, accounting for 27 % of
all Polish migrants in the UK, it is undeniable that they are also a relevant population
in other sectors, such as manufacturing 18 %, finance 17 % and public
administration, education and health 12 %. Polish migrants are represented at all
occupational levels, with 52 % in skilled and semi-skilled employment and half as
many managers, professionals and technical staff than in elementary occupations
(Census 2011 for England and Wales).
The research project takes an overall qualitative approach by conducting
biographical narrative interviews (Schütze 1983) and semi-structured experts
interviews enriched with quantitative secondary data analysis. There were 31
biographical narrative interviews conducted with a diverse sample of female Polish
migrant workers in the UK as well as 11 semi-structured expert interviews in the UK.
Furthermore 22 biographical narrative interviews with female return migrants and
seven semi-structured expert interviews were collected in Poland. The method of
data analysis follows the basic ideas of grounded theory, in which existing literature,
theory and knowledge inform the analysis, but do not direct it in the concept of
theoretical sensitivity (Glaser and Strauss 1968; Charmaz 2006; see Figure 1.).
The constructed grounded theory model (see Figure 2.) illustrates how in the
conditions of post-accession Polish migration to the UK and established gender
roles, possible dynamics of downward social mobility or moving up the ladder can
be mediated by different strategies found in the experiences of female migrant
workers. While some women are able to overcome barriers and progress
professionally, others feel stuck in disadvantaged positions. The analysis shows the
relevance of the intersection of gender roles and work trajectories, where migration
for young, single women was often accompanied by an emancipation of the
gendered expectations of their origin communities and the freedom to make
independent decisions in life, work and education. Professional progression then
materializes even within typical migrant sectors such as retail and catering or
following additional education in the UK, since education attained in Poland
predominantly did not get recognized in practice. Stagnation in low-paid, low skilled
employment is often connected to gendered responsibilities, which prevent mobility
within the UK and within different sectors and occupations, especially when settled
in an industrial region. Return migrants also demonstrated this dynamic, where
return was either a family decision despite positive experiences in the UK and
challenges in Poland, or independent decision-making, taking advantage of
11 | P a g e
European citizenship often accepting precarious employment in the UK as shorttime arrangement planning for professional fulfillment in Poland. The strategies are
influenced by various factors and were for example presented as spontaneous
decisions, rational or family decisions or the quest for personal and professional
fulfillment leading to a perceived feeling of being stuck or of pursuing personal and
professional fulfilment.
References
All statistical data: Census 2011 for England and Wales
Charmaz K. (2006). Constructing Grounded Theory: a practical guide through
qualitative analysis. London: SAGE.
Glaser, B. G. and Strauss, A. L. (1968) The discovery of grounded theory: strategies
for qualitative research. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.
Moch L. P. (2005) “Gender and Migration Research”, in: M. Bommes, E. Morawska
(eds). International Migration Research. Constructions, Omissions and the Promise
of Interdisciplinarity, pp. 95-108. Aldershot: Ashgate.
Morokvasić M. (1984) Birds of Passage are also Women. International Migration
Review 18(4): pp. 886-907.
Schütze F. (1983) Biographieforschung und narratives Interview. Neue Praxis, 13(3)
1983: pp. 283-293.
Figure 1. Applied form of grounded theory methodology
Theoretical sensitivity:
- exploring the literature
- pilot interviews
- researcher's own
background
Construction of a
grounded theory
model
Data analysis:
- supported by the use of
Nvivo
- open coding and axial
coding
- constant comparison
- developing themes
Construction of research tools:
- biographical narrative interviews
- semi-structured expert interviews
- secondary quantitative data
analysis
Fieldwork and theoretical sampling:
- post-accession female Polish migrant workers
in main employment sectors and half-half trade
union membership
- diverse in educational background, age, family
situation, length of stay etc.
- taking field notes
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Figure 2. Draft of a constructed grounded theory model on the experiences of
female Polish migrant workers in the UK
Influencing factors
- Length of stay
- Educational background
- Geography
- Age
- Family situation / caring
responsibilities
- ...
Conditions
- Post-accession labour
migration from Poland
to the UK
- Gender roles
-…
Possible dynamics
- Downward social mobility
- Moving up the ladder
Strategies
- Spontaneity,
coincidence and luck
- Rational decisionmaking, family
decision
- Personal and
professional fulfilment
- Mobility paradigm
Consequences
- Feeling stuck
- Pursuing
personal and
professional
fulfilment
T2 – (ESR6 – Radek Polkowski, University of Strathclyde)
Project title: Pathways to citizenship (inclusion) and conflict (exclusion):
employment relations in migrant workers’ workplaces in Belfast, Edinburgh
and Wroclaw
Many Polish post-2004 migrants have initially occupied lower echelons of the UK
labour market and disadvantaged position within workplaces (Stewart and Garvey
2015, forthcoming). The EU regulations and the UK immigration policy have
contributed to constituting CEE migrants as flexible, low-skilled and easily
exploitable workforce. Polish government’s immigration policy has constituted
migrant workers from its neighbouring countries like Ukraine in a similar way.
Initially, many of these workers were “fine” in occupying the secondary position in
labour markets and workplaces “designated” to them by the policy-makers and
employers. The imagined temporariness of their stay abroad (Anderson, 2013: 83)
coincides with seeing work instrumentally which means that migrants are likely to
accept low labour standards and exploitation as they see it as temporary and
helping in meeting other life goals. As a result, interests of workers and employers
coincide.
However, many of these workers that were initially mostly imagined as temporary by
the policy makers and employers, decided to settle in and make their new countries
a home. Using grounded theory method and based on data from a participatory
action research and longitudinal semi-structured interviews with Polish migrant
workers in the UK and Ukrainian migrant workers in Poland, the study develops a
model which argues that migrant workers negotiate belonging or, in other words,
struggle for inclusion in citizenship on two levels. My findings suggest the decision to
settle down and reluctance to return is entangled with these two processes or
struggles. These are delineated below.
Pathway/struggle for inclusion in citizenship as rights
A migrant struggles against marginalization in labour market and in workplaces.
