Fudge Judy - Temporary Work, Agencies, and Unfree Labor.

Unfree labour has not disappeared from advanced capitalist economies. In this sense the debates among and between Marxist and orthodox economic historians about the incompatibility of capitalism and unfree labour are moot: the International Labour Organisation has identified forced, coerced and unfree labour as a contemporary issue of global concern. Previously hidden forms of unfree labour have emerged in parallel with several other well-documented trends affecting labour conditions, rights and modes of regulation. These evolving types of unfree labour include the increasing normalization of contingent work (and, by extension, the undermining of the standard contract of employment) and an increase in labour intermediation. The normative, political and numerical rise of temporary employment agencies in many countries in the last three decades is indicative of these trends.

It is in the context of this rapidly changing landscape that this book consolidates and expands on research designed to understand new institutions for work in the global era. This edited collection provides a theoretical and empirical exploration of the links between unfree labour, intermediation and modes of regulation, with particular focus on the evolving institutional forms and political-economic contexts that have been implicated in, and shaped by, the ascendency of temp agencies. What is distinctive about this collection is this bifocal lens: it makes a substantial theoretical contribution by linking disparate literatures on, and debates about, the coevolution of contingent work and unfree labour, new forms of labour intermediation and different regulatory approaches, but it further lays the foundation for this theory in a series of empirically rich and geographically diverse case studies. This integrative approach is grounded in a cross-national comparative framework, using this approach as the basis for assessing how, and to what extent, temporary agency work can be considered unfree wage labour

Kendra Strauss is Lecturer in Human Geography and Fellow of Robinson College, University of Cambridge. She is a feminist economic geographer with interests in labour market change, feminist political economy and geographies of risk and welfare.

Judy Fudge is the Lansdowne Chair in Law at the University of Victoria, Canada.

Edited by Tony Elger and Peter Fairbrother

The aim of the Employment and Work Relations in Context Series is to address questions relating to the evolving patterns and politics of work, employment, management and industrial relations. There is a concern to trace out the ways in which wider policy-making, especially by national governments and transnational corporations, impinges upon specific workplaces, occupations, labour markets, localities and regions. This invites attention to developments at an international level, marking out patterns of globalization, state policy and practices in the context of globalization and the impact of these processes on labour. A particular feature of the series is the consideration of forms of worker and citizen organization and mobilization. The studies address major analytical and policy issues through case study and comparative research.

1 Employment Relations in the Health Service

The Management of Reforms

Stephen Bach

2 Globalisation, State and Labour

Edited by Peter Fairbrother and Al Rainnie

3 Sexualities, Work and Organizations

Stories by Gay Men and Women in the Workplace at the Beginning of the 21 st Century

James Ward

4 Vocational Training

International Perspectives

Edited by Gerhard Bosch and Jean Charest

5 Industrial Relations in Education

Transforming the School Workforce

Bob Carter, Howard Stevenson and Rowena Passy

6 Social Regionalism in the Global Economy

Adelle Blackett and Christian Lvesque

7 Unions and Globalization

Governments, Management, and the State at Work

Peter Fairbrother, John OBrien, Anne Junor, Michael ODonnell and Glynne Williams

8 Privatization of Public Services

Impacts for Employment, Working Conditions, and Service Quality in Europe

Edited by Christoph Hermann and Jrg Flecker

9 Rediscovering Collective Bargaining

Australias Fair Work Act in International Perspective

Edited by Breen Creighton and Anthony Forsyth

10 Transnational Trade Unionism

Building Union Power

Peter Fairbrother, Marc-Antonin Hennebert, and Christian Lvesque

11 Temporary Work, Agencies and Unfree Labour

Insecurity in the New World of Work

Edited by Judy Fudge and Kendra Strauss

Previous titles to appear in Routledge Studies in Employment and Work Relations in Context include:

Work, Locality and the Rhythms of Capital

The Labour Process Reconsidered

Jamie Gough

Trade Unions in Renewal

A Comparative Study

Edited by Peter Fairbrother and Charlotte Yates

Reshaping the North American Automobile Industry

Restructuring, Corporatism and Union Democracy in Mexico

John P. Tuman

Work and Employment in the High Performance Workplace

Edited by Gregor Murray, Jacques Belanger, Anthony Giles and Paul-Andre Lapointe

Trade Unions and Global Governance

The Debate on a Social Clause

Gerda van Roozendaal

Changing Prospects for Trade Unionism

Edited by Peter Fairbrother and Gerard Griffin

Unionization and Union Leadership

The Road Haulage Industry

Paul Smith

Restructuring the Service Industries

Management Reform and Workplace Relations in the UK Service Sector

Gavin Poynter

Trade Unions at the Crossroads

Peter Fairbr other

Between Market, State and Kibbutz

The Management and Transformation of Socialist Industry

Christopher Warhurst

Globalization and Patterns of Labour Resistance

Edited by Jeremy Waddington

The State and Globalization

Comparative Studies of Labour and Capital in National Economies

Edited by Martin Upchurch

State Regulation and the Politics of Public Service

The Case of the Water Industry

Graham Taylor

Global Humanization

Studies in the Manufacture of Labour

Edited by Michael Neary

Women, Work and Trade Unions

Anne Munro

The Global Economy, National States and the Regulation of Labour

Edited by Paul Edwards and Tony Elgar

History of Work and Labour Relations in the Royal Dockyards

Edited by Ann Day and Kenneth Lunn

Japanese Management Techniques and British Workers

Andy Danford

Young People in the Workplace

Job, Union and Mobility Patterns

Christina Cregan

Globalization, Social Movements and the New Internationalisms

Peter Waterman

Young Adult Women, Work and Family

Living a Contradiction

Ian Procter and Maureen Padfield

The Sociology of Industrial Injury

Theo Nichols

Global Tourism and Informal Labour Relations

The Small Scale Syndrome at Work

Godfrey Baldacchino

Insecurity in the New World of Work

Edited by Judy Fudge
and Kendra Strauss

First published 2014

by Routledge
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Simultaneously published in the UK
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