Social Polis Social Platform on Cities and Social Cohesion

Social PolisSocial Platform on Cities and Social Cohesion

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Working group for EF2:Urban labour marketsand economic development

Urban labour marketsand economic development

Can current labour market trends be usefully explored using the concept of social polarisation?

Frequently-used concept, central to many of the most influential sociological theories (Sassen, Bauman, Burawoy, Pahl, Harvey; Regulation Theory, Post-industrial Society etc.)

Strongly linked to social cohesion, as social polarisation threatens to exacerbate and render class divisions more visible, reduce social mobility, marginalise the weakest groups

Strongly but not exclusively linked to labour market processes


Social polarisation

Not a unitary phenomenon but a range of inter-connected

“mechanisms”

Structures and processes rather than outcomes

Theory-guided comparative empirical research – different factors in

different locations at different points in time

Attention on the Eastern and Southern peripheries of Europe

Domains: wages, conditions, occupational structure, opportunities

Polarisation within work vs. exclusion from the labour force


Economic development (1)

Advanced cities – global financial flows and producer services, research, elite education systems, “professionalisation”, developed welfare, high market value of scarce skills; but informal economy and poor jobs

Peripheral cities – limited growth of advanced services, weak professional expansion driven by state employment, decline of traditional middle classes, structural unemployment, underemployment and a mass of informalised, seasonal and low-paid jobs

-> different forms of polarisation (“global city” vs. “Neapolitan”)-> timing of economic transitions (late industrialisation, partial

development of welfare, uneven development of advanced services)


Economic development (2)

Evidence of polarisation from Eastern and Southern Europe, Latin America, South Africa and countries that have experienced severe economic crises (Tokyo, Mexico City, Buenos Aires) – link with peripheral European cities

Shift from “peripheral Fordism” (protectionism, developmental state, populism/clientelism) to “peripheral neoliberalism” (but global economic processes are insufficient to integrate those “left behind”)

Risk of urban concentration of poverty, informalisation, demodernisation in certain urban areas of Europe (Szalai, 2005)


Economic restructuring (1)

Strong continuity in theoretical accounts since the 1970s – “dualistic polarisation of the workforce” due to changing division of labour, technology etc.

Linked with debates about “post-industrial society”, labour market segmentation, flexible specialisation, competitive austerity from 1970s

Key notions: decline of industrial employment, insider/outsider labour market, polarisation in service sector employment, skill destruction and reconstruction


Economic restructuring (2)

Optimistic interpretation – originates with Daniel Bell (1974) – expansion of professional and managerial strata, appreciation of market value of skills, decline in inequality, opportunities for mobility, positive impact of new technology

Pessimistic view – Crompton and Jones (1984), Braverman (1974), Michon (1981) – “declining middle”, downward pressure on wages, proletarianised mass of low-paid and low-skilled workers

Service sector “proletariat” (Esping-Andersen, 1990), excluded “underclass” (Auletta, 1982) or continuity in class structure?

Attempts to integrate both views (Regulation School) → polarisation?


Employment conditions

Uneven trends towards expansion of casual work, outsourcing, small firms, segmentation, informal jobs with differential effects

Disembedding of skills and credentials from state regulation and collective agreements – undermining union capacity to defend conditions

Reduction of social mobility and strengthening of social closure due to credentialisation – inequalities, segregation, less universalistic welfare

Powerful effects on young people, immigrants, women – with a growing systemic impact – not stepping stones but a growing cleavage

→ Importance of studying the impact of economic recession


Deregulation/re-regulation

Competitive austerity (Albo, 1996) – export-oriented production, flexible labour markets, declining real wages, weakening of protective legislation, trade liberalisation, outsourcing, neoliberal education and labour market policies

→ Formation of a growing periphery of casualised and informal workers→ Degradation of employment – threat of delocalisation, heightened

economic competition, exploitation of cheap (often migrant) labour, organisational changes, state policy, obstacles to unionisation, dismantling of collective bargaining machinery

But note differences between European and American employment systems


Immigrants and the labour market

Increasing flows – supply and demand factors, transport costs etc.Consolidation of dualistic policies that relegate low-skilled migrants to

secondary labour markets and the informal economy (asymmetrical integration)

Vulnerability during periods of economic downturn – “bumping down”Segmentation – informalisation and poor jobs become structural features,

even in the context of relatively “tight” labour markets

→ Interaction between deregulated/informal labour markets and dualistic immigration policies, in the context of restructuring and economic crisis (segmentation, segregation, pressure on wages, criminalisation)


Economic “marginality” and social polarisation

Formation of a large, non-integrated and irrelevant mass of population – “human detritus wrought by economic deregulation and welfare retrenchment” (Wacquant, 2008)

Areas of concentrated, long-term unemployment, which previously hosted large numbers of unskilled industrial workers and often immigrants, have generated most intense forms of urban conflict (riots in UK and France)

Informal work – due to competitive pressures, growth of personal services, outsourcing, resistance to employment upgrading, uneven development


Conclusions Different configurations of mechanisms in different locations Urban hierarchy, “escalator cities”, role of skills, stretching upwards Stretching and bumping downwards “Modern” and “traditional” forms of casual and flexible employment Substantial continuities in theories as well as overall class structure Poverty that is more urban, more concentrated, more deeply-rooted Unequal structuring of access to employment and good jobs – gender,

race, legal status, credentials – who pays the highest costs? Importance of state in attenuating negative consequences of both

unemployment and insecure employment Interaction between deregulated/informal labour markets and dualistic

immigration policies

Social Polis Social Platform on Cities and Social Cohesion

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