ILPC 2027

 In the early 1970s, as part of the so-called ‘revolt against work’ (Ross, 2008), workers in highly-developed countries demanded more autonomy and flexibility in their employment. More precisely, this meant a revolt against factory-centred Fordism workplace and its organizational cage. Since then the number of those in atypical employment has been growing as more people started to be self-employed, work part-time or have short-term contracts. These forms of work have also been argued by some to be more beneficial for individuals: self-employment gives freedom to those who want to be their own bosses, flexible hours may suit some peoples’ lifestyle, and short-term contract allow mobility between jobs and can provide workers with variety of experiences.

This came alongside a shift in employers’ strategies and the move towards the ‘core-periphery’ model (Atkinson, 1984).  As part of an attempt to lower the cost of labour, many firms no longer rely solely on their core, permanent, full-time staff. Depending on the country or sector, different volumes of work are shifted instead to the peripheral, contingent workers.   These workers often don’t have the same rights as the permanent staff, their career opportunities are often limited, and their position is likely to be insecure. They may have more freedom as they are not tightly bound to their employers; this freedom however comes at a cost.

Data presented in this paper was collected as part of a recently conducted ‘Working Conditions in Ireland’ Project, which was a qualitative study of changing patterns of work and employment before, during, and after the recession. It focused on four sectors of the Irish economy: hospitality, construction, ICT and finance. At the core of the project were interviews with employees working in these four sectors, as well as trade union representatives.

Findings from this study suggest that, especially during the economic downturn, workers are increasingly forced to be flexible. There is strong evidence that atypical working arrangements were often individuals’ choice during the Celtic Tiger era of the early 2000s; after the crash, however, many were pushed into such work. In construction self-employment becomes compulsory as employers push workers out of direct employment in order to cut their costs. This results in bogus self-employment, where individuals only work for one contractor and do not have any employees by themselves. In hospitality employees are effectively on-call and have no control over their shifts or hours. As number of weekly hours varies, their income is also unpredictable. In ICT and finance most employees still have ‘good’ jobs, but younger workers are forced to take on short-term contracts.  Contrary to their older colleagues, their labour market mobility is not career-oriented, but rather constitutes a survival strategy. This ‘enforced flexibility’ was a common theme that emerged from the study. As Ireland is now going through the period of economic recovery, the study suggests that this shift may be a part of a long-term trend rather just a feature of the crisis.