They gradually establish themselves in the labour market and in a workplace. This
pathway/struggle can take both individualistic and collective forms. Some simply
abandon poor exploitative jobs, as they acquire experience, qualifications, skills,
13 | P a g e
networks, and confidence, and manage to change for a better-paid, more satisfying
and more stable ones. Others individually negotiate conditions with their employers,
changing the way they interact with them thus challenging positioning as migrants
that are easily exploitable. Some take up a collective struggle (e.g. trade unions). If
successful in establishing their position, migrants reorient themselves towards host
society and do not consider a soon return. Often the outcome of this pathway is
linked with emotional citizenship (Ho, 2009)
.
However, we have to keep in mind that in many cases, it was experience of poor
labour relations in the country of origin that made people decide to go abroad. In
saying that, the findings confirm arguments by Ciupijus (2013) and Woolfson and
Sommers (2008) who show the role of low road neoliberalism on migration from
CEE. Therefore, experience of employment relations abroad is judged against
similar experiences in the country of origin which affect the decision regarding return
or stay.
All in all, this pathway confirms models like that proposed by Friberg (2012) which
says that migrants, as they become better established in the labour market and
communities, decide to settle in. It also supports Ciupijus (2013) and Woolfson and
Sommer (2013) interpretation of migration as being a result of migrants from CEE
being stripped off social rights in their countries of origin as a result of low road
neoliberalism.
Pathway to inclusion in communities (of value)
As argued by Friberg (2012) and many other studies probably, establishing oneself
in a community (i.e. building networks with “natives” and with other migrants) is
important both for decisions to settle in rather than return and can give sense of
belonging (emotional citizenship). However, my initial findings indicate that inclusion
in more abstract communities of value (Anderson, 2013) is equally crucial. In this
way, the study adds to existing research on settlement decision making and
emotional citizenship. It also argues that a community of value has to be considered
in discussing reasons for why individuals migrate. Therefore, the study adds also to
arguments by Ciupijus (2013) and Woolfson and Sommers (2008) by showing that
not only neoliberal practice but also subjectivity might be a contributing factor to
migrations from CEE.
Moreover, while Anderson (2013) looks at how communities of value are constituted
by the state, my findings indicate also that migrant workers can reproduce, reinvent
or challenge the boundaries of these communities. Moreover, migrants’ choices and
practices can be affected by a community of value of their country of origin. In this
way, the article develops a framework that gives a new dimension to Anderson’s
(2013) argument by highlighting the role of the sending country and how its
economy and ideologies shape and affect migrants’ choices and practices and, in
turn, how these can reproduce or challenge communities of value in receiving
countries.
Furthermore, communities of value might be imagined communities but they do not
have to. We can argue that one belongs to a community of value even without
consciously imagining it, based on the theory of shame. By looking for the sources
of shame in individuals we can see what kind of values they internalized and these
bind them with a certain group which shares these values (Scheff 2000; Czykwin
14 | P a g e
2013: 20). However, communities of value can also be imagined in a sense that
people create them subjectively and feel that they belong to them. Either way, my
findings indicate that there is a link between membership in a community of value
and sense of belonging (but this sense of belonging might be related to particular
sections of the society specifically in the second case – i.e. imagined communities of
value).
References
Anderson, Bridgette. 2013. Us and them? The dangerous politics of immigration
control. Oxford: Oxford Scholarship Online.
Ciupijus, Zinovijus. 2011. Mobile central eastern Europeans in Britain: successful
European Union citizens and disadvantaged labour migrants? Work, Employment
and Society, 25(3): 540-550.
Czykwin, Elżbieta. 2013. Wstyd [Shame]. Kraków, Poland: Impuls.
Friberg, Jon Horgen. 2012. The stages of migration. From going abroad to settling
down: post accession Polish migrants in Norway. Journal of Ethnic and Migration
Studies, 38 (10): 1589 – 1605.
Ho, Elaine Lynn-Ee. 2009. Constituting citizenship through the emotions:
Singaporean transmigrants in London. Annals of the Association of American
Geographers, 99(4): 788-804.
Scheff, Thomas. 2000. Shame and the social Bond: A sociological theory.
Sociological Theory, 18(1): 84-99.
Stewart, Paul, and Brian Garvey. 2015, forthcoming. Migrant workers and the north
of Ireland : between neoliberalism and sectarianism. Work, employment, society.
Woolfson, Charles, and Jeffrey Sommers. 2008. Trajectories of entropy and ‘the
labour question’. The political economy of post-communist migration in the New
Europe. Debatte, 16(1): 53-69.
T2 – (ESR7 – Ben Egan, K U Leuven)
Project title: Workplace diversity in MNCs and trade union inclusion
strategies: Belgium, France and the UK
During the first half of the project I have been primarily focused on developing a
conceptual framework for understanding the main pillars of the research. These will
guide the fieldwork of in-depth semi-structured interviews which will take place
throughout 2015. The following summarises the findings from this progress under
the key headings, finishing with an elabouration on the research questions that will
guide the forthcoming interviews.
Diversity in the modern European workplace
The intended role of equality initiatives in multinational companies is contested and
as such has formed an important battleground in debates over transfer of policy. At
the root of these various conceptions of workplace diversity are the broader societal
understandings of what exactly is meant by the terms ‘diversity’, ‘equality’ and
‘inclusion’, amongst others. The distinctions between these is significant not only in
relation to one another but also because they intersect with one another according
to national and organizational contexts: diversity can mean something very different
in the same multinational organization in France compared to the UK, whereas the
issues raised in a metalworking organization will differ to those in legal services.
One development which however can be noted transnationally is the emergence in
15 | P a g e
recent years of the importance of diversity issues in broader society. The rapid
expansion of gay marriage legislation and the recognition of immigration as a key
political issue are two examples that demonstrate the primacy that diversity has
taken in political discourse. These developments and others push the diversity
agenda to centre-stage.
