Beyond the Wage
Ordinary Work in Diverse Economies
Edited by William Monteith, Dora-Olivia Vicol and Philippa Williams
Published
Jun 22, 2021Page count
314 pagesISBN
978-1529208931Dimensions
234 x 156 mmImprint
Bristol University PressPublished
Jun 22, 2021Page count
314 pagesISBN
978-1529208955Dimensions
234 x 156 mmImprint
Bristol University PressPublished
Jun 22, 2021Page count
314 pagesISBN
978-1529208955Dimensions
234 x 156 mmImprint
Bristol University Press
Beyond the Wage
In the media
'Work as we knew it has changed. Time to think beyond the wage' in The Conversation
Recent developments in the organization of work and production have facilitated the decline of wage employment in many regions of the world. However, the idea of the wage continues to dominate the political imaginations of governments, researchers and activists, based on the historical experiences of industrial workers in the global North.
This edited collection revitalises debates on the future of work by challenging the idea of wage employment as the global norm. Taking theoretical inspiration from the global South, the authors compare lived experiences of ‘ordinary work’ across taken-for-granted conceptual and geographical boundaries; from Cambodian brick kilns to Catalonian cooperatives. Their contributions open up new possibilities for how work, identity and security might be woven together differently.
This volume is an invaluable resource for academics, students and readers interested in alternative and emerging forms of work around the world.
"This book offers an innovative response to widespread contemporary concerns that we are increasingly facing a job-scarce future by rejecting the Eurocentric roots of this concern. The volume demonstrates how much we can all learn by turning to the Global South, to sites in which people’s engagement with fairly different strategies for work distribution and compensation have resulted in labour practices that can shed much needed light on contemporary work around the world." Ilana Gershon, Indiana University
"A much needed volume that brings to centre stage the diversity of ordinary work. It convincingly challenges the capitalocentric focus on wage employment as the only ‘real’ job." Katherine Gibson, Western Sydney University
"Challenging assumptions that restrict and hierarchise most thinking about work, this exciting collection draws from experiences across the globe to help us imagine new futures." Bridget Anderson, University of Bristol
"Giving voice to stories of contemporary work the world over, this book projects a shared perspective that complicates easy paths from the present reality of work to its possible futures." Frederick Harry Pitts, University of Bristol
William Monteith is Lecturer in the School of Geography at Queen Mary University of London.
Dora-Olivia Vicol is Director of the Work Rights Centre, a charity dedicated to employment justice.
Philippa Williams is Reader in the School of Geography at Queen Mary University of London.
Introduction: Work Beyond the Wage ~ William Monteith, Dora-Olivia Vicol and Philippa Williams
Part One: RUPTURES
Chapter 1., "Shit Wages" and Side Hustles: Ordinary Working Lives in Nairobi, London and Berlin ~ Tatiana Thieme
Chapter 2., The Work of Looking for Work: Surviving Without a Wage in Austerity Britain ~ Sam Strong
Chapter 3., Seeking Attachment in the Fissured Workplace: External Workers in the United States ~ Claudia Strauss
Part Two: RESIGNATIONS
Chapter 4., Wilful Resignations: Women, Labour and Life in Urban India ~ Asiya Islam
Chapter 5., ‘Be Your Own Boss’: Entrepreneurial Dreams on the Urban Margins of South Africa ~ Hannah Dawson
Chapter 6., Work Outside the Hamster’s Cage: Precarity and the Pursuit of a Life Worth Living in Catalonia ~ Vinzenz Bäumer Escobar
Chapter 7., Choosing to be Unfree? The Aspirations and Constraints of Debt-bonded Brick Workers in Cambodia ~ Nithya Natarajan, Katherine Brickell, and Laurie Parsons
Part Three: STRUGGLES
Chapter 8., “Earning Money as the Wheels Turn Around”: Cycle-rickshaw Drivers and Wageless Work in Dhaka ~ Annemiek Prins
Chapter 9., Going Gojek, or Staying Ojek? Competing Visions of Work and Economy in Jakarta’s Motorbike Taxi Industry ~ Mechthild von Vacano
Chapter 10., "I Voted Bolsonaro for President": Street Vending and the Crisis of Labour Representation in Belo Horizonte, Brazil ~ Mara Nogueira
Part Four: POSSIBILITIES
Chapter 11., Extraordinary: Crisis, Charity and Care in London’s World without Work ~ Dora-Olivia Vicol
Chapter 12., Defending the Wage: Visions of Work and Distribution in Namibia ~ E. Fouksman
