Jean Jenkins

Key concepts in work

The SAGE Key Concepts series provides students with accessible and authoritative knowledge of the essential topics in a variety of disciplines. Cross-referenced throughout, the format encourages critical evaluation through understanding. Written by experienced and respected academics, the books are indispensible study aids and guides to comprehension. Key Concepts in Work: Clearly and concisely explains the central ideas, debates and theories of work; Offers a broad overview of the social, political and economic contexts of work illustrated from diverse industrial societies; Begins each entry with a snapshot definition followed by key words and guidance for further reading; Inspires students to engage in further exploration of ideas and debates; Provides an essential reference guide for all students in sociology, business studies, management learning about work, employment, organizations and labour markets

Organizing 'Spaces of Hope': Union Formation by Indian Garment Workers

This article concerns union formation among female garment workers in Bangalore, in the southern state of Karnataka, India. It analyses a case where a category of workers dismissed by established national unions as impossible to organize came to form their own womens movement and thence their own union. The case highlights the crucial role of a sustained, flexible approach towards organizing at the micro level, in the mobilization of vulnerable workers employed in highly competitive labour markets.

Gambling partners? The risky outcomes of workplace partnerships:

This article analyses the motivations and dynamics of union—management partnership at two manufacturing plants located in the industrial region of South Wales in the UK. Each plant was a subsidiary of an international parent corporation: one in the aluminium sector and one in autocomponents manufacture. For meaningful partnership to be achieved, it is assumed that both union and management partners engage in reciprocal elements of risk in the hope — or gamble — that mutually beneficial outcomes will be forthcoming. But this article will argue that the causal association between partnership and substantive outcomes is contested. It suggests that analysis of partnership should focus on the context in which it is found, the motivations of key actors, and the nature of reciprocal risk for labour and management, in order to gain optimum insight into modern industrial relations and illuminate the political implications for the collective representation of labours interests in contemporary capitalist society.

Life after Burberry: shifting experiences of work and non-work life following redundancy

This article sheds new light on neglected areas of recent ‘work-life’ discussions. Drawing on a study of a largely female workforce made redundant by factory relocation, the majority subsequently finding alternative employment in a variety of work settings, the results illustrate aspects of both positive and negative spillover from work to non-work life. In addition, the findings add to the growing number of studies that highlight the conditions under which part-time working detracts from, rather than contributes to, successful work-life balance. The conclusion discusses the need for a more multi-dimensional approach to work-life issues.

Mobilizing resistance: the Burberry workers' campaign against factory closure

This paper draws on mobilization theory, frame analysis and community characteristics to explore a high-profile campaign by a largely female workforce against the closure of a clothing plant owned by the international fashion house, Burberry. It analyses the particular factors associated with their mobilization and examines the workforces propensity to act collectively, having exhibited little indication of a clear definition of its collective interests in the past. The paper highlights the central importance of perceived substantive and procedural injustice among the workforce, together with the ways in which geographic location and community characteristics reinforced their willingness to fight the closure decision. The paper concludes by considering the wider implications of this campaign for mobilization theory.

Mobilizing Protest: Insights from Two Factory Closures

This article draws on investigations of worker response to two factory closures to develop recent discussions around mobilization theory. With many shared characteristics between the factories, both located in the garment manufacturing sector, and with similar workforces and union organization, certain key distinguishing features between the two provide insights into why worker protest became effectively mobilized and sustained in one case but failed to materialize in the other. The findings point to the value of assigning greater weight in studies of worker mobilization to the impact of prior existing social structures within a population, and the interaction between that population, its leaders and wider society.

Ways of Life after Redundancy: Anatomy of a Community Following Factory Closure

This chapter examines the fate of redundant workers and their community in the industrial region of South Wales, U.K., where redundancy has been a ‘normal rather than exceptional feature’ of life since the middle of the last century (Harris and Fevre, 1987: 49). It analyses the experiences of workers made redundant by the international clothing company Burberry, as it closed its manufacturing plant in the Rhondda Valleys and moved its production to China. The chapter begins by considering redundancy in the context of contemporary capitalism. It then briefly examines the particular experience of the South Wales valleys, followed by an evaluation of the impact of job loss on the lives of the individual employees, their families and their community. In terms of the themes being explored in this volume, we discuss the challenge that different groups face in achieving a satisfactory integration of their work and non-work lives in a context of redundancy, poor job prospects and low pay.

In debt to the time-bank: the manipulation of working time in Indian garment factories and 'working dead horse'

In this article we focus on the creation of debt relations between workers and their workplace as a tool of managerial control in the garment factories of Bangalore, India. The currency of indebtedness in this case is working time and our focus is the manipulation of hours of work at the base of the international, buyer-driven, garment supply chain. In illuminating debt relations and worker dependency as an element of managers’ repertoire of control, we compare a system known as ‘comp-off’ in contemporary Indian factories with the historical precedent of a system known as ‘working dead horse’ in Britain. Our comparison illuminates how value is extracted from workers and how old control systems are updated within the labour process, in a feminized sector where workers’ associational power is weak and social downgrading is one means by which employers can offload risk, maximize flexibility and secure their position at the local level.

Captive in Cycles of Invisibility? Prisoners’ Work for the Private Sector

This article critiques a case of modern prison-labour by exploring prisoners’ attitudes towards the prison-work they undertake while incarcerated. The study is based at a privatised male prison in the UK, assigned the pseudonym ‘Bridgeville’. Bridgeville contracts with private-sector firms in providing market-focused prison-work – so-called real work – for inmates in some of its workshops. In exploring prisoners’ perceptions of this privatised prison-work, it is found that it mainly comprises mundane, low-skilled activities typical of informalised, poor-quality jobs that are socially, legally and economically devalued and categorised as forms of ‘invisible work’. At Bridgeville, such privatised prison-work largely fails in engaging or upskilling inmates, leaving them pessimistic about its value as preparation for employment post-release. Its rehabilitative credentials are therefore questioned. The article contributes to the debate around invisible work more generally by problematising this example of excluded work and the cycle of disadvantage that underpins it.