So workplace equity is directly related to broader societal understanding, central to
which is the notion of inclusion-exclusion. Inclusion-exclusion has been described as
a ‘continuum of the degree to which individuals feel a part of critical organizational
processes’, and as such can be a product of effective workplace initiatives. The
connection between the workplace and wider society and organization in which they
are embedded is often dependent upon the ability of local actors to ‘filter’ broader
strategies into specific and effective practices. Diversity and inclusion have myriad
meanings according to context, though this research is concerned primarily with
migrant and minority ethnic workers, with migrant workers conceived as foreignborn, remaining vigilant to where these characteristics intersect with those of other
underrepresented groups. In addition the pivotal role that inclusion plays as a
political construct, receiving near-universal formal legitimacy makes it an important
source of power.
Power in the modern European workplace
A relatively recent development in the literature around multinationals and the
transfer of policies within them has been an analysis of such organisations as
‘political’ in which power is exercised by certain actors over others. This power
analysis is conceptualized differently by scholars from the international business
perceptive than, say, the sociology of labour but this contemporary thread of
literature is, not least on account of the unique political role that outsourcing service
multinationals play in tendering and delivering hitherto ‘public’ services. This
highlights the political nature of such business organizations, which has been
explored in business strategy literature. One of the key antecedents that lead to
corporate political activity is the level of firm dependency on government, either in
the form of revenue through government contracts or the cost of regulation. The role
of public sector outsourcing falls into each of these categories, raising interesting
questions about which is the stronger incentive and whether this changes according
to the political and business cycle
‘The public service multinational’
The conceptual framework is built around the concept of the ‘public service
multinational’ (PSMN) as a unique, evolving and decidedly modern organisationtype, specifically as an employer. The volume of literature focusing on
manufacturing multinationals and those in heavy industry is much greater than in
various service sectors, about whose human resource and related practices ‘we
actually know relatively little about’, and the PSMN is an extension of this. Three key
characteristics can be identified that in this regard that make the original concept of
the public service multinational worthy of further investigation: 1) the absence, or
significant reduction, in the role of market forces; 2) the unique character of the
public sector customer, and; 3) the nature of ‘public service’ to employees in such
organizations. Each of these factors are fundamental to the research initial findings
and fieldwork design.
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Institutional legacies: barriers and opportunities
The approach taken by multinationals and unions in navigating institutional systems
is multileveled and relates directly to the power dynamic mentioned above. For the
particular case of unions there is widespread recognition amongst scholars that they
have often struggled to be effective outside of the traditional focus of the national
level, which is itself of diminishing significance. At the European level especially this
is pertinent to this proposal. The ‘Europeanization of industrial relations’ through the
establishment of European Works Councils and, more recently European
Framework Agreements is an area of significant progress over recent years, yet the
picture remains mixed in terms of tangible outcomes as questions persist within
organizations regarding the most appropriate level of dialogue. Given the role of
diversity initiatives we must also consider the ‘trilemma’ facing not only the
multinational actors operating with it but the EU as a whole: that free movement,
equal treatment and Member State autonomy around the fundamental rights of
association and collective action cannot be realized in equal measure. Such are the
numerous and complex institutional hurdles confronting actors.
Research questions
1. What role do workforce diversity strategies play in developing union activists
and managers in subsidiaries?
2. Why are these specific strategies suitable for a public sector multinational?
By way of brief explanation: the first question relates to how the specific institutional
arrangements in which they operate as private deliverers of ‘public’ services impacts
on their propensity to be inclusive workplaces, as alluded to in the previous
paragraph on diversity and inclusion. This includes the regulatory environment, by
definition much more politicized than in other sectors, as well as the relationship
between the services provided—potentially to marginalized groups—and subjective
experiences as employees. It all raises questions around how the subsidiary and the
multinational as a whole relate to the institutional and political systems in which they
are embedded, including how they seek to influence outcomes. If, for example,
multinationals lobby for beneficial legislation/regulation at national level and
subsidiaries are multinationals’ representatives in a given jurisdiction, whilst also
bearing in mind that expertise in navigating national legal frameworks is a domain in
which subsidiaries can derive much of their leverage in power relations with
headquarters, then what is the subsidiaries’ dominant motivation? Does the nature
of public sector outsourcing contracts change the intra- and inter-organizational
power dynamic, as opposed to traditional subsidiary arrangements founded on the
basis of more conventional foreign direct investment?
The second question relates to the power dynamics within this organization type and
how that impacts on workplace inclusion. The ways in which power resources can
be captured by managers and employees, in what is already a politically contentious
environment, to create workplaces that are, or are not, inclusive for migrant workers
and ethnic minorities. Again, the distinctive role of the public service multinational is
crucial to understanding here the power resources with a mixture and staff, including
management, and union representation structures from public sector backgrounds
and the sense of ‘organizational memory’ that this carries. The power analysis
raises further questions in relation to workplace inclusion, such as whether diversity
strategies, as a widely accepted objective generally, represent a relatively safe area
of work for union activists in which employees feel more confident in becoming
17 | P a g e
involved in union, and existing activists to develop further. What is the result of
differing motivations to developing diversity strategies in multinationals on the part of
management and unions? Do business case justifications inevitably contaminate
union equality objectives and what are the power dynamics that lead to this, or its
rejection? Here the business case justification of diversity policy will also need to be
considered: how does this interact with multinational structure? For example if
subsidiaries are in competition via any kind of constructed internal markets how
does this affect a business case approach to diversity? Again, channelling this
through our conceptual framework of the public service multinational will be key – for
example, are they less likely to be structured so as to compete due to the intrinsic
difficulty in delivering public services from another location?
These issues will all be addressed in the forthcoming programme of interviews.
T2 – (ESR8 – Mateusz Karolak, University of Wroclaw)
Project title: Return migrants inclusion and employment: the case of return
migration from the UK to Poland
Existing body of literature on return migration, similarly to those on migration in
general, usually take one particular perspective, be it neoclassical or structural
approach, new economic of labour migration or transnationalism. All of those
approaches are characterised be the certain set of assumptions and two separate
visions of the human action prevail: migrants or their families are seen either as
rational actors who take their decisions after carefully considering costs and benefits
of their actions or as out of free will subjects convicted to the pre-determination
resulting from their position in social structures.
So far, the research approaches applied to the Polish return migrants situation on
the labour market have tended to concentrate on the quantitative dimension of the
labour market and on the objective/measurable side of the labour market inclusion,
understood purely in terms of being employed. Less numerous qualitative studies on
the individual returnees working lives put more emphasis on human agency. In
extreme cases, they ascribe to the migrants full agency, seeing the migration
experience as for example an asset waking the “spirit of entrepreneurship”.
