Description
Book SynopsisThis book explores how power operates in workplace settings at local, national and transnational levels. It argues that how people are valued in and out of work is a political dynamic, which reflects and shapes how societies treat their citizens.
Offering vital resources for activists and students on labour rights, employment issues and trade unions, this book argues that the influence workers can exert is changing dramatically and future challenges for change can be positive and progressive.
This book is relevant to United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 8, Decent work and economic growth
Trade Review'This book is a wonderful example of a public sociology in the field of labour and industrial relations, harnessing the critical scholarship for the purpose of empowering the labour movement. It will be an ideal May 1st present for many scholars of labour and for your favourite union representatives. The courageous move of the book is seen in its vast scope – reviewing recent developments in work and employment studies (WES) and making them accessible both to advocates of labour as well as to students. While many scholars of labour and industrial relations seek to promote accessible knowledge for its impact in their field of study, the authors’ accomplishment is uniquely valuable in offering an elegant and concise content.'
British Journal of Industrial Relations
'The authors have provided an important contribution to the crucial debates of our time: what is happening to workers in our rapidly transforming world of work; and more importantly, what can be done to move it in the right direction so that we steer digital, climate and demographic transitions towards decent work for all.'
Guy Ryder, Director-General, International Labour Organization
'This new book on work and employment does what it says in the title and puts power, politics and influence at the heart of the analysis of changing employment relations. This is a welcome antidote to the often depoliticised actions of labour market change as the inevitable consequence of unstoppable forces of globalisation or new technologies. This is a book that should be read not only by students and academics but also by labour activists and trade union representatives as it has a two-fold ambition, first to develop a more politically-informed understanding of changing employment relations but second to offer insights into how to try to shape a better future for labour through new political strategies, new alliances and new forms of collectivism.'
Jill Rubery, Professor of Comparative Employment Systems, University of Manchester
'In today’s globalised world corporations have been able to reorganise work in ways that transfers risk away from capital and onto working people. The result is more inequality, more insecure work and persistently low wage growth. This book is a welcome and accessible contribution to understanding what’s happening and examines pathways for unions and collective action to swing the pendulum back towards working people.'
Sally McManus, Secretary of the Australian Council of Trade Unions
'Written explicitly for activists and those with a commitment to the labour movement, this valuable book provides a concise guide to the challenges facing trade unions and the strategies they can use to improve the experience of work. Power, Politics and Influence at Work is bang-up-to-date, well-informed, clearly written and provocative. It is an essential resource for all those seeking to build power for working people.'
Edmund Heery, Professor of Employment Relations, Cardiff University
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Table of Contents1 Work, power and politics
2 History, global capitalism and contexts
3 The State, law and equality
4 Who speaks for whom?
5 The futures of work: power, politics and influence
Bibliography
Index
