Precarious Lives
Job Insecurity and Well-Being in Rich Democracies
Format:Paperback
Publisher:John Wiley and Sons Ltd
Published:1st Jun '18
Should be back in stock very soon
This paperback is available in another edition too:
- Hardback£55.00(9781509506491)
This insightful examination of employment relations reveals how precarious work impacts well-being across various advanced democracies, including insights from Precarious Lives.
In Precarious Lives, Arne L. Kalleberg delves into the shifting landscape of employment relations in advanced, post-industrial democracies. He highlights how the burden of work-related risks has increasingly fallen on workers, leading to a rise in job insecurity and precarious employment. This trend raises significant concerns about the overall well-being of individuals as they navigate economic instability, family dynamics, and personal happiness.
Kalleberg's analysis spans six advanced capitalist nations: the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Spain, and Denmark. By examining the effects of liberalized labor markets and welfare systems, he uncovers the profound implications these changes have on various aspects of life, including the transition to adulthood and family formation. The book presents a compelling case for how active labor market policies and robust social welfare systems can be instrumental in protecting workers while allowing employers the flexibility needed to thrive in a competitive global environment.
Ultimately, Precarious Lives offers a thought-provoking exploration of the new social contract that could emerge in response to the challenges posed by precarious work. Kalleberg's insights serve as a foundation for understanding how societies can address the vulnerabilities faced by workers in the modern economy, emphasizing the importance of policy interventions that prioritize both individual security and collective well-being.
"This book addresses one of the most pressing issues of the day: how precarious work is leading to precarious lives. By drawing on experiences in six diverse countries, it provides a potentially optimistic agenda for policy to halt or reverse the damage. In calling not only for wider social protection for all engaged in all forms of work but also for action, supported by worker organization, to change employer practices and stem the growth of precarious work, Kalleberg offers a useful alternative policy framework to the ultimately defeatist basic income approach where regulation of employers and of work itself is downgraded."
—Jill Rubery, The University of Manchester
"This latest book by Arne Kalleberg offers a powerful conception of precarity, how it takes distinct forms under different employment regimes, and – most important perhaps — how the rise of precarious work has reached deep into the private realm, threatening the well-being and family lives of workers. Sure to become a classic in the field."
—Steven Peter Vallas, Northeastern University
"Precarious work is by construction a relative concept (precarious compared to some standard), and Precarious Lives is a model and a guide of how to think about this concept across countries, which in turn helps us to use it more analytically in any one country. Kalleberg's analysis shines [and] I am convinced that Precarious Lives should become, and will become, the leading monographic analysis of precarious work."
—Chris Tilly, ILR Review
"In many ways, this book is vintage Kalleberg [...]. Using national-level statistics, Kalleberg carefully unpacks the complexity of precarious work and lives."
—Ching Kwan Lee, American Journal of Sociology
"From the doyen of precarious work research comes this comprehensive volume comparing the prevalence and consequences of job insecurity in six affluent democracies. [...]. The book is thorough, systematic and clear. Wherever prior research is dense or contradictory, Kalleberg is there to provide us a path through the thicket."
—Allison Pugh, Social Forces
"[I]nformative and thought-provoking [...]. This book makes a valuable contribution to the literature on employment relationships."
—Relations industrielles
ISBN: 9781509506507
Dimensions: 229mm x 152mm x 20mm
Weight: 386g
248 pages