The existing studies (eg. Smoliner, Förschner, Hochgerner, & Nova, 2011) point out
that there is ‘mixed evidence’ with regard to the situation of Polish returnees on the
labour market. While some groups of returnees improve their labour market situation
comparing to that before emigration, other find themselves in more fragile conditions
(Iglicka, 2010). Recent analysis of the Labour Force Survey in Poland (Anacka and
Fihel 2013) has showed that the long term migration experience makes the
probability of the unemployment three to five times higher, as compared with the
non-mobile population. On the other hand, human capital approach suggests that
migratory experience and resources are likely to improve returnees’ competitiveness
and foster their successful adaptation on the home country labour market (eg.
Dustmann, Fadlon, and Weiss 2011; European Commision 2013) Addressing this
apparent contradiction, the research aimed at understanding the conditions and
processes of successful and unsuccessful reintegration on the labour market of the
Polish returnees from the United Kingdom. The choice of the UK might be explained
at least twofold. Firstly, after the EU enlargement in the 2004 the UK became new
and most popular destination country among Polish migrants (Kostrzewa and
18 | P a g e
Szałtys 2013). Secondly, it is indicated that the post accession migration patterns to
the “new destination countries” including UK, differ as compared to the previous
migration waves. It is characterized by the emergence of the “temporary foreign
worker” less committed to the host country and ready to move whenever it is
suitable (Engbersen and Snel 2013).
In order to overcome the dilemmas of agency-structure and fill the gap in the
existing literature the critical realism approach (Margaret Archer 2007) have been
applied. In that view, actors mediate between their concerns and structural as well
as cultural conditions, and the tool for that is reflexivity defined as “the regular
exercise of the mental ability, shared by all normal people, to consider themselves in
relation to their (social) contexts and vice versa” (Archer 2007:4). Exercising
reflexivity, subjects take into account their ultimate concerns and assess (correctly
or not) the structural enablements and define life projects they would like to realise
and finally undertake actions, which in their opinion should lead them towards
achieving the earlier defined goals.
Looking at the return migrants labour market situation through the lens of the critical
realism allowed on the one hand to acknowledge migrants agency, on the other
hand, to take into account specific structural labour market situation. Moreover,
analysing the returnees’ ultimate concerns and its evolution over the time enableed
to overcome the limitations of the theories treating social actors only as purely
economically motivated individuals.
The biographical narrative interviews were chosen as a main method of data
collection. Exploring migrant’s biographies made possible to study the objective and
subjective dimensions of their careers (cf. Hughes 1997). Moreover, the in-depth
analysis allowed also to grasp the intertwining factors influencing the decision about
return and general life strategy applied by the interviewees. The exploration of return
migrants labour market situation through biographical narrative interviews made it
possible to understand the latter as the outcome of structurally and institutionally
given opportunities and constraints and individual choices, concerns and reflexivity,
fully in line with the critical realist approach by Archer (2007).
So far 22 biographical narrative interviews with the Polish returnees from the UK
(10) and re-migrants to the UK (12) have been conducted. The collected data was
analysed following some of the procedures of the grounded theory methodology
(GTM) (Glaser and Strauss 1967), including open coding and selective coding.
The tentative analysis of returnees perception of their own labour market situation,
compared with the “objective” labour market positions, showed that the most
productive way of interpreting returnees labour market situation is to abandon rigid
division between inclusion and exclusion on the labour market and try to treat those
categories rather as endpoints forming a continuum within which concrete cases can
be situated. Such a perspective made it possible to take into account the dimension
of job quality, and thus spot the experienced consequences of the ongoing
employment flexibilisation. So far such perspective has been underplayed in the
existing research on Polish return migrants. Moreover, return might be caused by
both instrumental reasons, understood as a motivation related to present or future
employment, and by non-instrumental reasons, when work is of secondary
importance. This situation is similar to that of Polish emigrants, as indicated by Kaja
19 | P a g e
Kaźmierska and her colleagues (2011) Already existing quantitative data show that
while more people declare work related issues as a main motivation for emigration,
the majority of the returnees give non-work related issues as their main reason of
their comeback (Kostrzewa and Szałtys 2013). However the intersection of each
described category has been observed. In other words, while there are return
migrants who are coming back to Poland for non-instrumental reasons and enjoy all
of the work related securities, there are also people returning to Poland motivated
primarily by the work, but who end up in the situation perceived as exclusion
(subjectively or objectively or both).
The agency of the returnees is often constrained by the structural factors in Poland,
such as high unemployment (especially in the little towns and villages), low wages,
high prices of housing, precarious working conditions specific to certain occupations
and the decline in the value of formal education. In case of return from the noninstrumental reasons (eg. due to family reasons, crisis or post-materialistic values) it
might lead to the career characterised by the changeability of undertaken jobs
however not resulting in the social mobility. The experience of other, most often
better in terms of remuneration, working conditions abroad changes the perception
of work after return. Although the awareness of financial uncertainty after return is
stronger and returnees redefine their understanding of “normal working conditions” it
does not translate into collective attempts to change the situation. The re-migration
and thus changing the context is often perceived by migrants as a more reasonable
coping strategy than attempts to change situation in the country of origin. The
coping strategies of those who remain in Polad after their return, will be explored in
the further course of research.
As for re-migrants if the duration of stay in Poland was not too long, and migrants
exercise a construction type of carrier, re-migration leads to the restore of the value
of possessed resources and continuity of the career abroad. It seems that the return
for some young people is “the last chance” given to Poland. If from various reasons
it ends with the re-migration, people start to settle down, they take credits and buy
houses, what in turn, higher the potential costs of less likely second return. In this
way it discord also with the hypothesis of “brain circulation” or “liquid migration”. It
might be noticed that in the course of the life the initial “intentional unpredictability”
as described by Eade, Drinkwater, and Garapich (2007) gives way to the search for
stabilisation.
