1 WORK: FROM CERTAINTY TO FLEXIBILITY Graham Dawson Presentation: Dr. Faisal Al-Qahtani

2 INTRODUCTION Focus: Exploring the new ways of ordering the lives of people at work:  In the past: certainty of job for life  Now: a secure job can’t be guaranteed Work has become more diverse and flexible: (part-time, short- term contracts). Reflecting the two political ideologies:  Social democracy dominant in 1950s & 1960s Credit: maintaining full employment until the crises of the 1970s.  Liberalism: 1980s Credit: flexibility of labor market.

3 Flexible Job: A source of a new avenue of opportunity, or A new source of uncertainty in the ordering of our lives. Advantages:  More money  Working the hours that suit the workers  Working overtime, weekends, part time Disadvantage  Loss of leisure time  Insecurity for some Flexibility produces both diversity and uncertainty.

4 A JOB FOR LIFE: FULL EMPLOYMENT AND SOCIAL DEMOCRACY Exploring the relationship between  the full employment and job security of the 50s and 60s  and the social democratic political ideology which shaped the economic and social policies of the time. JOHN KEYNES : ‘the demand management policy.’  For social democrats: Limited intervention of the State in the economy. Purpose:  eliminating poverty and unemployment  leaving the capitalist structure intact.

5 Keynesian Demand Management: Source of unemployment is the uncertainty:  the unpredictability of the capitalist system. Keynes’s argument  the economy could be trapped in a situation of aggregate demand deficiency: too low demand of goods and services lead to unemployment. Macroeconomics:  national economy as a circuit: a circular flow of income see fig 3.3. Wage cuts make the problem of unemployment worse:  Result: Less demand for goods and services Leads to less demand for labor, and vice versa.

6 Keynesian Demand Management: Solution: adjusting the capitalist system Demand management (policies that influence the aggregate demand):  raising government expenditure to increase ‘aggregate demand’ and hence employment. Thus, the unemployed people were the effect of the malfunctioning of the capitalist economy and not of a refusal to accept a lower wages.

7 Power in the Social Democratic state: Keynes’ transformation of theories of power Transformation of Weber’s theory:  a characteristic shift in power at the top new patterns of entitlement:  acknowledging people’s right to have work and welfare (those in the bottom). new responsibilities (imposing taxation):  imposing more responsibilities on capitalists (those on the top).

8 Power in the Social Democratic state: Keynes’ transformation of theories of power Transformation of Foucault’s theory  Power had changed places in some respects, but not in others.

9 Power in the Social Democratic state: Keynes’ transformation of theories of power The Marxist theory  social democracy is a necessary adjustment to the capital structure.  It decreased poverty  it eliminated mass unemployment But, it served the interest of capitalist class by establishing the conditions for continuing capital accumulation.

10 Power in the Social Democratic state: Keynes’ transformation of theories of power The social democratic capitalism of the golden age had difficulty in meeting certain challenges:  Two Challenges: growing diversity of society growing diversity of the workforce: need for competitiveness in industry.

11 FLEXIBLE WORK IN THE UK TODAY 1970s crises: collapse of the social democracy. In today’s economic world change is normal. Flexibility: is the ability of markets and the agents that operate within them to respond to changing economic conditions. Flexible working  is one response to the need to increase competitiveness and it raises questions, not only about efficiency and motivation, but also about power.

12 FLEXIBLE WORK IN THE UK TODAY Flexible labor market:  Flexible wages In a competitive market, prices tend to converge to the equilibrium price.  inefficient producers are driven out of business  efficient producers sell the same goods at a lower price.  a flexible market provides information to people seeking work.  some people prosper and others are excluded.  the result is growing inequalities between workers.

13 FLEXIBLE WORK IN THE UK TODAY Job securities  A high level of job insecurities is a feature of a flexible market. Flexible employment contracts:  according to changes in the demand for the goods or services that they produce: Firms can adjust the number of workers they have to pay, and the number of hours worked  To sum up the UK market has become more flexible, as measured in the terms of :  wage dispersion,  job insecurities,  flexible employment contracts,  and a reduction in gender inequality.

14 FLEXIBLE WORK IN THE UK TODAY Interpretation of labor market development: Flexibility represents shifts in power between people, and these shifts are understood very differently by the theories of Power :  Weberian account of power: flexible labor market can be seen as the creation of the state, exercising authority from above.  Foucauldian account of power: an anonymous force.  Marxist account: flexibility is about  weakening the power of the workforce,  and increasing the profits of capitalist by  reducing their dependence on workers  and promoting competition between workers.

15 LIBERALISM AND THE CASE FOR THE FLEXIBLE LABOR MARKET Three Issues  Liberal neutrality  Liberalism and the restructuring of the UK labor market  The Flexible Labor Market Power: Power And Ordering

16 Liberal neutrality The market is a ‘spontaneous social order’  (order without government intervention):  the reciprocal benefits can hold the society together and increase the stability of society. The core liberal concern:  the protection of the individual from coercion by social groups to which one belongs. The liberal theorists see similarity between  the neutral state and the free market.

17 Liberal neutrality Three features of liberal neutrality in the economic world:  Diversity of consumer wants  The individual autonomy: producers and consumers make their own decisions about buying and selling.  Government neutrality: absence of central authority

18 Liberalism and the restructuring of the UK labor market Friedrich Hayek: liberal or free market ideas. Hayek’s theory of how market works:  markets are a means of communicating information. markets are sources of knowledge disseminated through changes in prices. markets are away of dealing with the diversity of people’s skills and their needs as consumers. reducing the uncertainty through spreading information about markets. unemployment is the result of people request for increase in their wages.  Reducing workers wages can help solve the problem of unemployment.

19 The Flexible Labor Market Power: Power And Ordering Keynesian social democracy was challenged from two directions:  the increasing diversity of society  the perceived need for greater competitiveness in industry. Liberals: the increasing flexibility of the labor market is a direct result of free choices. In the flexible labor market individual workers can exercise power to succeed through self-regulation and self-marketing. Liberal market can lead to unequal ownership of economic resources which can then lead to the exercise of a top-down power over workers.