Gender and the Contours of Precarious Employment

by Vosko; Leah

• ISBN13: 9780415494540
• ISBN10: 0415494540
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 2009-08-25
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Precarious employment presents a monumental challenge to the social, economic, and political stability of labour markets in industrialized societies and there is widespread consensus that its growth is contributing to a series of common social inequalities, especially along the lines of gender and citizenship. The editors argue that these inequalities are evident at the national level across industrialized countries, as well as at the regional level within federal societies, such as Canada, Germany, the United States, and Australia and in the European Union. This book brings together contributions addressing this issue which include case studies exploring the size, nature, and dynamics of precarious employment in different industrialized countries and chapters examining conceptual and methodological challenges in the study of precarious employment in comparative perspective. The collection aims to yield new ways of understanding, conceptualizing, measuring, and responding, via public policy and other means '¬ ; such as new forms of union organization and community organizing at multiple scales '¬ ; to the forces driving labour market insecurity.

Author Biography

Leah F. Vosko is Canada Research Chair in Feminist Political Economy at the School of School of Social Sciences (Political Science), York University, Toronto, Canada. Martha MacDonald is Professor in the Economics department at Saint Mary's University. Nova Scotia, Canada. Iain Campbell is a Senior Research Fellow at RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia.

Table of Contents

List of figures	p. vii
List of tables	p. viii
Notes on contributors	p. x
Acknowledgements	p. xiii
Introduction: Gender and the concept of precarious employment	p. 1
Canada: Gendered precariousness and social reproduction	p. 26
The United States: Different sources of precariousness in a mosaic Of employment arrangements	p. 43
Australia: Casual employment, part-time employment and the resilience of the male-breadwinner model	p. 60
Japan: The reproductive bargain and the making of precarious employment	p. 76
Ireland: Precarious employment in the context of the European Employment Strategy	p. 92
The United Kingdom: From flexible employment to vulnerable workers	p. 108
The Netherlands: Precarious employment in a context of flexicurity	p. 127
France: Precariousness, gender and the challenges for labour market policy	p. 143
Spain: Continuity and change in precarious employment	p. 159
Germany: Precarious employment and the rise of mini-jobs	p. 177
Sweden: Precarious work and precarious unemployment	p. 194
Spatial dimensions of gendered precariousness: Challenges for comparative analysis	p. 211
Investigating longitudinal dimensions of precarious employment: Conceptual and practical issues	p. 226
Precarious lives in the new economy: Comparative intersectional analysis	p. 240
Precarious employment in the health-care sector	p. 256
Index	p. 271
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