References
Anacka, Marta, and Agnieszka Fihel. 2013. “Charakterystyka Migrantów
Powracających Do Polski Oraz Ich Aktywność Zawodowa Na Rodzimym Rynku
Pracy.” Studia Migracyjne - Przegląd Polonijny (4):57–71.
Archer, Margaret S. 2007. Making Our Way through the World. Cambridge
University Press.
Dustmann, Christian, Itzhak Fadlon, and Yoram Weiss. 2011. “Return Migration ,
Human Capital Accumulation and the Brain Drain.” Journal of Development
Economics 95(1):58–67.
Engbersen, Godfried, and Erik Snel. 2013. “Dynamic and Fluid Patterns of PostAccession Migration Flows.” Pp. 21–40 in Mobility in Transition. Migration Patterns
after EU Enlargement, edited by Birgit Glorius, Izabela Grabowska-Lusińska, and
Aimee Kuvik. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.
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European Union. 2013. EU Measures to Tackle Youth Unemployment - MEMO/13/464
28/05/2013. Brussels.
Fuller, Andy, and Terry Ward. 2012. Mobility in Europe 2012.
Glaser, Barney, and Anselm Strauss. 1967. The Discovery of Grounded Theory:
Strategies for Qualita- Tive Research. Chicago: Aldine.
Hughes, E. C. 1997. “Careers.” Qualitative Sociology 20:389–97.
Kaźmierska, Kaja, Andrzej Piotrowski, and Katarzyna Waniek. 2011. “Biographical
Consequences of Working Abroad in the Context of European Mental Space
Construction.” Sociological Review 60(1):139–58.
Kostrzewa, Zofia, and Dorota Szałtys. 2013. Migracje Zagraniczne Ludności.
Narodowy Spis Powszechny Ludności I Mieszkań 2011. Warszawa.
T2 – (ESR9 – Nina Sahraoui, LondonMet)
Project title: Life on the margins - the social implications of precarious work
specifically in relation to young minority ethnic workers
Empirical context: The research design is cross-national including the UK, France
and Spain and the study focuses on the intersection of migration, gender, ethnicity
and age. It looks into the experiences of minority ethnic and migrant workers in
elderly care.
Research question: How do processes of precarisation intersect with racialization
and gendered labour segmentation in three care regimes? What does the
comparison of care workers’ experiences - as embedded in three national contexts
and narrated- reveal as to how policies and institutions shape their working lives?
Methodology and the added value of the cross-national analysis
This study relies on a political economy framework drawing upon Fiona Williams’
writings on the transnational political economy of care and her claim that “a
country’s care regime intersects with its migration regime and its employment
regime which provides the institutional context that shapes the experiences of both
migrant women employed in domestic/care work and their employers, as well as the
patterns of migrant care work to be found in different countries (Williams in
Anderson and Shutes 2014: 17, author’s emphasis). The analysis of the material
collected in London, Paris and Madrid will shed light on the specificities created by
the intersection of different care, migration and employment regimes as well as on
the commonalities created by underlying processes that these regimes share in
spite of apparent divergences.
Fieldwork contexts
The UK represents a case of extended privatisation through contracting out of
services and the implementation of cash allowances, with the share of the public
sector being significantly reduced since the 1980s (Simonazzi, 2009). Expanding
privatisation concerns both home care and residential care, with 76% of residential
care being owned by for-profit organisations in England (Simonazzi 2009). It is
estimated that the social care workforce caring for older people needs to increase by
79% by 2032 (Wittenburg et al. 2010: 15 cited in Shutes, 2011). Care work remains
one of the lowest paid sectors of the labour market (Low Pay Commission, 2010).
On average, workers in this sector are in their early 40s (Hussein, 2011). Non-white
minority ethnic groups account for at least 17 % of care workers (including both UK
and foreign born workers) and there is a particularly strong concentration of BME
care workers in London, where they constitute two-thirds of the workforce (Cangiano
et al., 2009). The sector presents very low levels of unionisation (Lethbridge, 2011,
21 | P a g e
p. 39) and high turnover that renders the workforce particularly vulnerable. The
share of migrant care workers in the sector is significantly growing with an increase
of 112% between 2003 and 2008 compared to 16% of growth for UK born carers
(Cangiano et al., 2009).
In France, most of residential care is provided publicly (60%), the remaining 40%
being shared between non-for-profit (26%) and for-profit facilities (14%), (Simonazzi,
2009). The sector is characterized by low pay, lack of professional recognition, high
rates of work disabilities as well as high levels of turnover (Lada, 2011). Regarding
employment terms, part-time and fixed term contracts are widespread. In spite of the
absence of ethnic statistics in the French context, previous research has shown that
migrants and ethnic minorities are over-represented in the sector, especially in
urban areas.
Official figures in Spain seem to indicate that the most common form of care
provision in the autonomous region of Madrid are care homes that are in charge of
3,7% of the elderly population, mostly in private facilities (74%), (Instituto de
Mayores y Servicios Sociales, 2005). While this data reflects certain trends within
the formal economy the importance of the informal economy would suggest that
homecare remains more common than institutional care. There exist various
reasons for institutional care not to be more extensively developed in the region of
Madrid in spite of the ageing population. On the one hand there is a strong
preference among families for care services provided at home, and on the other
hand the offer in terms of care homes hardly provides a sustainable solution.
Publicly financed care homes (mostly managed by private companies through
outsourcing) aren’t able to answer the needs and very long waiting lists are the
norm. Furthermore prices of private care homes make these services inaccessible
to most families (IMSERSO, 2005; this was also confirmed by fieldwork).
Emerging themes
The labour intensive process that characterizes the care sector engenders structural
pressures to maintain low costs of labour in the context of the commodification of
care. These dynamics manifest themselves through the construction of care as
unskilled labour and the channelling into the sector of a gendered and racialized
workforce. Emerging themes from interviews include routes into employment, pay
level, precarious working conditions, discrimination and racism as well as social
implications of affective labour for the workers. Most prominent themes are
presented in the chart below.
