The 2019 general election has already led to much soul-searching on the left. In particular, the loss of many seats in the, so-called, ‘red wall’ of historically safe seats in Wales, the Midlands and the North appears to demonstrate the social distance between the Party’s left-wing cosmopolitan London activists and its traditional working-class base. Why …
Continue reading “From despair to where? #McStrike shows us where Labour’s rebuilding must start”
Willy Brown sadly passed away on Thursday 1st August 2019. I was lucky enough to have gotten to know him over the past seven years. Although he wasn’t my supervisor the kindness and support he offered me, when there was no obligation for him to do so, will be familiar to many. I first met …
Continue reading “Remembering Willy Brown: a great researcher and teacher of labour relations”
After three years and nine months, I’m leaving the Oxford Internet Institute (OII) at the end of the month to take up a Lectureship in the Sociology Work at Birmingham University. I’ll be joining a highly regarded group of researchers in the ‘Organisation, Work and Employment Group’ at the Department of Management. I joined the OII …
Research by Alex J. Wood, Mark Graham and others shows how gig economy platforms commodify labour in Southeast Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa.
“In the U.K., one in five jobs is going to be automated… technology… has a contradictory element because on the one hand it makes you more precarious as a worker. On the other hand, it shows what you can be when liberated from work because you’ve got all this extra time. You can imagine different …
Continue reading “Post-work fallacies and the social reproduction of capitalism”
Workers are creating self-organized digital communities to support and help each other. Alex J. Wood and Mark Graham report the findings of their new study.
Social media, the power of reputational damage, and effective communications are powerful tools for trade union organising.
Millions of people across the planet use online labour platforms to make their living as part of the global gig or platform economy. One part of the iLabour project is to understand how worker voice and collective action shape institutions in this setting.
The fragmentation of work over the last decade has given birth to the on-demand economy. In this new world of work, we can no longer expect to work a standard nine to five week; instead, self-employed and traditionally employed workers alike scramble to make a living from online labour platforms and zero hour contracts, where …
Today the government released their response to the Taylor Review of Modern Working Practices. The government’s recognition that good quality work is important is very welcome. Unfortunately, much of the substance of the government’s response focuses on the need for further consultation and additional consideration. Six months after the publications of the Review’s recommendations, we …