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Title: Emerging themes from fieldwork at an early stage of analysis
Theme 3: Employee Wellbeing and Work Life Quality
Summary
‘Employee wellbeing and worklife quality’ comprises of three research projects. On
the first axis of investigation, the initial research findings concerned ‘Flexicurity and
temporary agency work: an international comparative study on organizational
practices and consequences on employee wellbeing’. The main findings showed an
existing gap in cross-country, comparative qualitative research. Addressing this gap
by conducting qualitative inquiry, ESR10 indicated a considerable difference in
employment regimes of TAW in Sweden and Poland, stemming from the critical role
of the industry and organizational practices and national regulatory regimes that
frame the use of agency work. On the second axis of investigation, the Examination
of the impact of the changing nature of employment regimes on employees in the
supply chain aiming at exploring job quality in the Scottish Spirits Industry (SSI) the
main results focus around the production process and its impact on the wellbeing. A
main result of the researcher’s participant observation with the multitasked teams
working through the whole conveyer belt indicated that there is a hierarchical
division of work between temporary and permanent workers, with more possibility of
autonomous work for the latter. The production chain revealed increased levels of
stress for the permanent workers due to the nature of the site and constant
presence of supervisors for each island of production .The third axis of investigation
Work rationalisation and intellectual work of engineers in high performance work
organisations is questioning work rationalization in the work organization of highly
skilled “white collar” IT workers. Firstly, it has been identified a research gap
regarding the connection between pace of technological change and people working
23 | P a g e
on the edge of these changes. Secondly, managerial strategies are feeding into
these tensions by attempting to categorize IT workers within strict frameworks of
skills and certifications.
An analytical overview of Theme 3 (Employee Wellbeing and Work Life
Quality) initial research findings
T3 – (ESR10 – Pille Strauss-Raats, University of Goteborg)
Project title: Flexicurity and temporary agency work: an international
comparative study on organizational practices and consequences on
employee wellbeing
The aim of this policy-focused comparative research project is to investigate
employee work life quality and wellbeing in the context of the current flexicuritybased EU employment policy. The practice of temporary agency work (TAW) is
selected as the key case for the study - this growing work form is recognised by the
European Union (EU) as a necessary contributing factor for achieving flexicurity in
European labour markets (European Commission, 2008). While flexicurity is
intended as a balanced combination of flexibility and security for both employers and
employees, it has been criticized for its unrealistic objectives – instead of the
proposed win-win situation for both of the labour market parties, a trade-off in favour
of capital or selected employee groups is a potential outcome (Burroni & Keune,
2011). Supporting this concern, a review of literature on physical and psychosocial
working conditions of temporary agency workers showed that agency workers were
constantly among the groups with lowest quality of work in terms of risk exposure
but also work accidents and ill health(Håkansson, Isidorsson, & Strauss-Raats,
2013).
The critical characteristic of TAW that distinguishes it from other forms of nonstandard employment is its tripartite employment relationship where the agency
worker has employment contract with temporary work agency but is sent to work
under supervision and at the premises of the user firm. In practice this means that
the employee’s work is organized and work environment controlled by the user firm
with no direct duty of care in the sense of the traditional employer-employee
relationship. The employer responsible for the employee, the work agency, has
limited access and control over the employee’s working conditions but also,
importantly, is to an extent financially dependent on its client, the user firm (Quinlan
& Mayhew, 1999). This break in the line of responsibility can pose a challenge for
labour market sustainability in the long run as the employee becomes another
commodity chosen for use by its ability to efficiently ‘fit in’ to the needs of a particular
user organization at the particular time with limited motivation for either employer to
invest in employee’s long-term training and development opportunities or wellbeing.
EU has acknowledged the need for specific protective framework for agency
workers and the core principles of TAW regulation are set at the EU level by
directives requiring equal treatment and safe working conditions1. However, there is
considerable national variety in application of the directives’ principles arising from
the diversity in historical, political and economical factors affecting the institutional
setting for employment relations in a particular member state (Watts, 2013). This
leads to one of the research questions for the current project – does the national
1
2008/104/EC, 91/383/EEC
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variety in TAW lead to different outcomes for employee work-life quality and
wellbeing? If yes, then what are the critical differences and underlying mechanisms
and if no, then what are the underlying factors ‘overpowering’ the differences in
regulatory regimes?
To answer these questions, the project takes a multi-level approach in three EU
member states: Sweden, Poland and Belgium. Empirical data is collected through
case studies in three subsidiaries of one manufacturing sector multinational
company (MNC) with subsidiaries in the above-mentioned countries. Using one
company and comparable type of production allows for better contextualizing of the
organizational practices and individual outcomes in these specific national
regulatory regimes. First, the national regulation of TAW is analysed through a
documentary review, looking at statutory regulation, collective agreements but also
strategies and enforcement documents of different state and non-state actors critical
in this field. Second, organizational policies and practices are investigated through
document review and interviews with key stakeholders in the organization. Finally,
questionnaire survey is carried out to gain data on employee subjective evaluations
of their work life and wellbeing.
In conceptualizing work-life quality for the project, the core concepts of flexicurity as
directed towards employee are understood as the starting point (Wilthagen & Tros,
2004). However, based on previous literature on developments in the world of work
in general (Standing, 2009) and in agency work in particular (Håkansson et al.,
2013), it is considered necessary to expand the dimensions of job, employment,
income and combination security by also looking at work demands and decision
latitude, representation security (opportunities for collective voice), work security
(safe and healthy working conditions). Finally, special attention will be paid to social
relationships at work – both social integration and social support are acknowledged
for their role in mitigating the effects of demanding working conditions for employee
wellbeing (Thoits, 2011) and TAW practice inherently challenges the opportunities to
form supportive connections at work (Garsten, 2008).
First results of the project so far are related to the literature review that was carried
out in the preparatory phase of the project (Håkansson et al., 2013) and form the
basis of the above discussion on working conditions in TAW sector. The review also
identified gaps in research in this area – there is little comparative research and
case studies, few of the larger quantitative studies pay specific attention to the
country-specific underlying mechanisms behind the findings, thus making
interpretation and comparing the data between different studies difficult and there is
little data on the comparative exposure to workplace risk factors for agency workers
compared to permanent employees at the same workplaces.
Second, the analysis of the regulatory regimes of TAW in Sweden and Poland (the
first countries that have been accessed for fieldwork) have been formulated into a
working paper presented at the Nordic Working Life Conference in June 2014. This
paper focused on three aspects of labour security: employment security, work
security and representation security for TAW and illustrates the interconnectedness
of the different security dimensions as well as the critical role of a national industrial
relations system in conditioning working conditions. Polish regulatory regime of TAW
is relatively strict, based mainly on statutory law and enforcement with little input
from the bodies of collective bargaining. The Swedish agency work regulation on the
25 | P a g e
other hand is one of the most liberal in the EU but relies heavily on social partners in
both standard-setting and enforcement. Looking at selected indicators of job quality,
the numbers at national level show high prevalence of insecure precarious
employment in Poland and specifically in the agency work sector where unjustified
use of civil law contracts that leave workers out of any kind of employment
protection is considered problematic. Even though the line between agency work
and other forms of employment is sometimes hard to draw also in Sweden, thus
making it difficult to estimate the prevalence of possible abuses (and have
trustworthy numbers of agency work at all), this is not highlighted as problematic by
the labour market parties. Most workers in TAW sector work on open-ended
employment contract and thus fall unto the protective mechanisms of general labour
law as well as sectoral collective agreements. In case of TAW, the main concern of
the Swedish Labour Inspectorate and social partners is the health and safety under
the shared responsibilities. In both countries the practice of temporary agency work
challenges existing structure of employee representation.
First empirical data from interviews in the subsidiaries of the MNC in Poland and
Sweden is available but not yet fully analysed, as the interview process is still ongoing at the time of writing. The very preliminary interpretation of the interview data
does confirm the critical role of the sector/industry and organizational practices
when looking at the mechanisms for work quality – national regulatory regimes do
frame the use of agency work but the underlying power dynamics between employer
and employee show similar patterns in both cases.
The final stage of empirical work in this project is yet to be done – a survey
questionnaire to investigate employee level perceptions (for both TAWs and
organizations’ permanent employees) on dimensions of security, workplace risk
exposure, job demands, decision latitude and social support patterns and wellbeing
will be distributed during the first half of 2015.
References
Burroni, Luigi, & Keune, Maarten. (2011). Flexicurity: A conceptual critique.
European
Journal
of
Industrial
Relations,
17(1),
75-91.
doi:
10.1177/0959680110393189
European Commission. (2008). Council regulation 2008/104/EC of 19 November on
temporary agency work, OJ L327/9.
Garsten, Christina. (2008). Workplace vagabonds: career and community in
changing worlds of work: Palgrave Macmillan Basingstoke.
Håkansson, K, Isidorsson, T, & Strauss-Raats, P. (2013). Kunskapsöversikt om
bemanningsbranschen och arbetsmiljöfrågor för hyresarbetskraft. Arbetsmiljövärket.
Quinlan, Michael, & Mayhew, C. (1999). Precarious Employment and Workers'
Compensation.
Int
J
Law
Psychiatry,
22(5–6),
491-520.
doi:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0160-2527(99)00023-0
Standing, Guy. (2009). Work after Globalization: Edward Elgar Pub.
Thoits, Peggy A. (2011). Mechanisms linking social ties and support to physical and
mental health. Journal of Health and Social Behavior, 52(2), 145-161.
Watts, J. (2013). The Institutional Context for Temporary Staffing: A European
Cross-national Comparative Approach. (A thesis submitted to the University of
Manchester for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Humanities),
University of Manchester, Manchester.
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Wilthagen, T, & Tros, F. (2004). The concept of ‘flexicurity’. A new approach to
regulating employment and labour markets. Transfer, 10(2), 166-186.
T3 – (ESR11 – Pedro Mendonça, University of Strathclyde)
Project title: Examination of the impact of the changing nature of employment
regimes on employees in the supply chain
The research project in which I am involved aims at exploring job quality in the
Scottish Spirits Industry (SSI). Building on qualitative research this study examines
drivers, trends and consequences for the quality of jobs, specifically on job security,
task discretion, and work intensity. Thus, by mapping rigorously how politicaleconomic factors influence inter-firm relations it exposes the implications it has for
job quality. This Initial Findings’ Summary Report draws on visits to the Associated
Partner where this research project will take place, and one meeting with its HR
Director; Although hasn’t been the time to ‘work’ on the gathered data, there is
information from two semi-structured interviews to key individuals with deep
knowledge of the Scotch Whisky Industry.
The associated partner to this research project produces spirits, specifically Scotch
Whisky and Rum. It is based in Glasgow and it is involved with every stage of
producing, bottling, distributing and marketing of its produces. The company holds
distilleries around Scotland where several brands and types of whisky are craftily
produced. 800 employees constitute the workforce in the company, in which 40%
are in temporary contracts. Therefore 320 out of 800 workers are in temporary
contracts. There seems to be a differentiation, as HR manager mentions:
Temporary contracts are firstly given 1 or 3 months terms, and then can be
extended. Most of the workers will leave at Christmas because we need
(them) to help us with the Christmas orders… so that is the season of the
year that we need more employees and then they leave, but we will re
engage them again in the next year. This is for operatives. But for staff all are
with permanent contracts.
The company is an unionised environment. It is recognised two trade unions, the
GMB for the operatives in the bottling, cooperage and distilleries sites. And Unite for
the line engineers. GMB – has 700 members. In Glasgow plant site 74% of the
operational workforce are union members; cooperage site has 90% of membership.
In distilleries only 22% of the workforce. But overall 66% of the workforce are
members of GMB.
During my two visits (the 1st in July, the 2nd in December 2014) to the company’s
facilities I was allowed to observe the production process. This is divided in two
sectors, the mass production and the quality production. Within the massed
produced sector, a range of conveyer belts working in bottling and packaging were
disposed in a typical manufacturing work setting. When finished, each unit was
ready to be loaded into the lorry and consequently distributed. Multitasked teams
were working through the whole conveyer belt with targets clearly disposed on
screens. These screens were showing the percentage of accomplished ‘allotment’,
as well as the time remaining for the allotment to be finished – which shows the
market as a controller of performance and pace of work. The work pace was clearly
high, as workers demonstrated fast pace from task to task at all times. Although it
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was observable frequent stops of the conveyer-belts due to ‘technical problems’,
which would slightly ease the pace of work. Multitasked workers have the freedom
to stop the conveyer belt for any reason. Although if there is a flaw in one bottle it is
automatically separated to a different compartment where workers could check the
flaw. I was told that the workforce working around the conveyer belts were a mix of
temporary and permanent workers. The temporary workforce was specifically at this
time of year (December) to compensate for the extra demands inherent from the
season. These workers were mainly left with more ‘easy’ and ‘straightforward’ tasks,
whereas the permanent workforce was distributed between quality checks. I was
informed that some of the core workforce had to be allocated to the quality
production section so that customer targets were accomplished in time.
In the quality production section, there were no conveyer-belts. Workers were
disposed in small ‘islands of production’ where they would work in teams packing
the products by hand. There was no machinery around because it was claimed that
‘these brands are packed by hand; no machine could do with the quality that they
(workers) do. It is also part of the brand value. A customer in the other part of the
world knows it is truly a handcrafted product’. Workers clearly enjoyed more
discretion and autonomy when compared with colleagues at the other section.
Although, due to the nature of the site and constant presence of supervisors for
each island of production, there was not much ‘idle moments’, and therefore it was
observable a constant and non-stop pace of work. In comparison to the mass
production section there was no moments of work ease. The workforce in this
section was composed by permanent employees with long-term relationship to the
company and/or that demonstrated great quality check skills. It was observable that
this workforce group had the opportunity to use their skills.
T3 – (ESR12 – Laurens Deprez, Université d'Évry-Val-d'Essonne)
Project title: Work rationalisation and intellectual work of engineers in high
performance work organisations
The main goal of this PhD is to research if work rationalization has been taking
place in the work organization of highly skilled “white collar” workers, more
specifically IT workers. In the last decades the IT industry has risen to a prominent
place in the global economy, and people working in it have become the poster child
of the knowledge economy. The IT industry itself has a lot of things in common with
other sectors, but there are a few crucial differences pertaining to rationalization and
pressure on workers, simply by the nature of the IT industry. Chief among these
differences is the extremely high pace of technological and job change, as well as
the constant learning and training.
Preliminary results are based on unstructured qualitative interviews with IT workers
using the snowballing method. In these interviews people can talk almost
unrestricted about their job and career history, with follow up questions asked about
subjects they bring up during the conversation. Based on my own experience in the
sector I also have a small ethnographic research going on working together with
some programmers on a hobby project outside office hours. All of this resulted in a
survey in Dutch, French and English asking about first starting out in the IT sector,
the current job in the IT sector and current company, and experiences with control,
stress and autonomy. Finally some general questions about the career, the IT sector
and future prospects are asked.
28 | P a g e
It seems there are several pressures at work for people working in the IT. There also
seems to be a gap in research regarding the connection between pace of
technological change and people working on the edge of these changes.
The constant uncertainty what skills to learn or maintain is a constant pressure given
that technology changes at an increasing rate, especially when measured over the
entire career. This pressure is especially prevalent in the IT industry, and it gives IT
workers, even those higher up in the profession an aspect of precarity as it is
impossible to settle into a job without fear of becoming redundant due to the march
of technology. The fact that this is an external pressure outside the control of the
worker makes it weigh heavier.
This means there is a constant pressure to learn, to adapt and up skill oneself.
Given there is a contextual aspect to knowledge as well, especially in those jobs
demanding more creative application of knowledge, this seems conductive to a
nomad career of frequent job changing to improve oneself and stay at the edge of
technological change. This can viewed positively, as a challenge and a way to
expand the comfort zone of one’s knowledge, but it also breeds career insecurity
and individualization.
Because of the high level of skill required, the creative aspect and the relatively tight
labour market, some groups offers within the sector are better able to withstand
rationalisation and commodification of their work and labour time. However, this is
not the case for all groups within the sector. Preliminary research suggests that IT
workers such as network administrators, technicians and helpdesk workers who
keep the infrastructure system running and do maintenance on a system already in
place are more vulnerable to rationalisation of their work than those workers such as
programmers, test engineers or developers who are involved in the creation
software or more broadly speaking IT products.
Especially this last group displays tendencies of being more akin to a pre capitalistic
craftsman: they have a strong guild mentality and ethics, they consider themselves
more part of an (online) community than of the company they currently work for, and
they are more focused on learning and creating technology than on climbing the
corporate (management) career ladder. This tendency is especially prevalent in
those IT workers that are also active in the open source world.
Because of uniqueness of the sector new forms of organizing teamwork are
becoming more and more part of the culture. Agile software development, Scrum
(organisational model) and Lean Startup (business model) are both reactions to and
consequences of high levels of autonomy as these forms of organisation are highly
self-policing. The work one does is being constantly scrutinised by colleagues as
they are best able to judge the quality of one’s work, but on the other hand it does
offer considerable autonomy to software development teams.
There is a tension between the craftsman aspect and the drive for quick profit from
management: good work may be less profitable than fast work in the short term. A
shorter time cycle for the product means higher efficiency and more profits, but this
point of view fails to take into account the creative process of the application of
theoretical knowledge to specific contexts, and is at odds with the craftsman ethic of
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doing the best work one can regardless of profitability.
All these tensions are strengthened by several management strategies attempting to
categorize IT workers within strict frameworks of skills and certifications, and
attempting techniques of knowledge management to make all this possible in the
first place. The constant rejuvenation and revitalization of the work force through
constant firing due to performance based evaluation certainly is also a pressure,
even though this does not happen everywhere. It seems the way management is
handling IT workers is not through a control system based on fear, or even force, it
is simply based on uncertainty.
Another thing to consider is that IT workers are not only the recipients of
rationalisation, through their work they are often the instigators of rationalisation and
automatisation in other sectors as well. The IT sector itself also creates tools of
rationalisation for other sectors. Technological concepts like the internet of things
are poised to have a profound impact on work and the rate of profit, while at the
same time the open source and peer to peer movements are undermining those
industries based on cognitive capitalism. These are fields of future research.
Acknowledgements
* This report has been developed and finalised accordingly to a design conceived by:
ER1: Dr. Maria Richea & ER2: Dr. Olena Fedyuk
END – published February 2015
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